i have an analog hb ice-55 still and it was the best i could find at that time (about 8 years ago) with seemingly plenty of controls to tweak it. after using it i found there were things i didn't care for such as the brightness of the lights!. i had to point it downwards and they would cause an ocular migraine. so a dimmer control was needed. then the stupid vibration noises it made would drive you crazy trying to figure out how to make it stop. changing it's angle on the stand would help for a short amount of time. maybe if a casual user owned it it might not bother them as much, but i fish long days and plenty of them. i go around 2pm and come home when the bite is done and at times that is midnight. so i use my gear heavily.
i set up a vex for an older friend (75 yoa who doesn't know how to use a sonar) many times for him. i think he has a grip on it now tho. he still uses a bobber and hand pulls his fish. old school 100%!
anyway, i knew i wanted some thing better because of those major faults. then it quit one day. i called hb and they now want 170$ to fix the what ever is wrong with it she said. being a 530$ item, i didn't want to call it quits and spent with them. it also always had a weird problem with the center display and would black out and come right back on and the power/depth switch was acting up. sent it in twice for the switch issue and they refused to replace it. so now i know they are awful at repairs and customer service and way too expensive on top of it all.
looking for some thing better like you, i knew i didn't want to keep wasting money on some thing i might not like and out grow too fast and i didn't want another analog system that is much too limited in many ways i started looking at other brands and for a good reason and looking for digital units. it brought me to marcum digital units. all the others were either hb or lowrance and i read how lowrance quits supporting it's equipment soon after buying. that left only marcum to choose from.
a buddy of mine had been using the digital showdown since aqua-vu made it and i found a great deal on it for him. it was only 225$ new. i liked how it worked and wanted some thing like it but in color. that's where the lx7 fits in. then it has many other perks besides those i knew i wanted such as having up to 4 display charts at any one time and a choice of 6 to pick from. i had tried a camera but it was black and white and so the lx7 gave me the opportunity to try it and if i liked it i could add the camera later. i added the camera last season.
they do offer a software upgrade for free that you do at home, when the make them to change it so you shouldn't out grow it. that was my next concern like the showdown can do, but they charge you to do it for the showdown.
another major deal for me was how to fish using them. the marcum units want the transducer just barely in the water to remove the air under it is all it needs. this means landing fish is much easier with no long lengths of cable hanging under the ice like i had to do with my hb unit.
so to answer your questions, i would go with the lx6 before going with a fixed screen analog system with very limited control.
cold weather doesn't affect it at all.
the screen is like a flat tv so it does reflect light or glare.
wearing sun glass's with the snow shield does make it worse to see, so take the snow shield off. it acts like it is polarized and two things polarized makes it harder to see.
it is silent and the brightness is adjustable.
the lx9 has a s-video jack if you have a wheel house and want to put the camera on your tv or a recording from the built-in dvr.
the camera on it can be full display or half and half or overlayed. you can hook it up to your home tv to share scenes then too.
you can use the lx6/7/9 all year in a boat and they offer a high speed transducer.
it offers conventional dial display like what your used to. a choice of 4 color pallets, one is gray scale and one is 6 color and the others are to match the other brands 3 color display.
i like using half screen as a graph and the other half with normal vertical display and zoomed vertical display and the camera (when in use) overlayed or like a living wall paper. otherwise i i use a black back ground instead of the blue it set up to use from the factory.
i am hoping other brands get into making digital ice sonars (hb is not an option being they screwed me over pretty good) like marcum's or better to give consumers more buying options. some are selling open water units in a bag with an ice transducer and calling it an ice fishing sonar. marcum is an ice fishing sonar that offers an open water transducer.
the only negative is there is a missing 2.5 of water where you can not see your jig from directly under the transducer. this is supposed to be resolved by their newest software released this month, but they are still saying it's missing. so if your on a foot of ice or more and the transducer in in the water an inch, your missing 1.5' and as the ice gets thicker, your missing even less. in all practicality, your not missing much if fish are swimming past your ice hole as they won't be there long when they are on the move like crappie do. my hb's shallow usage is bad too being it is full of clutter for 2 feet and you have to hang the transducer below the ice plate unless you like a swim noodle in your way of fishing and even then it still down nearly 1 foot and your loosing 2 feet from clutter on the screen so it's actually worse than the lx6/7/9! so the hb didn't help see shallow water fish either.
next year might be different as far as offerings go tho.
jet has 15% off first 3 orders and free ship and no tax for most areas.
109.50$ off a lx7.
94$ off a lx6
https://jet.com/search?term=marcumplankton fishing with a big crappie after my 5mm mikes tiger glow blue jig
i added cob lighting to the bottom of the head unit for night fishing. the lighting here is only from that added light!
i fish the 3 hole method when staying put for a while and ducer goes in top hole.
saving the neck some grief with the sonar on a bucket
