Our boat came with two units, one in the hanging locker across from the forward head and the other one in the cabinet at the head of the starboard bed. Both are Ocean Breeze units and I would never buy another one. They are the noisiest units I have ever dealt with. The compressors are extremely noisy and vibrate like crazy, everything around them vibrates. Also, there is only one fan speed, Hurricane force. Another issue, which probably doesn't apply in a new install, is that the fan outlet is fixed at either top, left or right. Most units I have dealt with, the fan cage can be rotated into just about any position, again, not a problem for a new install. They do have one advantage in that they are very compact, all the start/run capacitors and relays are in a separate box connected with a fairly long cable.
If you need heat I would definitely go with reverse cycle. One of the current units and a unit on a previous boat used electric heat and when the heat comes there better not be any other load.
The aft unit blew directly at the head of the person sleeping there, totally unacceptable. I had hoped to rotate the fan cage to blow up instead of to the right and duct the airflow up and then out at ceiling level. Unfortunately the cage cannot be re-positioned so I ended up moving the unit into the aft hanging locker. I called customer support to ask about the possibility of rotating the fan cage and was told it was possible but "it involves a lot of screws". Not being afraid of screws, I removed the unit and took it home to work on it on my workbench, that's when I discovered the cage could not be turned. Looking at the pictures on their web site, it is obvious that top, left and right discharges have totally different fan cages.
Hope this helps some and good luck with your install.
Bob
