Sat 100 Experience or Recommendations

[bgallinger]

Has anyone had experience with this satellite unit? It looks like a super idea but the reviews I've read are awful with respect to cost and support.

[GordMay]

You might get more response, on the Seiko SAT100 Guitar and Bass Tuner, on a musician’s forum, than here.

[bgallinger]

Ok,my error! It's SkyMate 100 that I'm wondering about. It's a satellite run weather/e-mail system available from www.cruisingsolutions.com

[Beausoleil]

I think this is what I saw at a demo it last year while in Marathon, FL. If it's the same system, then the following is my take on it. To be honest - I wasn't impressed. The following is all from memory - I could be mistaken or perhaps my concerns have been addressed in the interim.

It's basically a bundled system with totally proprietary software, and you're pulling information from their servers - so if they're having problems with their network, you're going to have problems.

It has a bunch of whiz-bang features, which when you peel away the external layers, which aren't just well thought out. For example, they have voice mail and fax capabilities, and text-to-speech and speech-to-text, but their software won't let you dial an international number - it's hard formated for North American Numbering (1-nnn-nnn-nnnn). And satellite coverage is only NA and the Caribbean.

Again, this is all from memory, and almost a year out of date - but I doubt there's been much improvement.

I'm a big believer in open formats and systems, and this thing reminds me of akin to the old pre-Internet Prodigy "For Dummies" that works only on their own little network.

That said (and sorry if I stepped on any toes), it probably addresses the needs of some cruisers. But don't expect anywhere close to world-wide availability.