I skipped the Spot 2 version for just that reason, lower battery life and seemed less reliable than the Spot 1.

I did upgrade to a Spot 3 last year. When Placed flat with a clear view of the sky as recommended. I rarely had any issues with it. Flopping around vertically in the pouch on my parachute the tracking is be less reliable but acceptable.

I have research Spot saves and failures. I have only found a couple instances where Spot 911 feature didn't work as well as expected and it wasn't hardware performance that caused the issues. Here are a couple examples.

1. 911 pushed in Mexico after an Auto Accident. There was no clear authority to notify in the area, or if they were notified they didn't do anything about it.

2. 911 Pushed after boat ran into a reef in the ocean. While a single 911 signal was received, the GPS location was not. The Spot failed to send any more data after the single 911 signal, likely because it was in the water. SPOT notified the contacts but could not tell them where the boat was located. Was 12 hours later before someone thought to see if tracking has been enabled and checking it. It was and they actually had the boats location within 10 minutes prior to the accident. There were no survivors.

3. Piper Super Cub crashed on landing, Spot was launched through the windshield into tall grass. Took the pilot over an hour to find it. Once found it worked just fine.

There are many examples where Spot 911 feature worked great. I agree reasonably reliable tracking should be expected, but to expect it the spot needs to mounted/positioned as recommended. Increasing annual fees of the Spot do have me looking at alternatives with more features but I haven't found other options to be very feasible with out significantly more cost due to the amount I use my Spot. But I keep looking for better options.

Brian