K Gonefishin

The ones I have are not the ones you want

I believe I have a few I could sell you. I'll check tonight.

Don't get all defensive about your Crestliner, they build a nice rig with great fit and finish. I know alot of walleye guys who have them. They are wet boats and ride terrible but they do build a good boat. But let's be real here, they aren't in the same league as the pacific northwest boats that guys are talking about here in this thread. Glass is superior on the great lakes, I know countless guys who have split hulls and have leaky hulls from too much pounding on Erie.

You can buy a hewscraft in Michigan and crestliner just came out with a model that is modeled after the Pacific Northwest boats, however the build quality wont be there. Shoot thru transducers don't typically work well or at all on tin boats FYI

Using that line of thinking why even buy a boat at all might as well head to a pier head and cast for them, guys catch plenty of fish that way. Seeing that op is considering going to Portland Oregon which if you are geographically challenged its the other side of the country I woud think he's pretty serious about buying a sweet rig. Why shouldn't he rig it right. I could walk or ride my bike to the grocery store but I would rather get in my big SUV with leather seats and touch screen GPS instead as well. Fisherman like to rig their boats with all the right goodies and even go overboard on rods reels electronics etc because it makes life better and simpler on the lake and if used properly those fancy tools do help you catch more fish. Btw, you need 15k in gear to catch fish

For lake ontario skip the down and side scan you don't need it and it won't even transmit to the depths Get an 50/200 tranducer and you are good to go. If you have the option to buy a unit without a ducer buy a Airmar P66 aftermarket it's of higher quality

I forgot to add info about networking, I have Lowrance units and they are networked. I have two tranducers 200 shoot thru and 50/200 skimmer also temp sensor, and a seperate 3000 puck and my HDS-8 has internal GPS so in case one goes down I am set to go. My HDS 8 unit feeds my LCX 38 which essentially acts as a slave unit to my HDS unit, however I do love the fact it has tons of built in maps to accompany the Navionics Platnium chip in the HDS. Networking is great because it's once source and allows you to share to multiple units. Lowrance now has wireless capabilities that will work with smartphones and tablets but IMO ipads have no business on a boat (i have one and it will never go with me) plus you can't see them with sunglasses on and they would require special cases to keep them safe they just aren't built for a fishing environment IMO etc. http://www.lowrance.com/en-US/Products/Wireless/ allows wireless control to tablets and smartphones

Go big on the electronics, 8 or 10 inch if you will be only running 1 unit, running a 5 inch unit in split screen mode is like looking at a screen for each sonar/GPS something smaller than the modern day smartphone it's riduculously small when ran like that. I would get two 7's if you don't want to spend the big bucks on HDS-8 or HDStouch 9/12. Two elite 7's would suite you well or HDS 7's I have two 8's and it's perfect. You will also need a probe.

Leadcore = dead steelies not much you can do. I usually try and target kings with leadcore, I'll run it early and late with a mag glow spoon right at first and last light, then I will kill it then switch to copper and go for big boys running it in colder water. If your running 8 color that bait will almost always be in the high riding steelie zone so your best to not run it unless you want to catch steelies.