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Comment by wmf | Hacker News Reader

phones that will roam into satellite coverage in rural areas

That's not what Apple announced. Satellite service is only for emergencies and is cumbersome to use.

The ones that are going to be hurting right away are Garmin with their InReach line and Zoleo. This covers the most important thing that backcountry types pay monthly fees and carry an extra device for, which are emergencies, but Apple didn’t mention anything about two way texts which is a secondary but important use. Backcountry hunters will still pay money for now to be able to text home or send a message to the floatplane pilot but that’s not going to last for long. Overall what they showed in terms of positioning the phone to get a good satellite connection looks about as reliable and cumbersome as using an InReach, which is fine.

Today was a real shot at two of Garmin’s profit centres with the Apple Watch Pro also targeting their GPS sports watches.

I own a Garmin InReach that I regularly take with me on hiking expeditions (mostly Scotland, Iceland and South Africa) and it’s super handy on remote areas with no coverage. The ability to send an SOS is the main feature, but the two-way messaging system is just amazing for peace of mind, for me and my family. However, the main thing about the InReach is its ruggedness and battery life, which I consider essential. I always carry an iPhone with me that I use when and if I get reception, but I need to carry a battery pack for it and it’s always in the back of my mind that an iPhone is a relatively fragile device and it’s one misstep away from cracking/breaking/etc, hence the inReach.

Moving forward, having both will be great, but I think having to rely only on an iPhone would make me a bit nervous, so I’m not sure how much of a threat this is for the inReach devices (at least for now).

I think this drastically underestimates or at least undersells the impact of convenience, or in this case the maximum possible level of convenience which is already having the feature even if you don't know it. Similar arguments could have and indeed were made for every other small electronic device the smartphone has replaced. It's not that the advantages you listed don't exist, it's just that they won't hold a candle to the explosion of smartphones with satellite messaging built in by default. I feel like even just 1 year (and 200 million satellite-enabled iPhones) from today pointing out these advantages is going to look like people pointing out that land lines have better audio quality and lower latency than cell phones.

I always carry my InReach with periodic location sharing enabled when I'm on backpacking trips. I also almost always carry it during international travel and road trips, but not usually with periodic location sharing. If iPhones start offering plans with periodic location sharing, I'm fairly confident that I'd stop carrying the InReach unless I was on a particularly remote trip that was outside of my comfort zone (which isn't something I really do anyway).

I may be taking trips you’d be uncomfortable with, but the InReach is invaluable for two-way messaging and weather updates. I haven’t needed the emergency service (knock on wood), but I’ve used most of the other things it does. My phone is a much better GPS, though, and if Apple makes it possible to do those two things I mentioned at first without it using much of the battery life I’d consider only keeping my InReach for extended trips.

There’s something to be said for convenience that worries me a bit with this. The amount of people that may be “misusing” this feature and the strain that it’s going to put on,say, mountain rescue. If people start feeling more confident than their capabilities, or they ignore weather reports just because they can be rescued with an iPhone, I don’t know what effect that’ll have on these resources.

It’s a reasonable question to ask what’s the effect of millions of people in cell-less areas who now can make a AFAIK SOS with no other context. I assume Apple has discussed this with various authorities however.

Some of these effects are already seen with cell phones. OTOH while no panacea, cell phones can help when someone is in genuine danger.

Genies and bottles and all that. Of course authorities may get more liberal with levying significant fines for people who get rescued because they were unprepared.

I'm a Paramedic in a California county that isn't even that far from San Francisco and we have a LOT of mountain range area with zero cell service at all. Even worse, our Motorola radios don't work up in the same hills either. We frequently get very vague and difficult to pinpoint locations for car accidents, medical emergencies, etc.

Now someone that is in a wreck or sees one can stay put and contact emergency services with a way more accurate location, and I think that's awesome.

Thank you for serving humanity!

I’m thinking of backcountry hunting applications personally. When I’ve been completely away from cellular service and put my phone on airplane mode and low brightness it goes for several days without a charge as a (not always on) gps and camera. Since these trips have usually been in groups of 3-4 the fragility of the phone is a smaller issue.

But I get what you’re saying, if you have 2 you have 1 and if you have 1 you have none. Some redundancy so nice and the iPhone as a backup to the inreach will be a likely set up.

I switched from Globalstar to Zoleo (Iridium) because Globalstar wasn't reliable enough for use cases like messaging the float plane pilot. I'd often have to wait for certain times of the day to send messages or make calls. This was at about 54 deg lat, so not in the fringes at all.

It may have been my device (older Qualcomm branded phone), but my experience seems consistent with what others report.

On the contrary, I've been very happy with the Zoleo device and service. It's been 100% reliable in all conditions even in the middle of the bush.

