New Sat Phone

[fair-chase]

Comming soon...Your smart phone will have satelite capabilities. So no more renting sat phones for wilderness excursions. Sounds like AT&T has the rights to the first one. I am sure others will follow. Oh yeah, when you are out of cell range you still have to pay the same rate as normal sat phones wich is big money. But I think this will eventually combine your GPS, phone, and computer all into one unit.


http://blog.tmcnet.com/blog/rich-tehrani/satellite/terrestar-networks-demos-satellite-smartphone.html

[fair-chase]

Here's another link.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1035_3-20017106-94.html

[Sumpnneedskillin]

That's gonna be an expensive bill for the guy/gal who isn't paying attention and gets charged sat phone rates for what they thought was a cell call/text/download.

[WDFW-SUX]

Ive had my eyes on this for a while now..im just going to wait a bit till the kinks are worked out then ill be in line.

[fair-chase]

That's gonna be an expensive bill for the guy/gal who isn't paying attention and gets charged sat phone rates for what they thought was a cell call/text/download.

They are claiming that it will drop the call when loosing coverage and then you have the chioce of returning the call by using the sattelite. So that you will always be aware of how much sat time you are burning up. That's what they claim. However, that's like taking a politician at their word. I am sure there will be some hidden fees in there somewhere and I am not sure how Internet (gps and mapping) usage would be charged.

Take it for what it is worth. I think I will hold off buying that new Garmin for a couple of years till this develops further.

[Sumpnneedskillin]

One of the links said 65 cents a minute for voice, 40 cents a text and $5 for a meg of data.

That will probably be a setting you have to change.  Knowing the way cell companies operate the default will be autotransfer.

[Mossy]

One of the links said 65 cents a minute for voice, 40 cents a text and $5 for a meg of data.

That will probably be a setting you have to change.  Knowing the way cell companies operate the default will be autotransfer.

No kidding!  But 65 cents a minute is priceless to get you out of the crap.  I'm sure companies are banking on phone settings though.  Good point.

[whacker1]

This will be great if they work out the kinks.

[fair-chase]

I think 65 cents a minute is great...Remember when sat phones were 10+ dollars a minute and they added 5 lbs to your pack?


I am sceptical of the data rates. Mostly because I am not tech savvy enough to understand how much it would take to rack up a meg of data. I would also like to see how the mapping apps like tomtom or alltrails work on this one. But even though I am sceptical of this, I think it is a step in the right direction. If you could package your GPS and sat phone into one unit it would be very convenient for extended stay trips.