It’s really popular for gun people to talk about needing a reliable gun for every day carry or duty use, but I don’t hear many gun people talking about having a reliable phone. So that’s what I’ll talk about today.
No matter where I am in the world, the likelihood that I will need to use a “communication device” of some sort to summon help from others is greater than the likelihood that I will need my “three pound” to bust a cap in someone’s rear end. Car accidents and heart attacks and so on occur with greater frequency than encounters requiring lethal force.
While I have medical/first aid knowledge, experience, and training, I do not carry an ambulance around with me. I’ll be able to help a stranger – or myself – much more effectively if I can provide some level of care while also calling for EMS with a phone that works.
In addition, I can’t always have a gun, but I can almost always have a phone. The phone is not capable of spewing fiery death at those who would dare challenge me, but then again, the gun can’t summon a pizza. Both have their uses, is what I’m getting at.
Why do I say “a phone that works?” Because I’ve had unreliable phones, or phones that didn’t get very good service. I used to use cheap Android phones on a prepaid plan. Yeah, it didn’t cost much – but the service was weak out in the wilderness and the phones would constantly need to have their batteries pulled in order to fix some sort of problem or another.
I now have an iPhone 4S. Not only does it work all the time, but the coverage area (Verizon) is great. Battery life is just okay, but I have vehicle chargers and external battery packs/charging devices with USB cables for the times when I venture off the beaten path.
When I leave the country, I use either a satphone or a “world” cell phone from Mobal. No, they didn’t give me anything or pay me or ask me to write this, and I doubt they know I exist as anything other than an occasional customer. The service is very expensive, but it has worked absolutely everywhere I’ve traveled with it – from Baja to the Dolomites to the Maghreb. A gun might have come in handy had I stuck around the latter for a while longer, but the phone was absolutely crucial to getting home.
So if your “carry” phone – no matter who made it or what provider you have – sucks, but your carry gun is super reliable, think about which one you’re more likely to use. Ask yourself if paying a little more for a phone that will work when you need it is worth the added cost. I certainly think so.
-Sigh- My Sprint Epic has less range and reliability then that PRR you show yourself wearing.
In times of dire need, I turn to my saxophone.
Oh man, I spewed my coffee laughing at that!
“The phone is not capable of spewing fiery death at those who would dare challenge me, but then again, the gun can’t summon a pizza.”
Touche’…Touche’ sir
Reasonable and fresh. Thanks, I’ll make a little PR for this post.
Also, you cannot call in artillery or an air strike with your rifle. And, people you shoot with your phone, generally survive the encounter. 😉
I can’t control the service my phone has. While it works great in one patch of wilderness, it may be useless somewhere else, and there’s nothing I can do about that. No cell phone works in some of the canyons I like to hike. A gun is something I do have control of. I practice with it, feed it good ammo, and apply lube generously. It will work when I need it, because I made sure it will. My phone? Who knows, but I don’t have much of a say in how some company lays out it’s network.
You can buy a satphone for less than what you have invested with your carry pistol. Which one is going to be more useful if you break your leg and no one’s within earshot?
That is why you should consider renting a sat phone when traveling in more desolate areas. You can rent an Iridium Satellite Phone from satellitephonestore.com for $40-$90 for a week(I have no interest in the company, but have rented from them). Add in the minimum 25 minutes and it is as cheap as $80. 25 minutes wont get you a lot of jabber time, but is more than enough for emergency use. Sat phones work almost anywhere you can see the sky.
Do yourself a favor and lose the Magpul case. Pick up a Lifeproof — they’re expensive, but as you said, it’s better to spend a bit more for added reliability on something you’ll rely on.
http://www.lifeproof.com/
Good point chief, I’ve been without phone for almost 2yrs now, and I must say you’ve made some valid points
On the other hand, I have summoned some really bad pizza via phone that caused me to spew fire(y?) death…
I think you guys are greatly underestimating how much a satphone costs. They are VERY expensive. A much better option is a emergency locator beacon. The advantage of that is you don’t need to know exactly where you are when you’re calling for help.
Pretty sure I know how much a satphone costs. I own one. I also have several of the little satellite communicator things. They’re not as reliable as a satphone.
The iphone i got my mother for christmas sofar seems to have been a massive mistake. It loves to drop calls when it connects IF it connects. Most likely a network issue (malaysia), but one that my galaxy s2 doesn’t suffer.
She’s holding it wrong.
I see what you did there. 🙂
I couldn’t agree more.
People make such a huge fuss about their EDC “load” and love to pontificate forever in YouTube and on gun forums about how they always carry a massive amount of stuff including their firearms; making it sound as though they won’t leave the house without two knives, a gun, a flashlight, 25 feet of para-cord, gold coins, weatherproof fire-starter, then maybe a phone and wallet as an afterthought.
The reality is your phone, ID, and credit card are the three things you absolutely should have on you whenever you leave your home. In that order, IMO. 99.999% of the time anywhere in the civilized world those are the only items you truly need.
