I farm. I use some high end electronics with my tractor. I'm talking $30,000+ per tractor with all activations and hardware. I also use another system that has a $250 interface and a $1000 service fee per yr and connects to an iPad through Bluetooth. Granted it doesn't do as much as the $30k system, it still makes me wonder why I get charged a [censored] ton of money for a display that has an expected life of 5 yrs when they could use another device such as a tablet for the display.

why don't the marine elect mfg use a black box interface with bluetooth connection to an iPad or other device To be used as a display? They could focus on the parts other than the display and make it much more effective. Even if they made their own display that was just a display i think it would make more sense than putting everything in one box that could break or be stolen.

And the answer is: $$$$$$$

That' also why this years unit is old next year and next years is old the year after that.

Insane profit and planned obsolescence ARE the prime motivators. No supplier is willing to burst the bubble on this lucrative gig, so the business model persists.

I will admit that a lot of the $ is actually in the display itself. Withstanding the exposed environmental factors on a boat is a much more involved undertaking that in the cab of your tractor. The screens must be driven very hard to make them as viewable as they are in bright sunlight. That power level along with the heat used to burn out the available screens in short order. A good marine-rated display costs a LOT more than the screen on a consumer computer product such as you mention.

There are several drawbacks that come up when separating the brains from the display itself. Some boats don't have a good place to put that "black box" and some locations could get rather hot due to no airflow. That would create unknowns that cause customer issues, and that's hard to diagnose and fix. Display technology has changed a lot also. With a split system, the supplier would have to test all the supported combinations of box & display to insure it all worked. They would have to do this repeatedly for a growing list with each product release. That stretches the design/test cycle. Additional interconnects increase cost (waterproof connectors & high performance cables) and reduce reliability. There's more, but that's enough for now, lol.