"HugYourPug" wrote in message
...
What are the relative merits of each. I have been looking at some boats
and the
inboards seem to offer a lot more boat for the money, but a lot of people
buy
outboards, so there must be some merit there. Fishing, cruising and skiing
are
the objective.

You only mention "inboard" and "outboard" but not "inboard/outboard'
You may already know the following, but I was confused on it when
I first started with boats...:

INBOARD - The engine is in / built into the boat and a
shaft goes through a stuffing box through the hull and
a prop is turned under the boat on the end of this shaft.

OUTBOARD: A single piece that has the engine and
prop all in one unit. This unit is mounted on the transom
of the boat.

INBOARD/OUTBOARD: The engine is mounted
in the boat simmilar to the "true" inboard. But instead
of a shaft going through the hull to run the prop under
the boat, the engine is coupled to an "outdrive" that
comes out of the transome of the boat. This outdrive
looks much like the prop housing on an outboard engine.