Ok sure I will just give up my 2nd amendment rights because a cell phone and my Govt issued I.D. card is all I need.
Lol give me a break.
I see your point of the importance of having a reliable means to communicate but to me your article was very close to an anti-gun argument. Left-wing gun grabbers could easily use your article and say “look, even a pro-gun guy says having a cell phone is more important than carrying a gun” and “why carry a gun when you can just call the police.” Both statements are total nonsense and I’m not trying to degrade what you are saying but lets be careful how it is said. If I had to choose between banning cell-phones or banning guns, I would choose banning cell-phones in a heart-beat. I absolutely hate cell-phones and I feel that life would be better without them. The importance of face-to-face contact with other human beings is immeasurable and in todays techno-driven world it’s slowly being marginalized. Just my opinion but maybe you should be more clear that a reliable communication device is a great addition to whatever defensive weapon/device you decide to carry.
No thanks.
Sorry I just thought it was a pro-firearms blog and I thought the tone of the article almost sounded like you were telling people that a good cell phone is an alternative to carrying a concealed weapon. If I mis-read or am missing the point then I apologize. I do enjoy the blog for the most part so keep up the good work regardless.
I don’t fit your preconceived notions of what a firearm-related blogger would be, is what you’re saying.
“preconceived notions?”
Um, I’m not trying to troll you if thats what you think. I Just didnt like the tone of the article. Like I said I agree with most of the stuff on your blog. Not trying to pick a fight, geez.
I was with you until your advocacy of the iphone as a good phone for ‘off the beaten path’. once you’re out of data range, there are rapidly diminishing returns for all that processing power. First, battery life: that GHz processor doesn’t come for free, and even with advanced power management, they can’t match the standby time of older ‘dumb’ phones. Second, durability: I’ve accidentally washed my phones, worn them into creeks, etc. Dry them out, and in about a day, I can power them back on and use them with only (possibly) damage to the screen, but, I still have a physical keypad if I need to dial someone. Third, reception: impedance matching for the antenna (with a continuously varying human interferer) is one of the phone designers most difficult tasks. It is made more difficult when constrained to the form factor of the iphone (or comparable android devices). dumb phones have much more flexibility in antenna design, higher quality filters, and matching networks.
Its cool if you want an iphone, because it just works (in town), I love my smartphone too. And if you’re going to carry a sat phone every single time you venture into an area of questionable reception, I suppose you’re fine. but for the same $29, or maybe a little bit more, you’d spend on a mobal phone that you referenced, an unlocked quad-band GSM phone from ebay would serve you just as well, if not better in a staggering number of countries with a cheapo simcard you pick up on location and here at home in the woods & mountains.
The Mobal phone is a known quantity that works everywhere they say it does; I’d happily pay ten times as much for the phone, knowing that it actually works. I generally avoid betting my life on “cheapo things” or things acquired on Ebay at a cut rate. As for locally acquired SIMs, with Mobal, I had cell service a short distance inside Libya when no one else did…not even the Tunisians using locally acquired SIM cards. Worth $29? I’d say so.
And yes, I carry the satphone when I go into the woods. But I’ve been very satisfied with the service I get with iPhone/Verizon in the woods, even where my “dumb” phones, as you call them, don’t work.
So I don’t exactly know where you’re coming from, but my “advocacy” is based on tons of real-world, around-the-world, experience.
Still not trolling, but people have survived for thousands of years without cell phones. Why now, is it the “most important” piece of equipment? In a foreign country I would rather have the value of the phone in hard currency than the phone itself. Money talks, BS walks lol. Also what good is it if you dont speak the language? Unless maybe you have a hot-line to the nearest carrier group lol.
In the wilderness I’d rather have some water-proof matches (a fire-starter of some sort) or a compass. Cell phones are still not 100% dependable no matter how expensive or technologically advanced they are.
People survived for thousands of years without firearms, too.
Just a thought for out & about – first a person unwilling to purchase a Sat Phone might consider the use of HAM Radio for emergencies. From a truck based rig w an expanded antenna the reach can be quite impressive.
Second of all is that in Arizona and much of the West Coast I’ve never had an issue with my Verizon phones/coverage no matter how remote I’m traveling.
If your ( provider is quality like Verizon) perhaps consider the reception of your phone as the weak point. I bought the Samsung Galaxy Nexus after 2 years with an HTC & be issues the Nexus Antenna is atrocious for remote use.
Depends what you call expensive but you can buy a Iridium iSat Phone pro for $699 (http://www.cellhire.com/products/satellite/purchase/isatphonepro) . If you’re going to spend a lot of time in areas without celltower coverage then that can be money well invested since a rental is probably going to cost you a couple of hundred bucks each month you take one.
Thank you for directing me to Mobal. I just realized that if you have an unlocked phone like the new Google Nexus 4 you can simply buy the $9 SIM card from Mobal and have full access to all of the US carriers at once in addition to international coverage almost anywhere. It’s no sat phone, but in a pinch you can still get coverage from whatever carrier happens to cover an area.