I don't know you gents well enough to opine on the keyboard fisticuffs... but the thread has proven useful me either way. Thank you. >>
Me and Wayne email each other about 30 times a day. He just sent me a recipe for grits and grillards. He knows he can tell me whatever he wants in an email, but he chooses to "educate" me via this public forum. Anything else wouldn't be natural!
So with all the times I have powered the unit on or off, I never noticed that. Thank you. I thought I saw a display that had the battery capacity in large bold characters. >>
Somethin else I discovered; When you see something in big bold letters, that's the one you'll be working with if you press the OK button. For instance, if you want to change something in the setup, you scroll thru the stuff on the menu with the up/down buttons on the left, till you see SETUP in big/bold. Then press OK.
Either way, when I called Garmin, the service person was adamant that
nowhere in the unit does it display the actual percentage. I feel very uneasy about anything else that person told me...>>
I had that experience also. Guy had no idea what he was talking about. If I call them again, I'm going to start off by asking if he's a technical guy, or if he's in sales, and to please transfer me to someone with technical. Or maybe I'll just take it to REI. There's usually someone there that knows these things.
I turn BT off on both devices between messaging. I rely on the Mini's audible alert to let me know when a message is in or out. If I am leisurely, I'll go through pairing and use the Earthmate app. Otherwise, I read the message on the Mini and decide what to do next.>>
Didn't know it had an audible alert. Thanks! With my ears, I just probably never heard it. (And likely never will!) But I love that earthmate app, and wouldn't use the device without it. You can even send an SOS with that app.
This is a stand-out for me. Makes a lot of sense to have the continuous tracking info regardless of how long the send intervals are. That said, I would certainly subscribe to full time tracking if I were backpacking the back country. I don't. My longest trips are but a handful of days and rarely am I that remote.. sadly. There certainly have been trails and scrambles I have navigates that offered a thousand ways to create a mechanical injury, fall or hit my head and that's why I carry it and why I leave it on. >>
I'm about convinced to start using it for tracking. Some of the stuff I've heard here sounds like it does make sense -- like if you wind up somewhere where there's too much cover overhead. Assuming I can run a test and get the kind of battery life I'm supposed to be able to.
Additionally, one factor being overlooked in the conversation above is that this is a two way communication device. Not just an SOS alert. Once you deploy the SOS, assuming you are conscious and have the unit on your person, you have the opportunity to communicate with you family as well as the SAR team to refine your position and situation. For my needs, this is tremendously comforting. >>
yes! absolutely!
Holy smokes.. that thing is crazy. I won't quote the battery life for this past trip, but I know I had it tracking three treks over three days.. all day treks..plus running full navigation of the routes and I'll venture a guess that it was probably at better than 80%. I'll never hit the trail without the Ambit.
This makes a lot of sense, though it isn't entirely applicable to how I use or rely on the InReach.