[scud]

I did too. Is actually applies to the 'new' viper and the GTR. The insurer has great rates, but for NSW they insist on the car having satellite tracking. For Qld they don't. Annoying.

but as a result you may be paying a lower premium than me

[allanuber]

but as a result you may be paying a lower premium than me

Could well be. I'm yet to call the insurers to ask wtf the go is in the interim while the recommended service is dead ... in theory would be a captured market for anyone who could reuse the quicktrack on-car devices.

[Jamezilla]

The problem with Quiktrak is their system uses their own proprietary radio towers. Coverage is centred around capital cities, making it completely useless in the country, or even just outside metro areas. I had a customer lock the keys in a car in Geelong last weekend, and Quiktrak couldn't get a signal to the vehicle. I got false alarms all the time and found when I needed to poll a car to see where it was, the best the could give me was a rough area like 'Melbourne : South East'

For someone to re-use Quiktrak hardware already in cars, would require taking over the external communication hardware - so effectively reviving the Quiktrak network.

All the newer tracking systems use the GPRS phone network for communicating with cars - allowing their range and service coverage to increase as the telco providers do. I have a test system of http://www.webtrack24.com in the Evo X and I'm pretty happy with it. A few things need to be sorted out, but it's much better coverage than QT and is roughly the same price.

J

[j15]

Does this technology only tell you where the car is or can it tell you if doors are open, its being hoisted, or if its moving but not under its own power?

[mondi]

Newer system is coming out using the 3G Network.

Will have lots better coverage than the GPRS as well as Sat tracking built in so the vehicle can be tracked every second if need be.

We have this system in our work cars, but they have not setup any of the remote options, like unlocking the car remotely, etc.
But the cars can be tracked and logged(not really a good thing sometimes) every trip.
And it also has 3G wireless broadband so can logon with the Laptop and go surfing, etc, etc.

To answer j15's question, this sytem can tell - if doors are opened, if the car is being towed, etc, etc.
There is also a panic button option as well.

[allanuber]

...All the newer tracking systems use the GPRS phone network for communicating with cars - allowing their range and service coverage to increase as the telco providers do. I have a test system of http://www.webtrack24.com in the Evo X and I'm pretty happy with it. A few things need to be sorted out, but it's much better coverage than QT and is roughly the same price.

J

Great info thanks, job for this weekend is to follow up with the insurer to see if they still want satellite tracking, and to also see who their new 'shortlist' provider is.

On J15's question about what could be monitored, here in Sydney there's a group called go-get car hire who use their mobile service to provision access to cars (your swipey card only lets you in at the booking time) and they also already monitor K's covered, locations travelled etc. I'll have to mention to the guy he should get into security monitoring