Cingular cell phone service

Author

Laptop card

Hell and High Water

2007-01-16, 10:33 am

I've seen the Cingular laptop cards, but really don't know much about
their data plans, nor about their network.

What I really want to know is: How well do they work?

If you have one, please let me know:

1. How easy it is to connect to the Internet

2. Any gaps in coverage?

3. How's the speed? Download speed? Upload?

try www.speedtest.net

4. Any other thoughts?

Thanks so much.

-Bob

Robert A. Fink, M. D.

2007-01-17, 10:33 pm

On Tue, 16 Jan 2007 07:48:10 -0600, Hell and High Water
< tifosoREM@OVEcomcast
.net> wrote:

>I've seen the Cingular laptop cards, but really don't know much about
>their data plans, nor about their network.
>
>What I really want to know is: How well do they work?
>
>
>If you have one, please let me know:
>
>
>1. How easy it is to connect to the Internet
>
>2. Any gaps in coverage?
>
>3. How's the speed? Download speed? Upload?
>
>try www.speedtest.net
>
>
>4. Any other thoughts?
>
>
>Thanks so much.
>
>
>-Bob
>

I have had the Cingular 3G Laptop Connect card for almost a year and I
am very pleased with it. I have been able to connect anywhere I can
get a cellular (GSM) signal. The "gaps" are the same as with the
telephone.

The download speed is significantly faster than dialup and almost as
good as standard DSL, but not as fast as the speed that I get with
Comcast cable at home. Upload speed is in the range of the
old-fashioned ISDN (126K). The speed is slower where there is no 3G
"accelerated" service, but this service is growing and is going to be
available in most big-city areas soon.

It is pricey ($60 per month for unlimited data transfer plus about
$100+ for the hardware), but, in my case, it is worth it. I no longer
have to depend on hotel "High-Speed Internet" connections, some of
which give one trouble, especially with sending SMTP mail through
another provider. Just this past weekend, I was at a convention in
Sacramento, and the hotel (Hyatt) had Wi-Fi in the rooms which (at $10
per day) worked just fine for downloading, but would not accept
outgoing mail from my Comcast account (it accepted ATT, my other
provider, just fine). I simply switched over to my Cingular card and
all was fine and the speed was almost as fast (and I didn't have to
pay any more daily charges).

Best,

Bob

Robert A. Fink, M. D., FACS, P. C.
Neurological Surgery
2500 Milvia Street Suite 222
Berkeley, CA 94704-2636 USA
510-849-2555

"Ex Tristitia Virtus"

Hell and High Water

2007-01-18, 10:33 am

In article < tbbtq25cmebe1mtaqgeh
dpr4vk67ip6rih@4ax.com>,
lynxer@comcast.net says...

> I have had the Cingular 3G Laptop Connect card for almost a year and I
> am very pleased with it.

Thanks so much for the info!

I appreciate your help.

-Bob

ParrotSquawk

2007-01-20, 10:33 am

On Jan 18, 11:27 am, Hell and High Water <tifoso...@OVEcomcast.net>
wrote:
> In article < tbbtq25cmebe1mtaqgeh
dpr4vk67ip6...@4ax.com>,
> lyn...@comcast.net says...
>
>
> I appreciate your help.
>
> -Bob

I have had the Novatel U730 for about a year(?) and use it extensively
while driving in the car (wife drives, I work.) Traveling from Florida
to North Carolina to Ohio to New York State to Massachusetts and back
home exposed few problems. Gaps exist everywhere but I was surprised at
how often I got 3G service. The card held connection very well from
tower to tower and rarely did I have to reconnect to chats (new area =
new ip?)

