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Comparing Wireless Internet Services
Carl Oppedahl writes "AT&T has released its new "Edge" wireless Internet access service, claiming it is twice as fast (100-130K) as Sprint's "PCS Vision" wireless service (50-70K). I have written up a few comments on my experiences with the services. What data rates are others getting with Edge? I rarely get the advertised faster speeds."
What I'd like is a reasonably fast wireless service that is good enough to let VPN work over it. My boss has had a terrible time getting that working on his Sprint PCS connection.
I almost feel bad when he calls from Hawaii and he can't get access to our database from the beach chair.
Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
My love affair with Vision ended about two weeks into the service. It's never been fast, its never worked reliably, and most important, I've never found it particularly useful.
Like a lot of products I have an early-adoptor's love affair with, it solves a problem I don't have. About the most useful thing I ever did with it was write a wap frontend for the nessus batch commandline so I could really impress the ladies. Turns out most ladies don't even know what nessus is. In a college town, I tell you!
For those of you that read Gartner, you'll note where Sprint falls on the fabled magic quadrent. Its a special quadrent reserved for those who had a great idea and then blew it. Can you guess which?
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Is this surprising? Have you EVER gotten the advertised specs from your high tech products? Have you ever gotten 56K from a 56K modem? Have you ever gotten 2Mbps from a DSL provider? Have you ever gotten 17" viewable from your 17" monitor? Have you ever gotten 20GB from your 20GB hard drive?
The advertised specs are almost always inflated and unattainable. But, the sad thing is that consumers continue to allow the vendors to get away with it.