We were struck by lightning and lost absolutely everything electronic and a lot of electrics. So we have very recently had to do a lot of research and make a lot of choices.

As for NMEA2000 - absolutely everything is going that way, and most are already there. Even the new Raymarine and Simrad gear have given up on seatalk and simnet and are putting standard micro-c connectors on their gear. Seatalk and simnet are just NMEA2000 (seatalk is a bit bastardized), but they always used proprietary connectors which served to lock people into not mixing and matching gear.

So how does the hype of 2000 match up with reality? We ran a single network cable backbone bow to stern and dropped the connector cables from all instruments, sensors and receivers onto it wherever they were mounted. All power and data run on this single cable backbone - no individual connections to power sources, no rat's nest of tiny signal wires hooked to terminal strips, no multiplexers strewn about - very simple and clean. Oh yeah - absolutely no need to call in professional help or electronics or computer experts. A 6 year old could hook this stuff together.

We picked and chose individual pieces of equipment based on performance, personal preferences, the way they fit existing cutouts and spaces, etc. Our boat is now equipped with gear from 11 different manufacturers - gps, wind/weather, speed, depth, compass, autopilot computer, AP drive, AP control head, chartplotter, radar, inverter/charger (yes, silly but true), and multifunctional displays. The autopilot alone is cobbled together using gear from 4 different competing companies. The ability to use multifunctional displays (not chartplotter types - the simple 4.5" ones that resemble old instrument displays) to read every thing on the system is great. They can be setup to display any available data in any form or way you choose, and they can be personalized so that when I'm at the helm I see data the way I prefer and when Michele is on the helm she just pushes a button and they show her data in the way she prefers. And a black box that connects to the backbone with a USB cable as the output and is a gateway for getting all this data onto a computer. So not only does the computer charting have all the information, I can actually update firmware in the 2000 sensors from the computer, monitor the network, turn on and off PGN's for individual components, etc.

So, I hooked everything onto the backbone, flipped the switch and everything immediately worked perfectly. All displays saw all data sensors and receivers, as well as each other, and they all communicate and live happily together. Absolutely no conflict resolution or tweeking or individual setup required. Even the autopilot - it told me it wanted to set itself up and asked permission. I told it to go ahead and it gingerly moved the the rudder back and forth a bit, made some more aggressive movements, thought a bit and then came back and told me what type of drive I had, where the rudder stops were and what it thought the best settings were. It suggested that I take it out and let it do a bit of S-turning as a fine-tune, but also told me that it didn't think it was really necessary. Keep in mind that these are components from 4 different manufacturers making up this system!

If you want to future-proof your investment for a while, and give yourself options for upgrading older gear going forward, do yourself a favor and don't buy strictly NMEA0183 stuff now. For seatalk and simnet, there are inexpensive converter cables that have the proprietary connector on one end and a standard micro-c on the other end, so you don't have to worry about staying with one company just because you want to hook up to existing instruments. This is providing you are talking about the more modern seatalk (ng or II or something like that) and not the old, original seatalk, which didn't even communicate well on 0183.

As for autopilots and wind mode, the Simrad AP computer we have has a feature called "wind-nav" mode, where it uses waypoint and wind data to steer to VMG. It calculates laylines, based initially on tack angles you tell it are appropriate for your boat and later on tack angles it calculates from historic data, and calls the tacks when appropriate (you have to OK them - it doesn't just head away on you). The newest B&G pilot computers are the same ones with a different sticker on them, so they will have this function also.

And I was completely unaware of the existence of any of this stuff just a couple of months ago!

Mark