[yardie]

We had an iPad 2 onboard our boat for almost 2 years. I'd get a waterproof case like a Lifeproof. Sea spray can be especially harsh on electronics.

It was one of the best purchases we made. We use Navionics, not only were the charts cheaper for the iPad than our chartplotter. We could also connect to the boats AIS, charging equipment, navigation, and satellite phone. Easily saved us hundreds of dollars on charts. Each component had an optional screen addition (ie. small screen for the AIS) that easily was the cost of an iPad.

For our next boat we're going to drop chartplotters completely and do all our navigation and planning directly on the iPad. Just one 10" chartplotter could buy 4-5 10" iPads.