Thanks fishboy, I appreciate the response and the offer, but I did call Harbour Chandler in Nanaimo and they are willing to replace my unit with an HDS-5 (I think that was the model) with the chip for VI for ~$400 plus the trade in of my old unit and cables. Seems like a good upgrade and a fair price. I'm gonna talk to them on Wednesday and get all the information. Are you in the area fequently? If this doesn't turn out to be such a great deal I'll PM you.
In case others are interested I'll post how it turns out.