Thread: Remote communication

Originally Posted by Frodo

Hi,

I'm looking at ways of accessing the internet and sending photos and written articles via email from the middle of nowhere.

I've looked at Satellite phones and BGAN Satellite devices. I could probably swing the price for a unit, but the associated service plans (especially if you want to send photo's) are super pricey. We're talking around $5 USD per Megabyte of data.

Is it simply a matter of "you've gotta pay to play" or are there cheaper ways of achieving what I'm trying to do?

Cheers,
AJ

Yep you gota pay to play unfortunately, all plans have fish hooks to be aware of. An example is FleetOne unit. There is no free lunch and not enough ubscribers to bring costs down to "mobile phone prices"
Most people / companies choose the cheapest plan which is (iirc )about $300us a month and includes 200MB data + 30mins calls
Now if you go over your data cap then it is $25USD per Meg................................ouch
another thing to be aware of is Windows 10 etc is always looking for or downloading updates behind the scene so it is very easy to go "over" your data cap significantley as most devices these days are geared towards unlimited data plans.
Iridium is cheapest, actually if you activate your iridium thru Pivitel in Australia and have free calling to Australia you can generally call the satphone from NZ for free due to the way the hanset is activated..
Iridium also has slowest data rate of about 9600 baud (old dial up speeds) and prone to dropping the connection at times