cellular companies can bite my....

wsuffa

wsuffa

Touchdown! Greaser!
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Bill S.
So, I'm looking for a wireless broadband card for the laptop. My greatest use for the thing will be during the next 4-6 months, with unknown usage after that. I despise term contracts. And it would be really nice to have something that works internationally.

The international part pushes one toward either T-Mobile or Cingular. T-Mobile is limited to low-speed service due to infrastructure. Cingular, aside from the usual customer service issues, has poorer coverage and higher costs than some of the alternatives. And (while not as restrictive as Verizon) more restrictive use limitations. Reports are mixed on Cingular international roaming... my past experience with Cingular voice service was not good cost/intl roaming wise. Cingular wants $79/mo for service.

Verizon's so-called unlimited service comes with usage limits. And they have disconnected people for excessive data downloads. Write Verizon off. VZ wants $79/month for service. Write VZ off.

Sprint, on the other hand, gets fairly good reviews on coverage. Usage limitations are far less than the others (Sprint will even sell you a WiFi router with a wireless card slot so you can set up your own multi-user shared network connection). Sprint very business oriented.

So... I look more closely at Sprint. Two contract terms available: a 1 year contract with $79.99 a month recurring charge plus a cost for the card and activation; or a 2 year term at $59.99 a month recurring with free card and activation. For either contract there is a $200 early termination fee. If I take Sprint, I'd have to do a prepay or something similar for a T-Mobile or Boingo wifi, but that's still cheaper/easier than getting a Cingular card, especially when intl travel is undefined.

I've looked at Cellswapper and CelltradeUSA, there's a couple of contracts available there that looks reasonable (assuming that Sprint will allow transfer - one's on a corp. rate contract), but the card that comes-with is a single band PCS card, as opposed to the dual-band cards that Sprint is now supplying. The single-band cards limit coverage area. Blah.

My thinking is, if I need to do this, get the 2 year contract, book the $20/mo savings, and if I want out in a year pay the $200 termination. No matter how I look at it, I come out ahead with the cheaper plan. The $200 becomes part of the rate. And I think it's cheaper than paying for the card + activation (even though the carrier doesn't pay anything near that for the card). Even if I could get a $79/mo rate without a term contract, the break-even point is 8 months if I got the card free.

And that's to get the really crappy customer service that Sprint has.

What a scam. Wish I could make money like that. Worse, much worse, than the airlines, I say.
 
The bane of financial analysis. Instead of feeling that you might be getting screwed, you can quantify it and show where it hurts the most!

Totally unhelpful response Bill, but frankly, dems the brakes when it comes to cellular service. I'd love to be in an industry where I can s*** on my customers and charge them for the pleasure.

Actually, strike that, I'd hate myself and feel like a dirtbag...

Cheers,

-Andrew
 
I am using T-Mobile GPRS. It is not super fast, about 250kbps, but it is cheap. I am waiting for mobile WiMAX to come out later this year in a few cities for trials. I am hoping to get to be one of the friendly users on the trial.
 
Bill, your not supposed to run the numbers like that. They know that $200 penalty should weigh on you to stay put.

There should have been some great deals with lock-in in these weeks before the iPhone ships.

It's funny because I do the same calculation, figuring the upfront cost divided over the months or years of use, all of the time. I don't think we're supposed to do that either.

Keep in mind that you might be able to limp along for those few months using public wifi and net access with a data plan on a conventional cell phone.
 
smigaldi said:
I am using T-Mobile GPRS. It is not super fast, about 250kbps, but it is cheap. I am waiting for mobile WiMAX to come out later this year in a few cities for trials. I am hoping to get to be one of the friendly users on the trial.
Click to expand...

Scott,

How's the latency with T-Mobile's GPRS? Will it support VPN and/or SSH connections without being kicked out due to latency?

If I understand correctly, the T-Mobile plan includes wi-fi access where it's available. It's $10/mo cheaper than Sprint, but I don't know whether that's the same on a one or two year plan.

I'd also have to spend $149 to buy the aircard, plus activation.

So the financial analysis is:

Sprint: 1 year = 12 x 59 + 200 = $908
Sprint: 2 year = 24 x 59 = $1416

T-Mobile: 1 yr* = 12 x 49 + 150 + 35 = $773

*assumes I can get a 1 year contract at no extra hardware cost or MRC

And T-Mobile works internationally.

Still worse than the airlines, I say.
 
BTW, Cellswapper and CelltradeUSA are great sites, though I suspect if they really take off that the cell companies will outright ban contract transfers.
 
wsuffa said:
Scott,

How's the latency with T-Mobile's GPRS? Will it support VPN and/or SSH connections without being kicked out due to latency?