I am waiting for the promised High-Speed Download Packet Access speeds
of 1.8mb/s (and potentially 14 mb/s!) Currently CIngular provides
average download speeds between 400-700 kb/s with bursts to more than 1
mb/s

eslickm@hotmail.com

2007-01-22, 4:33 am

i have tried the 3G laptop card from cingular and was not satisfied at
all with it. it was so slow. and besides, all i have to do is use the
data cable that came with my cell phone and hook it up to the phone and
computer and connect at only 1/3 of the price for the unlimited data
plan for the laptop card. it may be more of a hassle, but its a lot
cheaper for the same speed.

dold@77.usenet.us.com

2007-01-22, 3:33 pm

eslickm@hotmail.com wrote:
> i have tried the 3G laptop card from cingular and was not satisfied at
> all with it. it was so slow. and besides, all i have to do is use the
> data cable that came with my cell phone and hook it up to the phone and
> computer and connect at only 1/3 of the price for the unlimited data
> plan for the laptop card. it may be more of a hassle, but its a lot
> cheaper for the same speed.

The maximum data rate will depend on the service available in your area.
Where I live, there is only GPRS, not EDGE, not 3G, so the tethered phone
would be the same speed as a card. In an area with EDGE service, there is
a potential for the card to be 50% faster than my phone. 3G is 3 times
that speed, or 10 times the speed I see tethered to my phone at home.

http://www.cingular.com/sbusiness/network

--
---
Clarence A Dold - Hidden Valley Lake, CA, USA GPS: 38.8,-122.5

John Navas

2007-01-27, 12:33 pm

On Mon, 22 Jan 2007 19:51:29 +0000 (UTC), dold@77.usenet.us.com wrote in
<ep34k1$ffq$2@blue.rahul.net>:

>eslickm@hotmail.com wrote:
>
>The maximum data rate will depend on the service available in your area.
>Where I live, there is only GPRS, not EDGE, not 3G, so the tethered phone
>would be the same speed as a card. In an area with EDGE service, there is
>a potential for the card to be 50% faster than my phone. 3G is 3 times
>that speed, or 10 times the speed I see tethered to my phone at home.
>
>http://www.cingular.com/sbusiness/network

Speed of GPRS and EGPRS(EDGE) can and does vary considerably between
different handsets and different data cards because it depends on the
"multi-slot class" of the various devices.

--
Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/ Cingu...less_FA
Q>

dold@77.usenet.us.com

2007-01-27, 12:33 pm

John Navas < spamfilter1@navasgro
up.com> wrote:
> On Mon, 22 Jan 2007 19:51:29 +0000 (UTC), dold@77.usenet.us.com wrote in
> <ep34k1$ffq$2@blue.rahul.net>:

[color=darkred]
> Speed of GPRS and EGPRS(EDGE) can and does vary considerably between
> different handsets and different data cards because it depends on the
> "multi-slot class" of the various devices.

I should have said "also depend". My v551 in San Jose will be faster than
any card in Hidden Valley.

--
---
Clarence A Dold - Hidden Valley Lake, CA, USA GPS: 38.8,-122.5

Mahlon Wagner

2007-02-08, 10:33 pm

I have a different question related to the laptop PC card. If I am now
on line using the PC Card--could I then use SKPYE?
Thanks
Mahl

John Navas

2007-02-08, 10:33 pm

On Thu, 08 Feb 2007 17:24:40 -0500, Mahlon Wagner
<mwagner2@twcny.rr.com> wrote in
< 45cba32a$0$28127$4c3
68faf@roadrunner.com>:

>I have a different question related to the laptop PC card. If I am now
>on line using the PC Card--could I then use SKPYE?

Skype does work over GPRS/EGPRS(EDGE), but latency is a bit painful.

--
Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/ Cingu...less_FA
Q>

Robert A. Fink, M. D.

2007-02-08, 10:33 pm

On Thu, 08 Feb 2007 17:24:40 -0500, Mahlon Wagner
<mwagner2@twcny.rr.com> wrote:

>I have a different question related to the laptop PC card. If I am now
>on line using the PC Card--could I then use SKPYE?
>Thanks
>Mahl

It should work.