I'm pretty sure there won't be a two way feature here. They're using the same network as SPOT and the feature set looks very similar. With the classic SPOT, you can send one of three preset messages along with your coordinates, or send an emergency message. SPOT also lets you track, which is the same message format but the device sends it automatically at regular intervals.

Communication is one-way only and there is no way to verify delivery.

I agree that this will cut into InReach sales, because it provides about 70% of the capability and it's built into your phone. That said, the two way full text messaging and confirmation of delivery are huge advantages, especially if you actually plan to use it as opposed to it being a "just in case" communication device.

Watch the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41EdCXjotmo

It's clearly two-way.

>This covers the most important thing that backcountry types pay monthly fees and carry an extra device for, which are emergencies,

I am not a backpacker, so maybe I am missing something but if it is JUST for emergencies what do the Paid services offer than a NOAA Registered PLB Device would not?

You don't need to pay for an extra device and carry it around.

Well I guess my comment was around the assertion that people would buy the Commercial service solely for emergencies, so in my view the PLB would fine if your use was only for Emergency Rescue.

If you need the other features then that makes a different argument but the original statement was that iPhone feature would kill these over devices because iPhone could be used to send emergency messages.

Being able to have a 2-way conversation with search & rescue to explain the situation and get updates is the biggest one.

As for other things worth paying for: being able to text your family back home and let them know you're running a day late but everything's ok so not to report you as missing goes a long way to helping everyone involved have some peace of mind.

Coordinating pickups and getting weather updates are also big value-adds.

Not clear the phone will have two way capabilities.

Watch the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41EdCXjotmo

It will definitely be two-way.

Ah. Ok. Though apparently just with emergency dispatchers. Though that is more useful than just a beacon in a number of respects.

Other have pointed out what the satellite communicators offer, but one feature that the PLBs exclusively have is a radio beacon which enables you to be found by triangulation. (I carry a PLB, who cares about texting. I just want to get rescued if I break my femur.)

I suspect Garmin is not immediately worried about the watches.

I'm currently wearing a Garmin Fenix 7, which recently replaced a Forerunner 645. I look forward to seeing the Ultra reviews, but it doesn't strike me as competitive yet. E.g., the 36 hours of battery life is surely exciting for Apple Watch fans, but my Fenix 7 gets 18 days of battery life. Or if I turn Battery Saver on, I get 57 days of usage vs 2.5 days for the Apple Watch Ultra.

And what really makes the Garmin stuff suited for sports is years and years of carefully designed specialist features. I'm not even much of an athlete but I really appreciate so much of what they offer.

If the price were better I could see it being a threat for Garmin's low-end models. But at $800? Even if I were an Apple fan I'd struggle at paying more money for less watch.

Agreed. There’s so much functionality in the Garmin watches. There are modes for every conceivable sport (and if it doesn’t have it, it’s in the add-on store for a few bucks). It’s got superb navigation features. And if the battery life is a worry you can get one with solar charging via the watchface.

An interesting bit about the solar stuff: when I was at REI and comparing the Fenix models, I asked if the Solar was really worth it. Even according to Garmin, the solar gets you an extra ~20% on battery life. The REI employee pointed out that for the $100 extra it cost, I could get a much more effective solar panel/battery combo that could not only charge my watch but other devices.

So I ended up getting the regular model, figuring if I ever needed solar anything, I'd come back and get the right panel for the trip. Yet another reason I'm happy to support my local REI store.

Very true! I do the same thing myself, since I prefer the sapphire crystal for durability (solar is not available on that one). I can see how it would be very useful for someone who's on an ultralight type of thing where they may not even have a cell phone.

They mentioned a feature where your location could be sent via satellite in "find my" even in a non-emergency.

It looks it still takes some effort to send out a message with aiming and everything.

The findmy feature was in the press release. The aiming is probably only important for the sos case (sending the message immediately). Findmy can probably just update the location in the background whenever it gets a signal

Yes, findmy messages are store-and-forward. So the phone notices, "Huh, I saw something, when I was here, at this time, but I have no WiFi or cell signal" so it goes in a pile, and then a while later it has satellite, but still no WiFi or cell signal, so it sends out the pile.

I'm surprised it's worth doing this, I'd have expected that most findmy situations it's enough to get the pile of data hours or days later when somebody has Internet access again. Like, suppose I drop my airpods out of a pocket on some mountain trail on Saturday morning, a subsequent walker's iPhone sees them, but has no WiFi of course, however on Monday they're in the office, their iPhone reports it saw my airpods, X here at T time, and that's enough that I should be able (if I want) to go back and find them.

The place you might spend longer periods with only satellite is the open ocean, but basically if you lose shit in the ocean it's fucking gone.

Find My isn’t just Find My Stuff. It’s also Find My Friends and Find My Family Member.

The use case isn’t AirPods lost in the tundra it’s your husband or wife lost in the tundra.

