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> Here's the antenna inside. Looks like a small helical antenna. Thanks for proving my point and saving me the hassle of looking up the antenna inside. There i

> Here's the antenna inside. Looks like a small helical antenna. Thanks for proving my point and saving me the hassle of looking up the antenna inside. There is no way that would fit inside an iPhone, even with Apple’s creativity in antenna design. The frequency, as previously stated, is not the problem, it’s the transmission power. You need a lot more more watts of EIRP to transmit reliably 350 miles (distance to LEO) than you do for 3 miles (average distance to a cell tower). A modern smart phone transmits at about 100-200mW on average, Iridium operates at around 2 orders of magnitude higher transmit power than that.

kube-system 5y ago
Replacement batteries for the inreach mini online are labeled at 3.52Wh. The iPhone 12 has a 10.78 Wh battery. The key to keeping power consumption low is that you transmit momentarily, not constantly. A use case like backup communication on an iPhone wouldn’t necessitate use of the iridium network at 100% duty cycle. > There is no way that would fit inside an iPhone, even with Apple’s creativity in antenna design. The vast majority of the volume that a helical antenna consumes is empty space. The obvious solution is not groundbreakingly creative: try using something other than a helical antenna.
- jsjohnst 5y ago
  > A use case like backup communication on an iPhone wouldn’t necessitate use of the iridium network at 100% duty cycle. The OP article explicitly says voice calls, which require a virtually 100% duty cycle. I entirely agree in an emergency beacon or maybe even messages capacity it’s potentially doable on an iPhone, but voice calls over satellite require a different antenna than is possible in the iPhone form factor. There’s been something like 50 satellite phones in common use, including at least one that is Android based, and the one thing that is constant across every single one of them is the size of the antenna, always requiring a large extension via fold or slide mechanism while a call is in progress. I’ve personally owned over a dozen models of satellite devices (phones, beacons, terminals/hotspots, and two-way pagers) and used them on five continents, so I’m very familiar with the tech available in this space. There is just no existing satellite network that could support Apple’s iPhone footprint, even as a premium subscription add-on. There is zero chance Apple secretly and quietly launched their own satellite network, even just US based. Apple has also never been the lead adopter in any new radio technology / functionality (late to 3G, stalled on LTE due to early power usage issues, fairly behind even in 5G), especially one that is guaranteed to cause a hit to battery life in a big way, so I stand behind the statement this is a pipe dream for supporting voice calls. > The vast majority of the volume that a helical antenna consumes is empty space. The obvious solution is not groundbreakingly creative: try using something other than a helical antenna. There are only so many ways to make a circular polarized antenna (which is required to my knowledge for all existing sat networks). Yes, there are other ways besides helical antennas, but they still require much more space than is common to LTE/Wi-Fi/BT/BLE antennas used in phones.

kube-system 5y ago

Replacement batteries for the inreach mini online are labeled at 3.52Wh. The iPhone 12 has a 10.78 Wh battery. The key to keeping power consumption low is that you transmit momentarily, not constantly. A use case like backup communication on an iPhone wouldn’t necessitate use of the iridium network at 100% duty cycle. > There is no way that would fit inside an iPhone, even with Apple’s creativity in antenna design. The vast majority of the volume that a helical antenna consumes is empty space. The obvious solution is not groundbreakingly creative: try using something other than a helical antenna.

jsjohnst 5y ago
> A use case like backup communication on an iPhone wouldn’t necessitate use of the iridium network at 100% duty cycle. The OP article explicitly says voice calls, which require a virtually 100% duty cycle. I entirely agree in an emergency beacon or maybe even messages capacity it’s potentially doable on an iPhone, but voice calls over satellite require a different antenna than is possible in the iPhone form factor. There’s been something like 50 satellite phones in common use, including at least one that is Android based, and the one thing that is constant across every single one of them is the size of the antenna, always requiring a large extension via fold or slide mechanism while a call is in progress. I’ve personally owned over a dozen models of satellite devices (phones, beacons, terminals/hotspots, and two-way pagers) and used them on five continents, so I’m very familiar with the tech available in this space. There is just no existing satellite network that could support Apple’s iPhone footprint, even as a premium subscription add-on. There is zero chance Apple secretly and quietly launched their own satellite network, even just US based. Apple has also never been the lead adopter in any new radio technology / functionality (late to 3G, stalled on LTE due to early power usage issues, fairly behind even in 5G), especially one that is guaranteed to cause a hit to battery life in a big way, so I stand behind the statement this is a pipe dream for supporting voice calls. > The vast majority of the volume that a helical antenna consumes is empty space. The obvious solution is not groundbreakingly creative: try using something other than a helical antenna. There are only so many ways to make a circular polarized antenna (which is required to my knowledge for all existing sat networks). Yes, there are other ways besides helical antennas, but they still require much more space than is common to LTE/Wi-Fi/BT/BLE antennas used in phones.