If I understand correctly, the T-Mobile plan includes wi-fi access where it's available. It's $10/mo cheaper than Sprint, but I don't know whether that's the same on a one or two year plan.

I'd also have to spend $149 to buy the aircard, plus activation.

So the financial analysis is:

Sprint: 1 year = 12 x 59 + 200 = $908
Sprint: 2 year = 24 x 59 = $1416

T-Mobile: 1 yr* = 12 x 49 + 150 + 35 = $773

*assumes I can get a 1 year contract at no extra hardware cost or MRC

And T-Mobile works internationally.

Still worse than the airlines, I say.
Click to expand...
I have been able to get VPN to work with my GPRS connection. The main reason I have it is to get into the work network and they are the ones paying for it. The guys with 1xEV-DO are all happy with the service, one Sprint employee I know has told me he would even be willing to pay for the service himself as long as he had the 1xEV-DO rev A service equipment. But the price stops me. Most of the time I can get 802.11 coverage and use the GPRS as a stop gap.
 
mikea said:
Keep in mind that you might be able to limp along for those few months using public wifi and net access with a data plan on a conventional cell phone.
Click to expand...

Yabut I'm on a VZ phone w/crippled bluetooth that's OFF contract. If I add data service, I'm hooked back into a contract with them. Why VZ? Because they still have analog roaming when I'm out in the sticks... and they have exclusive rights to the subway tunnels in a major city that I've spent a lot of time in (not that it really works without dropping calls as the train is moving....)
 
smigaldi said:
Most of the time I can get 802.11 coverage and use the GPRS as a stop gap.
Click to expand...

that's what I've also heard about Rev.A EVDO.

Problem with 802.11 coverage is this: certain airports (SAT, for example) have no 802.11, some (DFW, Crown Rooms, Admiral's Club) have T-Mobile, and some (BWI, ORD concourses) have other services like Boingo. And then there are the hotels that "allow" T-mobile customers to roam on their systems for a "roaming fee".

Part of what's driving this is that I've stayed in a couple of hotels recently that are outright blocking the ports needed for VPN and/or Exchange Webmail. I've spent about 2 hours on the phone with tech support who claims they're "not blocking IPSec, there are just too many users online at the hotel for the network capacity". Bullhockey. They're blocking the ports 'cause I've tested it. They can bite me, too.
 
I've got the Verizon card. I think it's $59/month here. Haven't hit any limits on it so far.
 
mikea said:
Bill, your not supposed to run the numbers like that. They know that $200 penalty should weigh on you to stay put.

There should have been some great deals with lock-in in these weeks before the iPhone ships.

It's funny because I do the same calculation, figuring the upfront cost divided over the months or years of use, all of the time. I don't think we're supposed to do that either.

Keep in mind that you might be able to limp along for those few months using public wifi and net access with a data plan on a conventional cell phone.
Click to expand...

If the American public were good at math then the credit card companies wouldn't exist.
 
FlyNE said:
If the American public were good at math then the credit card companies wouldn't exist.
Click to expand...

Or some mortgage brokers, "Just call and let us tell you just HOW LOW YOUR PAYMENTS WILL BE!" (with negative amortization).

"We helped Mr. and Mrs. Smith LOWER THEIR PAYMENTS BY $450 a month! Imagine what you could do with that..."

"Get a $250,000 loan for just $800 a month..."
 
mikea said:
Or some mortgage brokers, "Just call and let us tell you just HOW LOW YOUR PAYMENTS WILL BE!" (with negative amortization).

"We helped Mr. and Mrs. Smith LOWER THEIR PAYMENTS BY $450 a month! Imagine what you could do with that..."

"Get a $250,000 loan for just $800 a month..."
Click to expand...

Yeah. "Creative financing". Ya gotta love that term...
 
I have the sprint PCS card. I have yet to find a place where I didnt have service. Broadband is poping up all over the place, most of the eastern US is broadband, and the west, all the major cities, and smaller ones are now being converted to broadband. I drove all up and down New england with very high speeds. Out west, I can drive from Havasu to vegas, phoenix, Los Angeles or even Flagstaff and have service the entire time. One trick with sprint...Dump their software and setup an dial up networks and dial #777 then you wont be dumped when you get into roaming areas. i pay 49.00 a month and have had the service for about a year now. Even in areas when you don't have broadband, the speed is still way faster than dial up. I hate sprint as much as I hate all cell providers, but they seem to be the better of all the cellular companies I have tried. Service wise.
 
wsuffa said:
Yabut I'm on a VZ phone w/crippled bluetooth that's OFF contract. If I add data service, I'm hooked back into a contract with them.
Click to expand...

