RV Technology.."This is not your Grandpa's motorhome!"

Wilson Cell Phone Amplifier

  One of the main reasons we decided to become "homeless by choice" last year is that we felt the communications technology had finally progressed enough that we could run our businesses and stay in touch to the point where it would feel somewhat seamless from sitting at the traditional office setup. Although there have been a few glitches along the way, our bet was correct. From time to time we'll break from our usual travelogue to go into the geek prone world of high tech devices we have onboard that have enabled us to do what we do.

Motorola Photon with it's HDMI output

  When I look at the roof on Harvey, sometimes I think people must think we work for some spy agency, what with all the antennas up there. The main component of our communication setup is, of course, our cell phones. At the moment (this stuff changes quickly), we both use Motorola Photon Android Smartphones. What? We don't have Iphones?? How could that be? The fact is that for us, where often our phones are the only means we have to be in contact, these very highly sophisticated devices fit the bill best. They are most computer like when they need to be, and they seem more compatible with PC oriented programs than Apple products (still). A quick example is that when we mentioned that to subscribe to this blog you need to hit the "atom" button on the left column of this page, a friend emailed back and said when he clicked the button it took him to the wrong place. We finally determined that it was due to his Iphone incompatibility. (We've since fixed this by simplifying the subscription link on the newly designed sight you're looking at).The radio part of the Motorola phones tends to be a little more powerful than many others too. This is really important to us since we spend a lot of time off the map ( I'm writing this from Victor, Idaho, about fifteen miles west, through the ten thousand foot pass, near Jackson Hole, Wyoming), Oh, did I mention that the phone also has a wireless Bluetooth keyboard that connects to it and turns it into an actual minicomputer? Sometimes a little extra power is needed to connect a call or get data. For this, we have a Wilson signal booster installed. This takes the weakest cell signal and amplifies it when we are really way out of range. This little device has come in handy more than once. The only problem with it is that you have to be standing in a certain area of the coach where it's antenna is located for it to work properly. It's better than no phone at all though!
 Back to the Photon phone for a minute. This little black case does way more than let us talk and send emails. When it's plugged into it's dock in the front of Harvey, a built in HDMI connection sends it's a/v signal to the big screen tv and allows us to watch Netflix and other programming over the internet, over our phone. Because this phone uses the Sprint network there are no excessive data or roaming charges (even when we're off network). Right now in Idaho, we are roaming on Verizon, but there are no extra charges..sort of. If you need more info about this, let us know.

Watching Netflix on the big screen with the Photon dock

  Besides the fact that the coach has four computers aboard, one that runs the whole house music and tv operations for the screens and speakers in the livingroom and the bedroom, a mini projector for watching movies, etc. on a 65" screen 

Toshiba mini projector mounted on the livingroom wall

with a Bluetooth audio setup, and Roku players, for even more tv options, connected to both tv's, the front of Harvey is also equipped with a Blue Ray player for our travelling dvd collection (you know, we are foreign movie fanatics!) for when we're really offline and have no internet connection at all. There are some innovations on Harvey that have nothing to do with any of that! In the kitchen, we have installed two induction cook tops over our usual propane ones . We feel that induction cooking is the wave of the future for RV's, boats, and especially regular stick houses. If you're not yet familiar, we'll explain more in the next RV Tech article.....gotta run now. Time to catch a movie.