Is a fancy Smartphone necessary OTR

Question:
Is a fancy Smartphone necessary OTR

Answer:

NO!

 

Having good backing skills is not "absolutely necessary" either but it's sure as hell nice to have.

 

Mobile virtual reality entertainment is worth the price by itself...

 

I honestly have no idea how people survived doing this before smartphones, elogs and gps. When someone tells me they have 30 years and 3 million accident free miles, I always have more respect for them. Not because of the accident free miles, but because at least 2.5 million of those miles were using payphones and paper logs and atlas. I use an atlas to plan my trip, but only really to confirm the gps route is legal and safe.

One time my Qualcomm went down and I ran from Laredo to Phoenix on paper logs. Fortunately my fuel stop was El Paso, so I didn't leave a paper trail. Good to get all those miles in basically a day. But calling to manually tell the company I arrived, delivered, am empty... all that ######## was lame. Then they couldn't dispatch my next load because I couldn't confirm my logs.

 

I have a phone and big ### ASUS Tablet. It's a nice luxury for navigation and Google Earth.

Also use my phone for Pandoa music, Audible books, and Podcasts.

 

I remember the days before smart phones lol. Wasn't bad at the time because you didn't know any better. I'd say you could survive without one, just like you could surVive without A/C, but why would you want to

 

Women aren't necessary either but nice having someone to chase the beer out the fridge for you

 

Probably not any more necessary than air-conditioning, power brakes-windows-locks, refrigerator, microwave, inverters, generators.....

If all you did was the scanning and photo documentation it would be worth it to me.

We all have differing levels of "necessary" though right?

 

yes, yes it did lol -

To answer the question though, a smartfone will make your life much easier. I hated my first one, but now would not be without one.

 

And if you decide to purchase a smartphone, don't feel like you have spend a lot of money for the biggest and greatest, however for mobile scanning, you'll need one that is supported by the apps (has built in flash)

Even a refurbished one with warranty [through your carrier] is fine.

And btw. I recommend buying through a carrier owned store as opposed to a "authorized retail agent". Don't ask me how I know.