That's precisely why I left VZ. I'd had a VZ phone for 8 years and was never less than 1000 minutes/month. I started looking for the next thing when their original Bluetooth phone (which could have been REALLY cool) was crippled. When I tried to *add* minutes to my plan and they wanted another year on the contract (which was a change in policy), I told them to take a hike.

Too bad, as their customer service is probably the best in the business, not that that's saying much when compared with the likes of Sprint. :vomit:
 
flyingcheesehead said:
That's precisely why I left VZ. I'd had a VZ phone for 8 years and was never less than 1000 minutes/month. I started looking for the next thing when their original Bluetooth phone (which could have been REALLY cool) was crippled. When I tried to *add* minutes to my plan and they wanted another year on the contract (which was a change in policy), I told them to take a hike.

Too bad, as their customer service is probably the best in the business, not that that's saying much when compared with the likes of Sprint. :vomit:
Click to expand...

I think T-Mobile has the best customer service of the bunch. Sprint garnered, what, the lowest customer service rating of ANY company of any kind?

I'd dump VZ, but I still occasionally travel to areas where analog is the only choice. VZ and Sprint were the only two providers that offered analog rollover (after I dumped my old, overpriced, and reduced coverage AT&T TDMA plan once Cingular bought it). At the time Sprint refused to do anything other than 2 years, even in the stores. So VZ it was.

Sprint has the best offering in domestic wireless broadband. I've got a couple of notes into folks on the cell swap sites, let's see what happens.
 
I've had T-Mobile for phone and PDA/Web as well as Web via an Aircard for nearly two years. Initially, I had a Sony GC-79 but it had problems like crazy. Its internal antenna was horrible as well. Last year, I sold it on eBay for almost as much as I paid and then bought a Sony GC-83 also on eBay. Along with it, I got an external mag mount antenna to put on the car. My signal strength took off like crazy.

When T-Mobile went to EDGE cards, they went with the GC-89 which also has an internal antenna.

I'm paying $29.95 a month and speeds range from about 80kbs to 230kbs. For the price, that's not bad. Things tend to do pretty well for me. When viewing PoA from that laptop, the server tends to be more of a problem than card speed.

If signal is important along with cost, I'd suggest going to them for service but buy a card elsewhere. Here is the link to the seller on eBay where I got my last card and the antenna:

http://search.ebay.com/_W0QQsassZsunsunsunQQhtZ
 
wsuffa said:
Sprint garnered, what, the lowest customer service rating of ANY company of any kind?
Click to expand...

That would not surprise me in the least.

What was nice about VZ's customer service was that they couldn't dump you on someone. The first human you spoke to stayed with you the whole time. No "Well, you need to talk to billing/tech support/whoever, let me transfer you." It was always a conference call with the other party, with the CS rep helping explain things to the other person.

I also had a billing issue once where I got a bill for $1200 :hairraise:. Now, I actually did legitimately owe them over $600 at that point, but we found that someone had not properly entered things when making a change to my rate plan and my free nights and weekends had never been added. Rather than simply fixing the bill and having me pay what I actually did owe, they fixed the account... And then wiped the bill clean. $0. Wow.
 
OK, so I elected to go with Sprint's EVDO Rev-A product.

It really wasn't easy. Not at all. Especially in a direct comparison with my experiences getting a Verizon cellphone a year or two ago.

First, I have a notation in my credit record after my passport and a credit card were stolen three years ago.

This was a non-issue for Verizon - they cleared it with two forms of ID at the counter. Sprint could not/would not. Despite having to present ID to establish the account (a normal requirement), they insisted that I call them from my home phone to verify that it's me (the fallacy of this as a form of ID fell on deaf ears). So, I went home, called from the home phone, and told the CSR that the credit department wanted me to call due to the potential fraud alert on my credit report. "You've had fraud on your phone" she asked - I said no - this went on about 4 times before I said: "just connect me with the credit department, NOW". She said she'd find the number and give it to me, instead the next thing I hear is ringing and "If you're calling.... press 1..."

I finally got a credit agent after pressing 0 a couple of times. She then asked if I had two lines so she could call back on the specified number. This went on a couple of times until I said "I'm going to hang up, call me back and I'll answer". After she called back, it took 2 minutes to get approval.

Then back to the store. It tooka good 20 minutes of the salesperson working with the computer to make the sale and set up the account. I walked out with the network card, the contract, and reciepts.

Done?

