[pct-l] Spot Connect

[David Lippke]

I received two Spot Connects today as potential replacements for our Spot 2s
since the field-changeable "OK text" could be a big win for our particular
needs.

Unfortunately, in my initial testing tonight the iPhone app proved to be
unusably green.   It frequently locked up, kept dropping contact groups on
me (which prevents you from sending OK or plain (non-911) help messages -
see below), had to be deleted and reinstalled a number of times, and was
just generally too flaky to take in the field and have any confidence in.
Other users reporting in online seem to be experiencing similar.

Meanwhile, the devices seem nice enough with a weight very close to that of
the 2s, about the same width, perhaps 3/4" shorter, but thicker.   However,
I not realize that the only hard button on the new devices is the 911/SOS
button -- I naively thought the ok, track, help, and "custom" buttons were
just protected under some cover (as the SOS button is) -- nope, they are not
there.   You have to have the smartphone around to initiate any of these
other functions.   We'll have those and but I had imagined being able to
have a little session with the Spot Connect and iPhone that allowed me to
configure the messages and then those would be what were sent by hard
buttons on the Connect until I changed things.   The way they've got it
should eventually work, but the approach rattles my brain and creates an
actual dependency on the smartphone I didn't know existed prior to purchase.

Nevertheless, I did get some messages through and believe that at some point
the iPhone app will be reliable enough to use.   I'm not sure whether
that'll be next week or next year, tho.    I'll be doing some quality time
with their user support before I give up but time is short and so I may will
be throwing in the towel on this early next week.

/David

On Fri, Apr 1, 2011 at 4:50 PM, Kevin Cook <hikelite at gmail.com> wrote:

> Anyone have one of these new products yet?
>
> We're considering it, but I'm curious if anyone else has used one with
> their
> smartphone yet.
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