I have a few questions. Since you're looking at a 2-D image, wont a wider beam just make it more difficult to put your jig in front of the fish in front view, not really knowing where your jig is adjacent to the fish left to right?
Also, there is a good bit of computing that goes on in those black boxes and some heat generated. They're created like a small amplifier to dissipate heat. The first Gen Scopes didnt need a black box and we all saw just how behind and lacking it was compared to the LVS32 setup.
Bird has incredible mega side and down scan and Im not ruling them out, because there is no way I would sub my Mega unit for a Garmin at my helm. If they have figured out a way to get better image quality, let alone Mega quality and do it without a black box, we all need to be buying JOUT equity right now.