Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I have used this for 30 months now, and have tracked over 4000 open ocean nautical miles with the Inreach. I have the Delorme INreach SE and not the Explorer. However, everything that I say here is applicable to the Explorer as well. Important: When you buy this unit, recognize that you are also buying into a service program supplied by Delorme, and it requires purchasing a plan. You can buy a 30 day plan, and let the unit then sit in your drawer indefinitely until you want to use it again. Or you can buy a yearly plan and pay a lower fee. See the screen shot and then do a search for Delorme Inreach Plans and you can see your options. Pro's 1) Every 10 minute tracking for a low $34.95 per month. See the screen shot of a recent trip of mine. I post this to Facebook and people can go on the site and see me anytime live. 2) SOS - Want the helicopters to come? They will, but either pay for the insurance or pay the price when the rescue you. This does not take the place on my boats of an EPIRB, but it does make for a redundancy and you can communicate with the coast guard (email or text!) 3) Send texts to your loved one's phone. Its simple and fast. 4) Send an email to anyone even the delorme CEO! 5) Get the weather and get weather predictions for 24, 48 or 72 hours for a specific GPS fix. Winds, Temp, Precip, Direction etc. 6) Use the bluetooth on the unit and easily connect to your tablet or computer for much easier input. 7) The unit is fairly weather resistant. Its not 100% waterproof, but I have been completely submerged in rogue waves on deck with the delorme on me, and it stays working. I also am in harsh environments at sea and it shows not corrosion of any metals like the Mini SD charger port. None. I bought the floatation case for it, and Its worth it. Cons 1) It is both a communication tool and an emergency device. Delorme has on its site a way to put in information if someone comes and saves you like your insurance info, medicine, key contacts and telephone number, medical history......Important stuff yes? Well, Delorme did not protect this information and a hacker stole this information on March 15th of last year. Here is an excerpt - "The company said the hackers may have obtained inReach customers’ names, mailing addresses, email addresses, telephone numbers and, in some cases, dates of birth and information for emergency contacts. No other information, including financial information, was exposed, the company said, and the hack affected only inReach communicator accounts that were opened in the period from July 30, 2014, to March 5." I wrote a note to the CEO of the company asking what they would do to protect their customers from this information but he choose to not respond. Delorme sent at the time that this hack occurred but did not provide any assistance. 2) The last screen shot is what is on my screen today. The network is down. This means that if you are relying on this system today, It will not work. You must inform the people that you are communicating with that if communication shows no activity, it does not mean an emergency. This is on the Iridium network that Delorme (Garmin) pays for. If their system goes down, your service does as well. (you do not get a refund of lost time) 3) The interface to input text to the Delorme directly is just like the one on Netflix as you have to move around the screen to choose letters. I recommend using a bluetooth tablet or phone (andrioid or IOS works) when you have a lot of work to do. Overall I would recommend this unit. The plan is very flexible. Delorme is not too responsive however.