Doesn't need to be that dramatic. Our Jeep got stuck in the Utah desert, and our guide had to pull out his Garmin satellite gadget to send a text message/coordinates for a friend to come pull us out. Lucky he had that thing. Yeah we could have hiked 3 miles over rugged terrain to a highway, but by the time we got there it would have been dark and we would have been exhausted. So we made the call. It wasn't life-or-death but it sure was convenient, saved us a lot of time, and allowed us to be back on schedule the next day. Definitely worth the investment. I'll be getting this iPhone for sure.

As others have noted it’s not clear if you can use an iPhone for that. It may well be emergency signal or nothing.

Good point. I did watch the keynote. SOS and Find My coordinates are the only explicitly specified use cases. But it's a paid service with the first 2 years free. I made the assumption you should be able to send text messages, because asking people to pay for a service that only lets you communicate with emergency services and that's all seems like a much less compelling product which is a bit un-Apple like. But then again, they have done lousy products before so it's possible they went with the less-compelling option.

Per a video someone else posted it seems there's communication with (probably just) emergency services which (for some use cases) is probably more useful than just a personal locator beacon.

For now! It would make sense for Apple to eventually own/manage a satellite fleet for global communication in the near future. The current carriers must be shitting their pants about this.

I'm not exactly sure what you're imagining, but there are fundamental physics problems in the way of just launching a bunch of satellites and enabling global communications.

Apple has partnered with Globalstar to use geostationary satellites to send incredibly small amounts of data measured in bytes, not kilobytes. These satellites have only limited bandwidth, and it's very expensive. And with the antenna size and power available in a phone today, it's never going to be more than kilobytes.

SpaceX Starlink/TMobile announced a much higher-bandwidth option, but it's incredibly fleeting, lasting just a few seconds.

Starlink satellites are in very low Earth orbit, moving at 8km/second. You can't just point an antenna at it and have it work. The antenna needs to track the satellite. And it needs to have a constant line of sight free of obstructions. Starlink currently builds a very cheap phased-array antenna, but it's still ~$1,000 to manufacture, it's a couple cubic feet in volume, and it uses >100 watts.

Starlink V2 will bring very large antennas to Starlink satellites which will enable direct 5G connectivity, but that connectivity will last for a few seconds, with perhaps thirty minutes between connections.

I'm not saying it's impossible, but no one knows how to build a satellite system currently that will cause any carriers to shit their pants.

> Apple has partnered with Globalstar to use geostationary satellites

I haven't read the announcement, but Globalstar's constellation is in LEO.

Yeah but their satellites are basically oversized analogue relays. So bandwidth is bugger all with little capacity to increase it. So Leo or not it's like having CDMA speeds as your cap. Pretty much useless for anything other than a GPS location ping for emergency use.

Indeed. Until a few years ago I was also under the impression that the satellite phone constellations were geostationary or at least geosynchronous. I remember growing up in the 90s hearing about satellite phones and how they had a very noticeable delay, which I assumed meant they were way up there. But perhaps that was just an older generation of constellations, because Globalstar and Iridium (by far the most popular networks in use by consumer-grade devices) are definitely LEO.

inmarsat does sell a handheld satellite phone product (google "inmarsat isatphone") which uses narrow band data channels and handhelds to talk to geostationary satellites. Its coverage is not quite as solid or reliable as iridium, because you can be easily obstructed by a mountain on your south side if you're at latitude 45N or something, and doesn't extend beyond about 70 degrees north, but it's also priced cheaper than iridium for the hardware and the monthly service.

what most people think of as a satellite phone is indeed LEO since iridium has the lion's share of the market.

1400km, compared to 550km for Starlink.

It sounded like temporary connectivity was only initially; once they have a full shell of V2 satellites I would expect constant connectivity.

Globalstar simplex only takes about 200 mW over 2 seconds to deliver a 72 byte message, into an antenna about 0 dBi gain. See the STX3 transmitter module.

That doesn't feel very efficient. 72 bytes is nothing.

72 bytes is more than your reply here.

The way technology is headed there is a 110% chance that the phased array tech gets miniaturized and put into a phone. And once the constellation is filled in, you’ll be able to find any tiny slice of sky and talk to a starlink sat that’s flying through it. Indoors is still a problem but who knows, things are always evolving.

You can't take say Moore's Law for chip tech and slap it on to radio tech. They're fundamentally different physical processes. There are limits to radio transmission and reception bandwidth and range due to the basic physics that you can't end run. The inverse square law is a harsh master, for any given level of technology a transmitter 100x closer is going to have a 10,000x advantage however you slice it.

What they might be able to do is expand this to something like limited texting, or maybe down the line even non-realtime voice messaging.

We are still able to have two-way communication with both Voyagers.