Best,

Bob

Todd Allcock

2007-02-09, 4:33 am

At 08 Feb 2007 14:53:29 -0800 Robert A. Fink, M. D. wrote:
>
>
> It should work.
>

Provided you are in a 3G area. Skype works pretty poorly on EDGE (the
slower "fallback" data service,) IMHO. You'll hear the party you call
fairly well, but your outgoing audio tends to be pretty choppy due to the
much lower uplink bandwidth on EDGE.

John Navas

2007-02-09, 10:33 am

On Thu, 08 Feb 2007 17:01:26 -0700, Todd Allcock
< elecconnec@AmericaOn
Line.com> wrote in <eqh5hk$93i$1@aioe.org>:

>At 08 Feb 2007 14:53:29 -0800 Robert A. Fink, M. D. wrote:
[color=darkred]
[color=darkred]
>Provided you are in a 3G area. Skype works pretty poorly on EDGE (the
>slower "fallback" data service,) IMHO. You'll hear the party you call
>fairly well, but your outgoing audio tends to be pretty choppy due to the
>much lower uplink bandwidth on EDGE.

With EGPRS(EDGE), much depends on the multi-slot class of your mobile
device. There can indeed be problems with Class 2, 4, and 8 devices,
but better devices, Class 10 or (ideally) Class 12, have sufficient
uplink for good quality Syype audio.

--
Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/ Cingu...less_FA
Q>

Todd Allcock

2007-02-09, 12:33 pm

At 09 Feb 2007 14:28:58 +0000 John Navas wrote:

> With EGPRS(EDGE), much depends on the multi-slot class of your mobile
> device. There can indeed be problems with Class 2, 4, and 8 devices,
> but better devices, Class 10 or (ideally) Class 12, have sufficient
> uplink for good quality Syype audio.

While my device is class 10, I still get poor performance. In my case,
however, it's likely a provider issue. I don't think T-Mobile provides a
many slots to the user as Cingular does. EDGE data on Cingular has
always seemed "snappier" than on T-Mo, so perhaps my comments don't apply
to this particular thread, except perhaps to say I wouldn't use Skype
over EDGE for any "mission-critical" communications.

John Navas

2007-02-09, 3:33 pm

On Fri, 09 Feb 2007 10:19:13 -0700, Todd Allcock
< elecconnec@AmericaOn
Line.com> wrote in <eqiegc$860$1@aioe.org>:

>At 09 Feb 2007 14:28:58 +0000 John Navas wrote:
>
>
>While my device is class 10, I still get poor performance.

What is your device?

>In my case,
>however, it's likely a provider issue. I don't think T-Mobile provides a
> many slots to the user as Cingular does. EDGE data on Cingular has
>always seemed "snappier" than on T-Mo,

Have you ever measured your uplink speed (and latency)? I'd be
interested in seeing how it compares to Cingular.

>so perhaps my comments don't apply
>to this particular thread, except perhaps to say I wouldn't use Skype
>over EDGE for any "mission-critical" communications.

Likewise.

--
Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/ Cingu...less_FA
Q>

Todd Allcock

2007-02-09, 3:33 pm

At 09 Feb 2007 19:33:48 +0000 John Navas wrote:

> What is your device?

A T-Mobile MDA PPC phone (like the Cingular 8125, it's a rebadged HTC
Wizard.) Supposedly "EGPRS class B, multi-slot class 10."

> Have you ever measured your uplink speed (and latency)? I'd be
> interested in seeing how it compares to Cingular.

For you, John, I'd be happy to. Tested around 1:30pm MST today in the SW
Denver suburbs, with "full bars" of signal using the Opera browser for
PPC 8.6 (and verified by stopwatch, because I've had incorrect time
reporting problems on PPC browser-based speed tests before.)

