Communications after the SHTF within several miles around a retreat – or even your neighborhood – can range from easy to almost impossible. Terrain plays a big role and of course the type of devices being used to communicate. I was sent a link to a new product soon to be released that may provide an inexpensive but extremely powerful area communications solution.
The Sonnet allows for a connection grid to be set up over a fairly large area – as in miles – and provide voice, text, and multimedia communications using smartphones. With a communications grid accessible over several square miles consider the possibilities:
- Sending pictures
- Sending audio messages
- Sending video
- Sending files
- Communicating via voice
- Communicating via video-to-video
I hope the Sonnett system works as well as this video suggests.
Visit https://tinyurl.com/ycu87sus for more information.
Saw them on Kickstarter a while back. Cool concept. Will try a few out when they go into production.Would be fun to play with the mesh network and solar while also adding an external SMA high gain antenna (900Mhz will be pretty small) and some elevation. Might enable coverage of a decent sized area (5 mile circle).
Digital radios will do the same things securely with greater range while carrying only one device. That is what we use but they don’t have the interface that everyone is used to (their phones).
Okay..I’m in for some. I have several older “smart phones” I can use and test it. A 2-pack pledge is only $89. Not bad.
I recently installed some solar powered area lights. One of the devices had a USB out port for a secondary device. I am thinking that is the way to keep them charged without personal maintenance. Panels were about 8×5 with a bright aluminum frame but some spray paint could make it less noticeable. tied in with a wireless game cam has possibilities as well .. 900 MHz was the initial freq used by cordless phones then they went from 900 to 1.2, then 2.4 the 5 ..
so anyway 900Mhz is pretty easy to disrupt,,, not a bad way to go really .. even disruption in a specific area tells you something.
GG58
Rourke, are you seriously willing to label this product as the “ultimate”? This certainly seems to have some bells and whistles, and will appeal to teens who would hope to maintain their connected lifestyle. Ain’t gonna happen! I will stick with a couple of good hand held vhf/uhf radios and one good hf rig for regional and national coverage.
Woodchuck. You may not be grasping what the significance of this device is and the possibility of communication. It is NOT connected to the internet, therefore, no teens connected to social media. It is a local network thus the reason for my discussion of retreat communication(limited area).
A couple of older cell phones may be able to connect to these devices and talk just as you would normally. You could text. You could take pictures of a large buck and text it across a few miles to your home base – or to someone on the other side of the hill. It’s not for everyone – but options are excellent.
Check out “goTenna” Rourke, same thing encrypted, and already on the market.