No, not yet. I had to install the card and call them to activate it. Trouble was, when I called, they couldn't see the account on the computer. It was "too new". She asked if the sales person gave me a lock code and some other data, when I responded yes, she had me type them in on another screen. She then said "leave the computer on with the card in for 4 hours". At that, I hit the roof. It was 4:30, and I was headed out the door to a meeting at 5.

Fortunately, the activation took hold within minutes, so there was no need for a 4 hour wait.

Now we'll see if they got the contract right.

On first test, downtown in a major metro area, I saw 286 down, 450 up. At a suburban location, I saw 900 down, 650 up. The suburban numbers are quite respectable. Downtown's OK.
 
Bill, is it the $79.95/mo rate or was there any better deal than that?

The speed is pretty impressive. Keep an update here on how it does in different areas.

The week before last, I did a late night run from Atlanta out to Talladega then north to Fort Payne. I was listening to JFK tower on LiveATC.net the whole time. I didn't lose a signal until I got over a hill east of Fort Payne. I was able to pick it up again when getting near Rome, GA. That wasn't bad at all. I lose T-Mobile entirely when I cut through the woods between Augusta and Athens. Some other signal shows up but I can't capture it for a link.

I'd love a faster bandwidth but I don't know that I can justify the higher costs.
 
smigaldi said:
Kenny who well does it work when you start moving and at what speed do you as a user notice the degradation in performance?
Click to expand...
I had to read that a couple times... oh... "HOW"!!! There are drops here and there. I've had it go down to the lowest bars and still have a connection. Other times, it would drop on me while I had a decent signal. I'm told the data signal comes off the same towers as voice but voice gets priority. This may pose a problem at times but I don't see a pattern in any particular areas such as the business districts. I do see the same drop in the same areas as my Treo but there are times one will drop while the other is strong. To sum that up, I can't see a rhyme or reason!
 
KennyFlys said:
To sum that up, I can't see a rhyme or reason!
Click to expand...

Scott:

What Kenny said. (Uh oh, the world is ending! :rofl:)

(Snip the start of a long explanation of how this crap works 'cuz you probably already know.)

So, to sum it up... It depends, and it's not obvious where you'll get good (or any) service or have it just drop. (This is speaking more to Cingular service than Sprint, because that's what I have experience with, but they pretty much all work the same.)
 
wsuffa said:
It really wasn't easy. Not at all.
Click to expand...

Sounds like Sprint, all right. Some companies make it exceedingly hard for you to give them money, don't they?

On first test, downtown in a major metro area, I saw 286 down, 450 up. At a suburban location, I saw 900 down, 650 up. The suburban numbers are quite respectable. Downtown's OK.
Click to expand...

Wow, that's pretty darn good. Have you tried it outside the major metro areas yet?
 
I have a Sprint card on loan, if you're in coverage it works great. But at the "country house," near T82, it does not work. Green light blinks, indicating a signal of some sort, but it never connects.

What I want is a comparison test of all these, see if any of them work in the airplane.
 
KennyFlys said:
Bill, is it the $79.95/mo rate or was there any better deal than that?

I'd love a faster bandwidth but I don't know that I can justify the higher costs.
Click to expand...

Actually, it's a $59.95/month rate, 2 year contract ($200 if you terminate early - do the math, you're ahead of the game on a 2 year deal even if you cancel at 12 months). The $79/mo deal is a 1 year contract.

I'll keep you informed. So far, I'm pleased with it. It allows VPN connections, which is better than the "free" internet service that some hotels provide.
 
wsuffa said:
Actually, it's a $59.95/month rate, 2 year contract ($200 if you terminate early - do the math, you're ahead of the game on a 2 year deal even if you cancel at 12 months). The $79/mo deal is a 1 year contract.
Click to expand...
I hope they come down more. Right now, I'm paying $29.95/mo with T-Mobile. Slower but it works for me. MY biggest problem is when downloading map graphics and satellite images.
 
SCCutler said:
I have a Sprint card on loan, if you're in coverage it works great. But at the "country house," near T82, it does not work. Green light blinks, indicating a signal of some sort, but it never connects.

What I want is a comparison test of all these, see if any of them work in the airplane.
Click to expand...

Spike,

Probably not. I've tried. By the time you're 1000 AGL you have line-of-sight to all the surrounding cells, and the poor thing just gets confused. It'll show excellent signal, but will not work. Cellular technology relies on all the crap on the ground, believe it or not! Somehow, you have to attenuate the signals sufficiently that you can't reach another cell with the same frequency group, which is probably only 12 or so miles away...
 
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