Saturday, Feb 07, 2015 at 20:54
Bit of a clarification on the Globalstar network.
Users, of some years ago, were affected by the permanent failure of satellites in the Globalstar network. This caused major periods of service outages. The failure of the satellites was due to them not being radiation hardened sufficiently for passage through the "South Atlantic anomaly"
Once it was realised what was happening Globalstar launched their constellation of Gen 2 satellites. Since then the network is back up at capacity.
However, we do NOT recommend the Globalstar network for areas heading north of Townsville /
Broome etc. Think
Darwin, gulf country,
Cape York etc. Due to the configuration of the network, service availability reduces. Whilst calls are still possible it can become an exercise in frustration. For these areas we recommend other networks. Incidentally in the far north Iridium will also suffer from call drop out, availability etc. albeit to a much lesser extent.
In the less high latitudes Globalstar will give great coverage and by far, the best audio quality of any satellite service.
The SatSleeve uses very different technology than Iridium and Globalstar (which both use a constellation of moving satellites). Thuraya (SatSleeve) and Inmarsat use geostationary satellites - a fixed point in space. If you can see the bit of the sky where the satellite is located you can make and receive calls.
Hopefully that clears a few queries.
Kev
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