The Marine Electronics Hub
Vesper has cemented a reputation for high performance, well-thought-out, feature-rich products. So, when they tease that “The future is coming” as they have in their recent promotional material it’s worth paying attention. It turns out Vesper’s take on the future is about continuing their track record of innovative features while expanding their capabilities to VHF radios and boat monitoring.
T-Mobile has been busy building out their network and extending their coverage. For many boaters it may be the best compromise of coverage and cost-effectiveness. But, how do you know if their coverage is good enough where you plan to use it? T-Mobile hopes you will take them up on their offer and try 30gb of data and a hot-spot to find out.
A couple of weeks ago Visible announced they have removed the 5 megabits per second speed cap making their $40 unlimited plan even more interesting. In my entry on the change I promised I would order a line and see how it worked out. The SIM has arrived and testing is well underway and although it hasn’t been all sunshine and roses I’m going to try using Visible as my main cell carrier
Inmarsat’s Fleet One satellite connectivity solution for the leisure and fishing markets has surpassed the 5,000-installation landmark as the rate of service uptake continues to increase. Reflecting a growing demand from leisure boat owners for Fleet One’s flexible and reliable connectivity anywhere on the world’s oceans, the 5,000-boat milestone has been achieved just three years after the launch of the Global service plan…
Visible, a relatively new Verizon subsidiary, has been offering a $40 per month (taxes included) unlimited plan for about a year. While the plan’s pricing is great, its usefulness has been potentially limited by a 5mbps speed cap. Today Visible announced that they’re removing this speed cap while keeping the rest of the plan the same. Is this as good as it sounds?
Simrad Yachting – a leader in the design and manufacture of world-class marine navigation, autopilot, radar, communications and fishfinding systems – announced today the new Simrad RS40-B, the first VHF marine radio with AIS transmit and receive capability. Featuring a sleek design with wireless handset capability, removable fist microphone, Class D DSC functionality, built-in GPS and a Class B AIS Transceiver, the Simrad RS40-B takes VHF marine performance to another level…
Prior to being a boating geek… I was a professional geek. I have a lot of data on the NMEA 2000 network on Have Another Day but no way to access it all remotely. I’m getting ready to leave the boat for a few weeks so I really want to access all that data off the boat. After some digging for a way to make that off boat access possible, I found one with which I’m currently thrilled.
That’s Shakespeare Marine Electronics manager Bill Eastwood hamming it up with their just-announced inflatable VHF antennas at METS last November, and the grin is well deserved as the product had just won the DAME Award for the Safety category. In fact, I was the DAME judge who got to pull the cord to inflate the sample — worked like a charm — and I think we were all impressed with how rigid it became…
I’ve often heard wireless headsets referred to as marriage savers but before cruising full time I didn’t realize the accuracy of the nickname. Now after several years of regular use, I wouldn’t want to cruise without them. But there are multiple brands and types of headsets, and two we’ve used extensively each has its own strengths and weaknesses.
I believe that VHF radios from the big four MFD manufacturers are primarily offered so that boat builders and customers can put a single brand of electronics at the helm, and thus my normal advice is to consider VHF radios (and AIS transponders) from specialist manufacturers who may offer fuller-featured, better-performing equipment. Testing the new Raymarine Ray90 makes me reconsider that recommendation…
