for years; I've been a garmin fan -- I've liked their UI and generally; I've
been really pleased with their products. I sitll have a working 12xl...

2 years ago I bought, what I thought was, a nice system (Garmin 498 sounder) --
however, I soon found out it was discontinued.

I began to have problems with it. So I hauled and replaced the tranducer as
that's what their tech support said it was... Same issues remained.

I have been told "no more software updates for it" -- but they'll take $175 from
me to "look at it and fix it if they can"

I thought I'd update to a non-discontinued model so I can get software updates
as they come out -- however, I need to use an external antenna.
I wanted their G2 Vision cards --- but the jump from 498 cost to a 4xxxx series
is 3x the cost ($2000 for a cheap 4xxxx series) . Apparently that's the
cheapest unit that uses an external atenna according to their tech support; the
rest are internal antennas.

Is it time to move on to something different? I've been responsible for close
to $10,000 in garmin purchases and feel like they've always been helpful; but
now that it's just little old me, "thanks for your money send us more" is their
attitude....
They won't say if the issues I'm having are 'fixable' -- so Im stuck with
sending my unit for a month or more + 175 or putting that 175 towards towards a
new (non-garmin) unit.

Anyone have any helpful thoughts?

Thanks
-josh