Google’s Lyra codec can already get down to 3Kb/s and be reasonably audible. It’s not a stretch to imagine within a few years we’ll be able to push that to below 1Kb/s.

Taking those two things together, I think it’s fairly reasonable to assume at least text and voice are within reach.

Stable diffusion, backwards on the device, targeting a photo. send photos with only the prompt.

Reminiscent of Vernor Vinge's "evocations", as mentioned in A Fire Upon the Deep:

> The screen showed a color image with high resolution. Looking at it carefully, one realized the thing was a poor evocation…. Kjet recognized Owner Limmende and Jan Skrits, her chief of staff, but they looked several years out of style. Ølvira [the ship] was matching old video with the transmitted animation cues. The actual communication channel was less that four thousand bits per second; Central was taking no chances.

> [...]

> The picture was crisp and clear, but when the figures moved it was with cartoonlike awkwardness. And some of the faces belonged to people Kjet knew had been transferred […] The processors here on the Ølvira were taking the narrow-band signal from Fleet Central, fleshing it out with detailed (and out of date) background and evoking the image shown.

Sounds a lot like DALL-E plus a finely tuned training database on both ends could create this sort super-compression if we wanted to. I could imagine having a crisp, real-time (But artificial) 4K video conference at a few kb/s.

Nvidia is already working on this.

The novel I'm quoting was written in 1992. :)

Phased arrays are already in phones that have mm wave antennas ;) usually only 1 dimension though. But it's not inconceivable they will add one capable to reach a satellite. Obviously the number of elements and thus the gain will be lower than the one Ina starlink station. But with slower speeds you don't need as strong a signal.

Sparse array fallacy. You can't make a phased array too small and have high directionality-- you lose all the power in the side lobes. This one's underlying physics.

You can't really shrink a phased array.

If you use smaller antenna elements you must use a higher frequency, and higher frequencies are more attenuated by the earth's atmosphere (generally, when you get to THz there is a window or else visible light wouldn't be able to penetrate) so they have no chance of making it to a satellite.

If you use less elements you lose all your gain in the side lobes, as the other commenter mentioned

not geosync, LEO.

> Apple has partnered with Globalstar to use geostationary satellites

globalstar's existing network and licenses have nothing to do with geostationary at all.

please don't comment on things like this if you have fundamental misunderstandings about the nature of different types of mutually incompatible satellite network technology.

If you are going to be pedantic, it would behoove you to use correct capitalization.

it's a well documented fact that typing in all lower case is very slightly faster for persons accustomed to it as a regular practice, which is a completely different thing than fundamentally misunderstanding the technical parameters of a L/S-band LEO vs geostationary data link, if we want to be pedantic about it.

Starlink is not going to be faster than this necessarily. Starlink is also low bandwidth, but has to be compatible with all phones. So they are not able to design hardware in the phone with a better antenna for this purpose as Apple can do.

> You can't just point an antenna at it and have it work. The antenna needs to track the satellite. And it needs to have a constant line of sight free of obstructions.

People already do this when communicating from the ground via amateur satellites on handheld radios. Here the fellow followed the sweep of the sky with his yagi.

https://youtu.be/jmCgIk8eVWw

The speeds Starlink will deliver are 2G speeds/device. They said 2-4Mbps/cell, and a cell is a wide area. I think it will have continuous coverage once the constellation reaches a certain size. AST SpaceMobile is planning 4g or 5g speeds/device with their 40 Gbps capable satellites.

They're funding a large amount of GlobalStar's future constellation, which seems like a pathway to ownership (if Globalstar goes under or apple can acquire without the debt burden)

Apple also funds much of TSMC's growth, without any pathway to ownership. Apple is likely just buying top priority.

Let's be real here, TSMC's growth is there with or without Apple.

It’s not obvious it would be had Apple not started pumping stratospheric amounts of money into them years ago. And they’re still pre-paying new fab development that TSMC might find it challenging to afford without them.

(Disclaimer: casual observer at best. May be misrepresenting what I’ve heard.)

That's not clear at all. TSMC's capability growth _started_ with Apple fabbing with them

Apple prefers to keep away from the downsides of actual ownership while having the upsides of being an only customer

Does anyone prefer to keep the downsides? The only thing stopping people is not having the cash to be able to do the same.

There are a number of companies that can goe toe-to-toe with Apple that don't have the same approach, even if they can afford to. Apple and Walmart are known to put the to put on thumbscrews on their suppliers more than fellow behemoths in their respective industries.

This makes me think it's less of an affordability issue, and more of where they fall along spectrum on amount of margin that can be squeezed from smaller suppliers.

They aren't.

https://www.t-mobile.com/news/un-carrier/t-mobile-takes-cove...

I'd also bet on Starlink to scale better than Globalstar (after they also own the fucking rockets). Add better features and innovate

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