Wireless Wide Area Data Services

[big chopper]

Hi All,

I want to subscribe to one of the broadband data services offered by Verizon, Spint, Cingular. I'm talking about one of those plans where you get a PC Card that provides access to the Internet in metro areas (without WiFi).

Does anyone here have any experience with any such plan? Any advice?

TIA
--BC,

[cycom]

I use verizon for my phone, and have a data cable that plugs into my phone. You can get low speed (14.4kbps) off of your minutes that way. This works with your free nights and weekends. Just set up your connection settings to dial #777 , username: qnc password: qnc. I've asked several verizon reps and techs and they all say it's cool with verizon. This kicks quite a bit of ass when you are traveling away from cities and hotels and such, but still have cell access. For $20 (Overpriced, from Radio Crack, available online for far less, I imagine), it seems like a pretty decent deal.

However, there are three cons to this method that I think are important.
1)It uses your minutes, so it's really only free for nights and weekends.
2)Your phone cannot accept calls while it is data mode.
3)The connection is slow.


The pcmcia card that you get is supposed to be good, but AFAIK, the speeds aren't really up to 1mbit yet on a regular basis. I can passably surf the web and ssh to my machine at home, but I can't do much more than that with my phone. The highspeed is probably fine for normal web surfing, but gaming will probably be better saved for wifi. That's my two cents. Hope it gave you some help. Keep in mind: I have not tried the pcmcia cards myself, and have only used verizon for phone/internet combo.

[astcell]

I have the same deal with Sprint with some minor differences:

1. $10 a month gives you Internet access on your phone. This is for unlimited use, and it does not use your minutes.

2. Speeds in 5-bar areas approach 230k.

3. Sprint will let you slide as longs you do not take the "unlimited data" part seriously. Stay under 200MB a month and they are fine.

Technically, "tethering" your phone may be a violation of TOS, but what isn't? According to TOS if I swear at you on the phone or email a dirty joke I just violated the rules.

There is the PC card that you can use as well, but they run about $79 a month for Internet service. I prefer to use my phone and pay much less, and also have a phone to boot.

[octalpus]

I pay $19.99 a month for unlimited data with T-mobile. I just use a data cable with my phone instead of an additional card. It doesn't use my minutes and it's slightly better than the dial-up speeds of yore.

On an unrelated note, I could have sworn this thread was titled "Wireless Wide Area Dating Services".

[cycom]

I actually used to work for radio crack and all of our sprint reps told us that tethering your phone did not make sprint happy at all, if they catch you using it for data. Verizon is discontinuing their data cable sales, but they are keeping the service up. I can pay to get the highspeed per month as well, not sure how much it is, but I can get the 230k/s. The new EVDO network is supposedly faster, but not sure how that goes. As far as customer service goes, verizon's is pretty hot. We had a customer come in with a $1500 bill because someone had clicked the wrong promotion code when activating the phone, and verizon had it fixed within 20 minutes. We had sprint customers coming in all the time griping about their phone being cut off for going over their spending limit, paying down the bill, and then having a charge that was delayed for some reason hit and have their phone cut off again. Cingular incorrectly set up my minutes on a prepay and then refused to credit me the $30 that they had been removing from my account $1 a day instead of the 20 cents daytime 10 cents nighttime per minute that it should have been. Nextel and Sprint are now basically one and the same. T-Mobile is supposed to have some kickass data services, but where I am, their coverage cannot touch verizon. Radio Crack is ditching verizon in the next week or so, so perhaps you can get a phone on the cheap there, but I'd go to a real store if you end up picking them up. Radio Crack does NOT have the Verizon data cards. In any case, good luck with your hunt. Make sure when you do get a service to let us know how it is. Also: Check the laws for your state. In my state you are legally entitled to a 14 day trial period before you are locked into the contract in which they can only charge you for services used. That may give you a chance to test out all the services where you will normally be and pick the best.