Which PLB?

On Wednesday, April 2, 2014 10:02:20 AM UTC-7, Soartech wrote:
PLBs do ONE THING extremely well, but they do not supersede SPOT/INREACH.



Good observation. It won't be long before someone sees the advantage of this and comes up with a device that does BOTH.

I'll wait for that one.

Perfect is the Enemy of Good.

These PLBs and tracking devices cost a few hundred bucks, a few launches, an aero retreive or two, a couple of nice dinners out. By all means do an evaluation of your own risks and needs and buy whatever is appropriate, and that might be both. But waiting around for a device that does everything is unlikely to help anybody.

And in this case a combo device may be worse than two separate devices.

Waiting until somebody sees any advantage? That is not the issue, you think every vendor in this space does not fully understand the competing technology and have done so for years. And it has not happened yet. So maybe run the thought experiment and ask why.

Maybe more likely each vendor is worried their devices (e.g. PLB/tracker purchased at Amazon, REI etc.) are more impulse buys/purchased by not so sophisticated consumers who really don't know what much about what they are buying and therefore trying to explain these issues and justify a more expensive device is a marketing challenge they may not want to get into. And once a vendor does a combo device they are publicizing weaknesses in their standard devices. And batteries are going to be an issue. A manufacturer has to meet demanding PLB battery/shelf life/operating time specs and also allow a user to run down the device while using it for tracking. So two separate battery packs? One primary for the PLB and one rechargeable for the tracker? How much larger than the standard device can this be... give that batteries are a significant part of many of these products volume.

The redundancy of having two separate devices, with two separate battery packs, that signal distress/provide tracking by two entirely different means is a huge selling point in my book, much preferable if you are doing more extreme things than having a single device. And I want a PLB strapped to my harness, the tracking and some of the advanced two-way messaging features of an InReach may work better if the device is mounted in front of you on the glider not your parachute harness.

Darryl

On 3/04/2014 02:09, son_of_flubber wrote:

PLBs do ONE THING extremely well, but they do not supersede SPOT/INREACH.

No. That's back to front. PLBs do one thing extremely well and
Spot/Inreach does NOT supersede them.

Spot/Inreach is an interesting toy. A PLB is the real thing.

GC

On Wednesday, April 2, 2014 9:28:28 PM UTC-4, GC wrote:

Spot/Inreach is an interesting toy. A PLB is the real thing.

It's silly to turn this into a PC vs. MAC type argument.

The tracking and 'I'm OK' capabilities of SPOT/INREACH have real value and that base is not covered by a PLB.

On 3/04/2014 13:39, son_of_flubber wrote:
On Wednesday, April 2, 2014 9:28:28 PM UTC-4, GC wrote:

Spot/Inreach is an interesting toy. A PLB is the real thing.

It's silly to turn this into a PC vs. MAC type argument.

The tracking and 'I'm OK' capabilities of SPOT/INREACH have real
value and that base is not covered by a PLB.


Sorry. I'm not one of the IT passionistas and that's not what I
intended. The point I wanted to make is that a PLB and its capabilities
are defined by international agreements and specifications and if you
buy something called a PLB you know exactly what you're getting and you
know it will meet it's specs with near 100% reliability.

A Spot or Inreach box will (possibly) attempt to do what you think the
the maker has claimed if you have interpreted his advertsing accurately
(rather than the way he hopes you will - this is the nub of the "Aegean"
case). If it can't/doesn't do it, that is your problem unless you have
a deep pocket.

I repeat, a PLB is the real thing, Spot/Inreach is (so far) an
interesting toy.

GC