Quote:
Originally Posted by Cinisajoy
Ok now I must ask: HF? The only thing I can think of is a high frequency radio and am having a hard time figuring out how one would check email with it.
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Yes you have that correct, that is HF radio.
There are several options. There are some commercial services that provide paid email access into the internet over HF radio (e.g. Sailmail) for both business and private emails. For licensed amateur radio operators there is the free service provided by the Winlink organization for private emails only (private emails can be with a business though, for example to purchase over the internet).
It works like the old days analogue modems connected to ones telephone line when the message came as tones down the telephone lines and were turned into text by the modem and ones connected PC. But the tones are sent by radio and that connected to a PC with the appropriate software modem and editing application turns it into text. Of course it works the opposite way round for sending emails
. It can be very slow though but fine for text only emails.
A number of satellite services are also available but are either also slow and somewhat expensive, or faster and expensive. It is more reliable though as it doesn't suffer from the vagaries of propagation and noise (static) as anyone who has used HF radio (aka shortwave) to listen to "shortwave radio" broadcasts (BBC, VOA, etc.) knows. The hardware varies from the normal satellite phone up through much more expensive systems with dish antennas which lock onto the satellite and maintain their direction as the boat rock and rolls about or changes direction - so just like a home satellite internet connection but with a dish that locks onto and keeps pointing at the satellite as the boat moves around (options include TV too).