One reason why people continue to use $30 beacons is marketing. The companies selling it for that much are clearly explaining what their tech is, and assures us that it works with iPhones.

For a lot of us (myself included), this is new stuff. Unlike you, we wouldn't have a clue what part to search for, nor could we be sure that whatever we do get is guaranteed to work. I've looked around, and this article is the first I found that clearly connected iBeacon to BTLE.

Even with that, I still have no idea what exactly I'd be looking for in a cheap iBeacon hotspot - would it be a BTLE chipset attached to an ARM? Do I need to install an OS? Should I look for something with an SD card?

Those aren't stupid questions - they're the questions anyone would ask if they're not sure where to start. So those $30 beacons start looking like a pretty good value now.

So you've been working on this for 8 months? Quit holding out on us and write something up! :) If the comments here are any indication, there's a need.