Communications

Rugged tech is a rapidly growing market, with outdoor users eager for everyday devices built to survive real-world punishment. Here, the new Oukitel RT10 Rugged Tablet delivers solid performance and supreme battery life – for less than $500.

Even in clear water, it can be easy for divers to lose track of which way they're heading. An experimental underwater navigation system could help keep that from happening, using a combination of electromagnetic waves and HUD (head-up display) tech.

It's plenty easy to lose your bearings while scuba diving, which is why Garmin's new Descent S1 Smart Buoy could really come in handy. It helps submerged divers figure out where they are, plus it lets them communicate with their topside crew.

Jack Dorsey, famous for co-founding Twitter (now X), is cooking up a different way to connect people. It's a peer-to-peer mesh network-based messaging app that lets you chat with people over Bluetooth, no internet access required.

A few years ago, Google showed off its Project Starline tech that would make you look like a 3D hologram on a video call for a more connected experience. It's now called Google Beam, and you can pick up the gear from HP for the princely sum of US$25,000.

For the last few years, Google has been developing 3D video technology that would allow distant colleagues to chat as though they were in the same room. Now the tech giant has rebranded Project Starline to Google Beam to prepare for commercial rollout.

The world’s longest quantum communications link has been set up between China and South Africa, spanning a record-breaking 12,900 km (8,015 miles). The connection takes advantage of quantum physics for “unbreakable” encryption.

Augmented reality comes to deep-sea divers, thanks to the US Navy's Office of Naval Research (ONR) and Coda Octopus's Divers Augmented Vision Display (DAVD) system. The setup turns any standard diving hard helmet into a digital information center.

Starlink isn't the only American company to offer direct-to-cell satellite connectivity. AST SpaceMobile has been at it for years and was the very first company in the world to "phone home" from space. Now it's looking to provide 100% coverage of the US.

If you've ever found yourself in a dead zone, maybe you find solace in the quiet. Or maybe you've found yourself in an emergency and help is not coming. Either way, the ability to connect if and when you need to has its merits.

SpaceX has just launched 20 of its Starlink satellites up into Earth's orbit, enabling direct-to-cellphone connectivity anywhere on the planet. That completes the constellation's first orbital shell, following a test of six satellites back in January.

Because GPS doesn't work underwater, divers usually can't track their real-time position on a digital map. The new Diver Navigation System (DNS) gets around that problem, however, using both floating and wearable acoustic transponders.