[lug] Cellular Internet Access Info

[Ferdinand Schmid]

HI,

For those of you who are still interested in cellular Internet access:

Until tomorrow you can still purchase T-Mobile Internet access cards from 
http://www.otgsolutions.com for $150 and get a $100 rebate if you sign up for
a one year service contract.  The monthly charge is $30.

The service works well under Linux and the speed is OK.  T-Mobile claims
56kbps, which would be equivalent to dial-up.  I think the connection speed is
slower than dial-up but still very useful for e-mail and basic web browsing.
The coverage in urban areas is excellent.  In fact here in Boulder the
coverage is better than any other service I have tried (Sprint, Verizon,
AT&T TDMA).  

The Linux instructions for using this card can be found on the manufacturer's
web site:  http://www.sierrawireless.com/SupportDownload/ac7x0_linux.asp

There are other solutions for cellular Internet access at higher cost.  I seem
to remember these:
Sprint (about 120 kbps) $100 per month (unlimited)
AT&T (about 200 kbps) $80 per month (unlimited data, less with quotas)

T-Mobile's offering is also unlimited.  AT&T uses the same card that T-Mobile
uses but through some tricks they get much better speed.  Their speed claims
have been confirmed by reviews I read some time ago.  I have not met anybody
who used AT&T's service with Linux.  Sprint's service works under Linux.  You
can find more info about it on tummy.com's web site.  I have also used
Sprint's service at times and found it much faster than T-Mobile for
throughput but the latency is still much worse than dial-up. 

None of the above info has anything to do with WIFI (aka 802.11b wireless
LAN), which is offered at some coffee shops, bookstores, ...  WIFI is
generally much faster than cellular connections but is limited to so-called
hot spots (small areas where the service is available). 

I hope this brief summary is of use to some of you.

Ferdinand
--
Ferdinand Schmid
Architectural Energy Corporation
Celebrating over 20 Years of Improving Building Energy Performance
http://www.archenergy.com