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Satellite phone on Antarctica trip?
in Antarctica
Although I realize the Antarctica trip is supposed to be an opportunity to be "out of pocket", I am writing to ask if any previous traveler on that trip has brought along a satellite phone. If so, how did that work out, what was the quality of the calls and what other comments would you share? Thank you.
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Does your phone operate on WiFi? If so, I don’t think a satellite phone would be necessary.
Y0dal...I took this tour in 2012. I connected to the ship's Wifi and used my iPad to make calls thru Skype. The quality was fine. I would imagine it would be much better almost a decade later.
We have poor cell phone coverage in our house due to our location next to a large hill. So my T-Mobile phone is connected to my home WiFi network, and it works fine. My AT&T phone also worked fine on WiFi. I have used the WiFi option on ships as well.
Voice and text have minimal impact on Wifi capacity and speed, however video calls and uploading photos have a HUGE impact.
All,
We used AT&T WiFi calling throughout our recent expedition on L'Austral without any problems. Including (probable) high demand times like when we all found out we had to fill in another DDJJ to get out of Argentina.
As Alan pointed out, voice calling is very low bandwidth. Absolutely not a hog unless you are are making a video call. Years ago we used Skype, but there was a modest charge to connect to the phone network for the "last mile" to the phone we were calling. The AT&T WiFi calling has no fee at all. No doubt Verizon, et al, have similar options.
And, like Sealord, I leave it enabled all the time because at the Air & Space Museum where I'm a docent, the cell network is weak, but the WiFi is solid. The phone will automatically use whichever connection is best.