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From: Ken Williams (no email)
Date: Sun Jul 01 2007 - 10:19:30 EDT
Greg:
I crossed the Atlantic with Skymate on board in 2004. My information is out
of date, but my assumption is that that they have gotten better, not worse,
over the past three years.
If you have the right attitude, it is fantastic. I'm building a new boat and
am installing Skymate again.
Skymate gives you low-cost email via satellite. You don't have much
bandwidth, and can't send (or, couldn't send) long emails with attachments.
It was really just a text message service. It works differently than other
systems, in that instead of having a dish which positions to find a
satellite, it sits and waits for a satellite to come to it. In other words,
it is not real-time. You type your email, and relax and check back later,
and your email will have been sent, or new email will have arrived. My
recollection is that it normally found a satellite about every four hours.
If the base unit is somewhere where you can see it, a light lights up when
transmission has occurred.
In addition to text messaging, you can request weather updates, and send out
information about your boat (such as gps position).
It's as simple as it gets, and worked great - depending on your attitude. If
you have an email you want sent "right now", it won't do that. It's a really
simple to use, really slow, but, reasonably priced, reliable and simple to
use way to get/receive email at sea.
-Ken Williams
Nordhavn68.com
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Hello, new member here. I searched the archives for info regarding
the SkyMate service, and found the last posting to be over two years
ago. Have there been many with good/bad experiences using the service?
I am disembarking from Mobile for the Falklands via Bermuda in
November 2008, and although I can use my ham license to run a Pactor,
the transmission from my low power radio might not be optimal.
Besides, having alternative comm methods is preferable.
-Greg, s/v Someday
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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