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Verizon PCMCIA Card Just Works
Apple God writes "I was a friend's house and he showed me his Verizion PCMCIA card for internet access. On a whim, I put it in my PowerBook, and it recognized the card and prompted me for authorization to configure the system for use with the card. I entered my password, and was surprised to see an icon in the menu bar for it. I clicked on this icon and selected connect, it worked! I had internet access. Here is a picture of the card that I used. When we checked Verizon's page, they only listed Windows compatibility. To make matters sweeter, my friend was shocked that it 'just worked' because he had to install drivers in XP before it would work."
Apple provides some pretty versatile generic drivers with the OS. If your hardware is somewhat standards based, there's a pretty decent chance it will just work weather it's officially supported or not.
I know my USB card, my mouse, and 2 of my ethernet cards are not officially mac-compatible, but that didn't stop them from working beautifully as soon as I pluged them in and powered on.
"The worst tyrannies were the ones where a governance required its own logic on every embedded node." - Vernor Vinge
I've found that I rarely have to actually install a drive on OS X, but it's not imediatly recognized I usually have a hard timefinding one. Same thing for Linux
anyone tried this with SprintPCS CDMA cards?
http://tinyurl.com/4ny52
When that box was designed, it was by someone who gave a damn about quality of the parts. I am not suprised that Apple worked. They really are better built boxes.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
If you don't use the cdma carriers, one of the gsm ones also have cards for OSX, and apple drivers included.
http://www.whateversclever.net/sereview.php
Its nice when you can have a choice on Apple, you dont have to be locked down to 1 carrier and hardware.
I assume it's 10.something, but 10.what?
Good to hear about the VZW cards. I use one on my Windoze lappy (my work made me take THAT computer!) and have also played with it on Linux. As for OS X I love the fact that most handsets, CDMA or GSM, seem to work over bluetooth or data cables right out of the box. They do a really good job on the seamless syncing too. Now if they will just get on the ball with SyncML then all will be well. Hell, world peace may even ensue, starvation and poverty could become a thing of the past and, um, ok perhaps not. But it would be nice ;-)
http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/verizonbroa dbandaccesssupport.html
Were you running 10.3.5? Since those drivers were released a month before 10.3.5, I suspect they were included in it, and that would explain the card "just work"ing.
FWIW
Guess what? I plugged in a DeskJet 970cxi into my Windows XP system yesterday and it "just works".
Of course, when this happens on a Mac OS X system, it's worthy of front-page status on Slashdot, complete with a mini-dig at XP.
This is why people call Slashdot "Apple biased".
Every USB interface includes a class, subclass and protocol. There are several well defined combinations such as USB modem, printer, audio and all the HID stuff (joystick, keyboard, mouse etc).
Windows provides HID drivers, but does not provide drivers for any of the other stuff even though it could, which is why it needs drivers for almost any USB peripheral you plug in.
Mac and Linux have default drivers for a lot of the protocols which is why you can just plug things in and have them work.
And the relevance for this topic is that 5220 card is actually a USB controller with a USB modem and some other device (I forget which now) attached. Fortunately there are standard ways of talking to USB controllers as well.
So the real issue isn't being amazed at Mac/Linux not requiring drivers for this card, but why Windows is so damn broken by design that it does require them.
I've used unsupported ATM, SCSI and video cards in sun and rs/6000 workstations, and some driver in there made things work. Was also impressed when my SuSE install detected and setup a tokenring card that wasnt listed anywhere in Linux docs as supported.
Heres how it goes. Acme the semiconductor company as an ethernet design in its IP, and sells the design, or wafers to other places which integrate it into their own chips and boards. They name it different. They sell their stuff, make specific drivers, sometimes change PCI IDs, and hope everyone depends on THEIR drivers. Some hacker realizes the two chips are the same, and adds the PCI IDs of one in the other to make a unified driver in Linux/BSD/whatever.
Joe Schmoe plugs card it, is impressed and posts a slashdot story.
Really makes me wanna post a slashdot story on how I ran Windows 2000 on a 21164 CPU.
"Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you." -Nim Chimpsky
I think much of the "Not supported on OS X" talk is related to companies not wanting to pay for a cross-platform support staff.
Sprint does this. With their cell service you can get PCS Vision. You're not supposed to use it to go online with your computer (official response is that it's an unofficial feature), but you can. On top of that, it's not supposed to work for Mac, but it does. There's even a PCS Vision modem script built into OS X that ends all the hassle.
The ever ellusive, unsupported feature within an unsupported feature! I imagine companies save some money by just saying "not supported" instead of training a Mac Support team (or rather, hiring one), but I'd be surprised to learn exactly what works on a Mac that isn't supposed to. Makes you wonder...
Like Teddy with an elephant gun.
Jeeze, the thing just worked, to quote the key phrase of this thread. At that moment, I knew I'd not be going back to solaris or linux anytime soon. After a year with the box, I've yet to plug in anything and find it not working right away.
Apple wants you to think that the GUI is the best thing about their OS, but that's wrong. The GUI is OK, mind you, but it's more awkward than GNOME in some respects. But the hardware support, that's the jewel.
A lot of hardware also "just works" with Linux and BSD. In fact, I suspect a lot more hardware "just works" with Linux than with Macintosh because Linux includes so many drivers out of the box.
The reason for why hardware "just works" on all those non-Windows platfoms is simple: if OS vendors don't ship drivers with the hardware, you have to ship drivers with the OS.
Note that a lot of "driver CDs" contain a lot more than drivers: they contain documentation, setup utilities, etc. So, built-in support, whether on Macintosh or Linux or BSD, is often not as good as what you get from vendors. (OTOH, vendor CDs often install lots of garbage in addition to what you need.)
