Travel Technology - Alternatives to TMobile AirCard for laptop use?

I have a Sierra Wireless AirCard 750 in my laptop working with TMobile. Its ok, it is just SLOW.

I'll be on a ship along both the East coast and the West coast this Fall. Who has good coastal coverage? Who has FASTER service? With what devices?

Is a PCMCIA card best? Or a phone with a cord that hooks to the laptop?

TIA!

Actually, there really aren't any good solutions yet, with singular (no pun intended) exception to the Verizon high speed available only in some areas of the country.

The others, are all weak compared to even dial up, or an 802.11b plan nationwide.

Sprint PCS seesm to be the best solution, for speed and access, AND, if you have the 10$ a month unlimited phone plan, then you can buy a cable on ebay that will let you use this as a modem for your laptop, and have unlimited access there too.

Sprint frowns on this, but they can only reprimand you and or cancel the data side of your account access.

There was a review of many plans in the latest mobile PC I think.

Sprint PCS seems to be the best solution, for speed and access, AND, if you have the 10$ a month unlimited phone plan, then you can buy a cable on ebay that will let you use this as a modem for your laptop, and have unlimited access there too.

Thanks, nmenaker, great help, and you got my attention... Now, can you either suggest how I might find these (I've spent more than an hour searching)? Or give me URLs?

Sprint PCS $10 per month unlimited phone plan?

Cable on eBay that allows me to use the above phone as a modem?

Much thanks,
925

The sprint pcs vision plan, is the one that offers the 10$ unlimited interent.

suppossed to be from the phone, but this lets you surf from your laptop connection

http://www.gomadic.com/

ATT Edge service with a SonyEricsson GC82? (currently FREE with an Edge plan)

Be careful with using PCS vision account for Internet use, Sprint are not too happy with that and **MIGHT** slap on overage charges.

The Sierra Aircard is currently the fastest GPRS device you can get so any GSM based phone and cord won't speed things up.

What Access Point is the card using? Are you on T-mobiles FULL GPRS service or are you using their wap Access point (T-zones?)

T-zones is limited to around 28k8, their true GPRS accounts on internet2.voicestream.com and internet3.voicestream.com are rated at around 52k max. If you are on internet2 call them and get your account provisioned for VPN access, that will allow you to use the internet3 access point, IMHO often a bit faster.

[QUOTE=ScottC]What Access Point is the card using? Are you on T-mobiles FULL GPRS service or are you using their wap Access point (T-zones?)
QUOTE]

I am using a GPRS connection. I don't understand the "Access Point" reference.

There is now a new promo with the t-mobile prepay service, Easyspeak. Users with a card, get FREE GPRS access, no usage charges at all. Meaning, if you have a phone cable, or even BT connection, you can use the phone as a modem. I don't know how long this promo will go on, but for the 30$ it takes to buy a prepay card on ebay, with 100$ worth of "minutes" it seems a very cheap solution indeed.

One would need an unlocked phone for that, but thost too are cheap on ebay, or even in the stores.

[QUOTE=ScottC]What Access Point is the card using? Are you on T-mobiles FULL GPRS service or are you using their wap Access point (T-zones?)
QUOTE]

I am using a GPRS connection. I don't understand the "Access Point" reference.

Let me ask it differently, how much do you pay per month for GPRS?

There is now a new promo with the t-mobile prepay service, Easyspeak. Users with a card, get FREE GPRS access, no usage charges at all. Meaning, if you have a phone cable, or even BT connection, you can use the phone as a modem. I don't know how long this promo will go on, but for the 30$ it takes to buy a prepay card on ebay, with 100$ worth of "minutes" it seems a very cheap solution indeed.

One would need an unlocked phone for that, but thost too are cheap on ebay, or even in the stores.


Not 100% correct, users get free WAP over GPRS, but you CAN use that for web browsing. Most ports are blocked (i.e. secure HTML etc...) PLUS it's speed is limited to under 28k8, so this will not be a solution to his problem.

Well, I am using it now for getting my pop3 email, and for web browsing. It allowed me to get to my bank, and ual.com.

I have not tried imapi, or other protocols, but this should cover most users. I'll try to VPN into my company site tonite when I get home

If you are a t-mobile user, then you can sign up for their hotspot services, all starbucks, airports, some kinkos, other places. They only charge 20$ a month, and it is turn on turn off, not committments.

Granted, one has to be near a hot spot, or find one.

But, the speed is very good.

Well, I am using it now for getting my pop3 email, and for web browsing. It allowed me to get to my bank, and ual.com.

I have not tried imapi, or other protocols, but this should cover most users. I'll try to VPN into my company site tonite when I get home

It's a local thing, there are reports that not all regions support secure web and pop.

The Aircard is the best we have found if you travel to areas that are outside of the major markets.

the new AT&T Edge card (Sony/Eric) is sweet and the price is decent but you can't get service in most places yet and the price per bit downloaded sucks compared to the t-mobile $30 a month unlimited plan.


Your best bet for speed is wifi if you can get it, otherwise just be happy with the Aircard for email and save your web needs for a faster pipe.

Have you tried the T-mobile Web accelerator?

When connected to GPRS head over to:

http://getmorespeed.tmobile.com

It's a web based proxy that compresses and re-renders images for you.

