Need Help Please need some electronics, have a few questions

[Taco de Pescado]

I'll try to keep it short... I recently purchased a 24' Sea Ray. It has a thru hull transducer already installed into it and it looks like it had a fish finder before (there is a hummingbird fish finder mount that someone left behind). What I want to know is are all transducers the same? Specifically how they connect to the fish finder. Is there one generic type of plug they all use? And I guess most importantly what brand and model should I purchase? I would like the basics; water temp, sonar , gps and room for expansion would be nice. I really don't know too much about them as you can see. I would like to keep it below 700$ but you know how that goes...Maybe one of you guys has a good deal on something clean and used? Any opinions on refurb's? thanks guys in advance

[middleofnowhere]

Start out by going to AIRMAR MARINE PRODUCTS
Chances are your transducer is manufactured by Airmar. Most of the transducers have a different plug that will fit specific head units. If you buy a different brand than what was originally installed in the boat, you can often change the plug on your existing transducer cable to fit your new unit with some basic wiring and heat shrink tubing.
For $700 bucks, I would think you could get a nice combo unit (gps/fishfinder) with a transducer.
I use Lowrance HDS and am happy so far. I fished a buddies boat this weekend with a 4" Garmin and it was great too. You basically can't go wrong with any of the brands though. The skimmer transducers that most smaller units come with will work fine for most all applications.
Visit West Marine, Bass Pro, etc. to put your hands on some working displays.

[sickcat]

Depends on what you want to do. How serious are you about fishing?

You should look on the cable or xducer for the model number. That will allow you to try to cross reference it and see what you can hook up to it with/without an adapter.

More info on what you plan on doing with the boat would help narrow down specific choices.

[Luhr'd Away]

Are all transducers the same? No, no, and no!

[Taco de Pescado]

I want to start fishing the islands and then possibly San Diego offshore

[lynndeva]

I bought one of these from an ebay store for about 550.00, I had a choice of 2 different tranducers, for the price this works great! weve been using it for about 5 months now with no problems. It unhooks easily so we keep it in the cabin when not in use.. ..
Humminbird Matrix 97 Fishfinder - MATRIX97GPS

[Luhr'd Away]

The higher the KW, the better images you will get.

[Taco de Pescado]

bump!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[phingst]

Try a Garmin 440 S they are one sale at West Marine you still have to buy the transducer. I had the same problem trying to find a transducer to fit my fish finder