It all depends on how you plan to fish. If you're a jigging/casting from the front deck kind of guy, I'd put it up front. If you like to troll and do most of your work from the back of the boat (that's me) I'd put it in back. I can read my structure scan at the console along with my gps maps easily from the back of the boat, and I just have a cheaper bird at the front hooked up to my TM, just to see depth and fish at the front.