Do phones actually have a GPS chip in them? In most cases, the answer is -no-. They uses AGPS, in which the cellular towers are used to triangulate your position from the phone's signal, rather than being derived at the phone using satellites. So they can -theoretically- be used to locate your phone even if there's not enough signal for a connection. Whether they do or not - maybe someone here has experience with the tower equipment and can answer that question.

Now I'm not sure if SAR has access to radio direction finders in the cellular frequencies, but that would be a portable way of locating your signal. Those boxes can detect really weak signals - way below the strength required for reliable data transfer. Two readings can pinpoint your phone.

Back to SPOT - Things I want to see in SPOT II:
  • Increase the transmit power (overdrive) when you press 911 so the signal gets through dense canopy. (really need)
  • An external antenna jack so I can keep the unit in the pack and just mount the antenna to the top of the pack. (nice to have)
  • As long as it's going to run a GPS, how about a display of coordinates? (nice to have)
  • How about some indication that the call went through? There's a two-way satellite modem in there, so it shouldn't be that difficult to add a "Hey, I'm connected and your message went through" indicator. (really need)
  • Since we're on that line of thought, why not let it receive messages too, like "Come home now"? (nice to have)
  • How about sending custom messages, such as "will be a day late". I won't pay $50 extra for tracking, but I'd pay that much for two-way peace of mind. Heck, do it like OnStar - charge per message. (also nice to have)
  • Widgets for Facebook, Twitter, and the other social networking sites. (nice to have)


If something like that doesn't show up, I'm still recommending a PLB. Since SPOT (in it's current version) still only works some of the time, that translates into some-of-the-time-peace-of-mind, which is no peace of mind.

Then again, I wonder if having a device like this would negate one of the reasons I hike - to get away from the tether.