AirCards?
February 22, 2006 2:02 AM Subscribe
AirCards . . . Has anyone done a real comparison of the features, peformance, and cost of the different cards and the diferent plans? I'm sitting in an expensive hotel paying an additional $10 for HS cable access per day. I've decided to get an AirCard but I'm not sure which is best.
My experience was that Verizon's cellular broadband service was significantly more realiable and, on average (I travel a lot) faster than Cingular's HSDPA. But Cingular had a 30 day return policy, so I tried theirs first. :) Try Cingular, and if it doesn't work, return within 30 days to get out of your contract, and switch to Verizon.
posted by Merdryn at 6:12 AM on February 22, 2006
posted by Merdryn at 6:12 AM on February 22, 2006
We've issued Sprint cards to our traveling sales people, right now some still have the old cards and some have the new EVDO-capable cards. I pretty much never get support calls for them, unless the cell network is generally jacked in which case there's nothing I can do.
Right now we're getting the cards free and paying $80/month unlimited airtime, which I think may be the same as the regular consumer price. I always borrow one if I'm going out of town, as they're very handy. Even with the old, slower card, I could VPN and Remote Desktop to the office at tolerable speeds. The cards also generally get better reception in my signal-hole office than my brand new Sprint phone. (Actually, the phone, a PPC6700, will operate as an aircard via cable or bluetooth. So that's an option as well.)
It doesn't appear that there's a MacOS client for them, though. I think I've heard of the Verizon cards being used on OSX.
posted by Lyn Never at 8:07 AM on February 22, 2006
Right now we're getting the cards free and paying $80/month unlimited airtime, which I think may be the same as the regular consumer price. I always borrow one if I'm going out of town, as they're very handy. Even with the old, slower card, I could VPN and Remote Desktop to the office at tolerable speeds. The cards also generally get better reception in my signal-hole office than my brand new Sprint phone. (Actually, the phone, a PPC6700, will operate as an aircard via cable or bluetooth. So that's an option as well.)
It doesn't appear that there's a MacOS client for them, though. I think I've heard of the Verizon cards being used on OSX.
posted by Lyn Never at 8:07 AM on February 22, 2006
To piggyback if I may, I'd be interested if any plans (particularly Verizon) let you start up service without a contract. I may need a card for 6 months, not two years.
posted by RikiTikiTavi at 8:26 AM on February 22, 2006
posted by RikiTikiTavi at 8:26 AM on February 22, 2006
This thread is closed to new comments.
I am interested in if anyone is using HSDPA from Cingular yet. I wasn't blown away with the old-school GPRS and EDGE services available from T-Mobile but the "bursts above 1 megabit" from the Cingular marketing copy made me wonder if it is worth $60/month.
posted by birdherder at 5:42 AM on February 22, 2006