Yep - the proxy is not bad for certain things but it kills our online sales systems and blows up a bunch of java things I normally need.

Let me ask it differently, how much do you pay per month for GPRS?

I am on full GPRS. I pay $10/mo in addition to the cell service (of $20 on a Family Plan).

I think Verizon is better than anyone in the US in terms of both speed and coverage. They cost more however. I dont know how their coastal coverage is in particular. You might check their maps and www.verizonwireless.com. You would be looking for the National Access or 1xRTT maps.

I am on full GPRS. I pay $10/mo in addition to the cell service (of $20 on a Family Plan).

Well, unless you are on some odd promo I don't know of that is NOT full GPRS. That is "T-zones PRO". (WAP and EMAIL access).

Check your latest bill for the description of the GPRS service.

You need to call T-mobile and tell them to provision your account for the "T-Mobile Internet Unlimited plan" which costs 29.99 stand alone or 19.99 as an add-on to any voice plan.

Also tell them to provision for VPN Access. Then setup the Aircard with the Accesspoint name internet3.voicestream.com. I'd be more than willing to help let you know how to change the settings on the Aircard.

The plan you are on is limited to 28k8 as it isn't made for full blown web access.

The Verizon stuff is not bad if you can get the coverage on their newer network otherwise it drops down to CPDP speeds. The Verizon card also does not roam internationally that I know of.

Right, only the National Access/1x network is high speed. But it has pretty good coverage from what I understand.

I am on full GPRS. I pay $10/mo in addition to the cell service (of $20 on a Family Plan).

Well, I got that backwards... I pay $20/mo in addition to the cell service (of $10 on a Family Plan). Basically, the plan that lets you add GPRS to any TMobile line for $20 more per month, unlimited use.

Well, I got that backwards... I pay $20/mo in addition to the cell service (of $10 on a Family Plan). Basically, the plan that lets you add GPRS to any TMobile line for $20 more per month, unlimited use.

OK, then that the "real" GPRS.

In the Aircard watcher pop into the options menu and check the profile you use is setup to internet2 or internet3. You mentioned you are on a ship, how is the signal there? You might want to consider getting an external antenna for the aircard (Sierra Wireless sell adapters for these on their website). They also sell an adapter to make the current antenna external to place outside the boat.

I have two profiles:
T-Mobile Internet (which is auto connect and default), and
T-Mobile Internet - VPN which has neither box checked.

On the first one, my APN is internet2.voicestream.com.
On the VPN profile, my APN is internet3.voicestream.com.

I'll check the Sierra site also. Thanks.

Either my reply is missing or this is a duplication... sorry.

My default profile is internet2.
There is an unused VPN profile of internet3.

I've just been to the Sierra Wireless site.

I use a Nokia phone (n-gage) and t-mobile's unlimited data. It give's me 33Kbps all the time and close to 50Kbps sometimes. There are only a few ports blocked out, but then if you use a VPN client to your office you'll be wide open. It's good for all mail protocols, www, even oracle and sap clients work just fine. It's the best anywhere solution for the $

Combine with T-mobile's hotspot and for when you have access and you have the best mobile solution you can have.

Most handset vendor's will have a handsets that are GPRS/EDGE and 820.11 capable this year. This will allow you to roam from a GPRS connection to a hotspot location for faster service.

I use a Nokia phone (n-gage) and t-mobile's unlimited data. It give's me 33Kbps all the time and close to 50Kbps sometimes. There are only a few ports blocked out, but then if you use a VPN client to your office you'll be wide open. It's good for all mail protocols, www, even oracle and sap clients work just fine. It's the best anywhere solution for the $

Combine with T-mobile's hotspot and for when you have access and you have the best mobile solution you can have.

Most handset vendor's will have a handsets that are GPRS/EDGE and 820.11 capable this year. This will allow you to roam from a GPRS connection to a hotspot location for faster service.


Edge, yes. But GPRS/820.11 has only been announced in a couple of devices like the Motorola MPx and the new Communicator.

Have you tried the T-mobile Web accelerator?

When connected to GPRS head over to:

http://getmorespeed.tmobile.com

It's a web based proxy that compresses and re-renders images for you.

Has anyone been able to successfully use getmorespeed? From what I understand, you put this as your proxy using port 8080 when connected through GPRS.

I use a BT card in my laptop to connect to a SonyEricsson T610. The T610 is set up using the internet3 (VPN) gateway at tmobile.

The problem I am having is that IE6's proxy settings only kick in for LAN type connections and are effectively disabled for dialup connections. The BT based connection I use work like dialup.

Has anyone been able to successfully use getmorespeed? From what I understand, you put this as your proxy using port 8080 when connected through GPRS.

I use a BT card in my laptop to connect to a SonyEricsson T610. The T610 is set up using the internet3 (VPN) gateway at tmobile.

The problem I am having is that IE6's proxy settings only kick in for LAN type connections and are effectively disabled for dialup connections. The BT based connection I use work like dialup.

You don't need to change any proxy settings, you just go to that web page as soon as you are connected and tell it the compression you want, it then keeps that setting as long as you don't close your browser session.

It's down quite a lot, pretty much like a lot of other T-mobile services...