In the long run, we need more standard hardware interfaces, so that the low-level suff works for all hardware out of the box, but we also need to get vendors to support non-Windows platforms more.
You know, I'm sure all the Apple fans are really thrilled and enjoying this article and all that, given how nice this sounds on the surface...but seriously, consider what is being implied by the fact that this is on Slashdot. The article says: "Particular Piece of Hardware Easier To Use On Mac OS than Windows". The fact that this is newsworthy isn't a particularly cheery fact, y'know?
May we never see th
I noticed this a lot with my new Mac. After eight years of using Microsoft products, I buckled down and bought a dual 1.8Ghz G5 a few weeks ago.
:)
Every time I plug something into it, it just works. I bought a Formac TVR video capture unit, and plugged it in. No drivers, it recognized it just fine and Toast even let me capture off it. My new mouse worked perfectly. I plugged in my USB printer, and it didn't even bother prompting me about it - I was simply suddenly able to print documents from anywhere.
I love this thing
Mike
Having run a linux system for a while and having my graphics card not 'just work' with RH's default version of X, my experience is that the stuff that I want to use 'just works' with the Mac and is less likely to work with RH. That's not a complete story, but it is tell tale.
My old digital camera worked out like that... It was a Fuji FinePix 1400. Not fantastic, but it got the job done.
Anyways, it always seemed to have issues with my XP machine. I'd have to install drivers to begin with, but every once in a while it just decided to not work at all when I plugged it in. It ended up becoming a chore to get pictures off of the damn thing.
Then I tried plugging it into my iBook. I saw a "no name" drive instantly show up on my desktop, iPhoto opened and everything was perfect. I didn't even have to think about if it would work when I plugged it in again, it just always did.
Needless to say, I stopped using that camera with my XP machine and always pulled pictures off of it with my iBook. I use the past tense form there because I have a new camera now, so that one's not in use anymore.
yeah, i agree that it is really cool that our beloved mac os has so many drivers preinstalled, but come on, is this really a /. worthy story?
How fast is this service? I've used my T-Mobile phone with my PowerBook over bluetooth (irda a few years back) and it has always been dirt slow. Is this card faster than modem speeds?
I bought a playstation 2 adapter to USB for my G5. It said it was only compatable with Windows XP. It also came with a floppy disk full of drivers.
I plug it into my Mac.... And it worked. *shrug*
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1XEVDO rocks. That's about it.
Any idea who makes the card?
"Champagne for my real friends - and real pain for my sham friends!" http://ericblade.postalboard.com/
I'm a Verizon subscriber and I got curious a couple of weeks ago as to how to connect my TiPB to the 'net through my Nokia cell phone. The solution seemed to be a $50 cable and some modem scripts. Best speed would be 14.4K. This looks way better. The card pictured by the original poster is an Audiovox PC 5220 card. Here's the Verizon page for it:
Verizon Audiovox PC 5220
The card is currently available (to Verizon customers) for $99 with a 2 year contract ($15 activation fee). If you choose to keep your voice phone, then you'll get a second phone number for the card.If the link doesn't work, I found the card by googling for "audiovox pc 5220" and scanning the list (it was on the first page of hits) for the Verizon link.
I'm a bit hazy on the availability of the service and what if any charges there are beyond the activation fee. If you follow the links to "create a wireless package" you get sidetracked into a Verizon broadband coverage map where I stopped clicking. I may call Verizon tomorrow to see if a customer service rep can clarify this.
What's so impressive with this article? "Guy buys computer where things Just Work, tries it out, learns that things do indeed Just Work. Film at 11."
At my job, we have two managers with Powerbooks and these Verizon cards, and have been using them to little fanfare for perhaps a year now, maybe longer. The only glitch I can think of was that the cards didn't work with when 10.3.3 came out, but they worked fine again with 10.3.4.
Things usually just work with Macs. Why bother making a headline out of what should be obvious to anyone that uses these computers ?
DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL
Why is it news when an article of hardware works in a non-Microsoft system? It's not even a news article when hardware works under Linux!
I am government man, come from the government. The government has sent me. -- G.I.R.
My powerbook doesn't have a pcmcia slot. Is this using some kind of usb to pcmcia adapter?
Open Source Java Web Forum with LDAP authentication
AC writes:
you are all trolls. I refuse to respond.
I was just thinking the same thing. Although it's amazing how much we say when we're not responding to people.
Donate background CPU time to fight cancer.
If so much hardware 'just works' under Mac OS X, why don't manufacturers plug the hardware in, see that it works and state explicitly that is it Mac-compatible?
;)
Mac hardware can't cost that much. If the device doesn't work, tough - it's PC-only after all. If the device works, they can disclose it.
I'm sure the increased sales would justify a more guerilla attitude...especially as Mac hardware is obviously much more consistent than PC hardware.
Or are they worried about liability in the event of something going wrong with a piece of mission-critical hardware? Surely the license agreement could just say, if you're using this on a Mac then don't use it for running a nuclear power station/air traffic control system etc.
I hear this all the time, and I call bullshit.
Prove that you can make a top of the line PC for $500.
Piece of cake!
First, I budget $250 for a sweet Lian Li case. Aluminum, thumbscrews, wheels. Great stuff.
Second, I go to eBay and get whatever kind of computer I can get for $250. Maybe a Pentium-166 or so these days.
Install Pentium-166 board into nice case. Then go to a hacker get-together, and show off your sweet new computer. When somebody asks what it is, you say "It's my sweet new computer! But it'd be even better if I had a GeForce graphics card for it..."
Repeat about 10 times.
Man uses Mac, machine 'just works'. Film at 11.