I've made a command decision and I will be getting the 2204A. My reasoning is price/performance.
I actually just got off the phone with the regional sales manager here in the US (a nice gent named Frank Paz) in Chino, CA. I had a couple of questions for him which he answered satisfactorily to me.
1. Where is it serviced if there is a problem?
It's actually serviced here in the States. They have a repair facility in Chino, CA to handle service.
2. If it needs recal where does it have to go?
Again, their US service facility will handle the recal. Negative for them is the recommended annual recal vs Agilents 2 or 3 year cycle but whatever. It's done here in the US and has a 2 week turnaround.
3. CAN decode.
As I mentioned earlier its in their next firmware update I believe. Either way its coming and it's not an addon. I actually use this so it's kind of important if I have a LA that it can do CAN.
4. Fine vertical (or lack thereof)
This is on their firmware roadmap with no scheduled release date. Frank mentioned he had just heard back from the factory from my earlier query about this. Instek has a decent rep here in the US so I don't think he's blowing smoke up my ass. Then again there's no release date scheduled so it could be tomorrow or 2 years from now. Not a deal breaker though.
From tequipment.net I can get this for $1765 and add in the LA a little later after I mess with the scope. That's $100 less than the best price listed for then 2000x used on eBay, and when you add in all the upgrades for the Agilent to bring it to par with the Instek it's a significant amount (memory upgrade, segmented memory, decodes, etc).
Stay tuned.
Greg