I feel your pain Trueblue, I researched for days too trying to figure out just what the deal is with Edge, Gryphon, 'Tunes', and programming. I think by now I've got it nailed down, but I'm sure a mod will put me in my place if I'm wrong.
The Edge company makes Edge programmers... for the purposes of this discussion they make the Evolution, the CS, and the CTS. The Evolution has a black and white screen, the CS is color, and the CTS is a color touchscreen. I believe they all function similarly, so one isn't better than the other in terms of performance.
Power Hungry Performance, or PHP, modifies Edge progammers in house and converts them to Gryphons. In the process, the local tuning wizard Bill makes tunes that are far more effective and specific when the conversion is done, meaning that Gryphons give better performance than stock Edge programmers. You can purchase a Gryphon directly from PHP or you can purchase and Edge from somewhere else and send it to PHP for conversion for a fee.
Custom tunes are seperate and are made for YOUR truck by Bill individually... he actually looks at your truck's specs and mods and builds a tune for YOU. You then load these tunes into your truck by using the Gryphon programmer and the tunes will replace some canned tunes on your Gryphon. Custom tunes cannot be loaded by the Edge... it must be converted first. If you have this done when you purchase a Gryphon from PHP it costs you $30 per tune. If you have this done any other time it costs $60 per tune. This means buying an Edge from somewhere else and wanting custom tunes will require you to send it in and have it converted, which costs money, and having any custom tunes done would be $60 a tune. Additionally, adding tunes at a later time, even if you bought your Gryphon from PHP, will cost $60 each.
Hopefully all that is right and makes sense.