U/L (averaged over 3 trials at Toast.net) was 69.7 kbps, alatency
(according to two tests at BBR) was 1.5 seconds. D/L averaged 140.5kbps
at Toast via 1&1, and 110k at BBR.

U/L is under the 128k Skype recommends, but as I've said, it results in
choppy, but recognizable, audio. Nothing that Skype would want to use in
a commercial! ;-)

I've never used EDGE on Cingular, but GPRS was always faster on Cingular
vs. T-Mo back when I used to use both- I never beat 28k on T-Mo GPRS.

As an aside, what I'd really like is a stable, relatively inexpensive
standard SIP VoIP client for PPC so I could use a good-quality low-
bandwidth codec like GSM over EDGE, rather than Skype's higher-bandwidth
proprietary one.

John Navas

2007-02-09, 10:33 pm

On Fri, 09 Feb 2007 14:15:42 -0700, Todd Allcock
< elecconnec@AmericaOn
Line.com> wrote in <eqioar$5qn$1@aioe.org>:

>At 09 Feb 2007 19:33:48 +0000 John Navas wrote:
>
>
>A T-Mobile MDA PPC phone (like the Cingular 8125, it's a rebadged HTC
>Wizard.) Supposedly "EGPRS class B, multi-slot class 10."
>
>
>For you, John, I'd be happy to. Tested around 1:30pm MST today in the SW
>Denver suburbs, with "full bars" of signal using the Opera browser for
>PPC 8.6 (and verified by stopwatch, because I've had incorrect time
>reporting problems on PPC browser-based speed tests before.)
>
>U/L (averaged over 3 trials at Toast.net) was 69.7 kbps, alatency
>(according to two tests at BBR) was 1.5 seconds. D/L averaged 140.5kbps
>at Toast via 1&1, and 110k at BBR.

Last time I tested my Sony Ericsson GC82 (EGPRS Class 10) in a good
signal area:

* 12 KBytes/sec uplink on Cingular as measured by net FTP throughput, or
about 96 Kbps.

* 19-20 Kbytes/sec downlink, or 150-160 Kbps.

* Average ping latency of 315 ms.

Those are pretty big differences, especially the latency.

--
Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/ Cingu...less_FA
Q>

Dennis Ferguson

2007-02-10, 3:33 pm

On 2007-02-09, Todd Allcock < elecconnec@AmericaOn
Line.com> wrote:
> U/L (averaged over 3 trials at Toast.net) was 69.7 kbps, alatency
> (according to two tests at BBR) was 1.5 seconds. D/L averaged 140.5kbps
> at Toast via 1&1, and 110k at BBR.

It's funny. I have cable Internet service in Mexico where the uplink
runs at 54 kbps. SkypeOut works fine over this, even with a bit of
competing use, though PC2PC Skype doesn't.

I measure the total bandwidth taken by the SkypeOut codec and IP packet
overhead to be about 40 kbps, while the PC2PC codec is variable but peaks
at about 90 kbps. The problem seems to be that they consume this bandwidth
by sending a whole lot of small packets, instead of a few large ones
like the speed tests do, and the per-packet overhead of the wireless service
seems to cause the actual throughput to drop significantly this way.
The 120 kbps uplink speed I got with EVDO Rev. 0 service is sufficient
for SkypeOut but still isn't enough for PC2PC Skype.

> As an aside, what I'd really like is a stable, relatively inexpensive
> standard SIP VoIP client for PPC so I could use a good-quality low-
> bandwidth codec like GSM over EDGE, rather than Skype's higher-bandwidth
> proprietary one.

No, the codec used by Skype for SkypeOut is G.729, the same as the SIP
services use. Only the Skype transport protocol (and the PC2PC codec)
is non-standard. G.729 is an 8 kbps codec, it's leaner than the GSM
codec. The only problem is that it generates a packet every 10 ms
(i.e. 10 bytes of data), and when you add a 20 byte IP header and
12 or more bytes of transport header to each packet you end up at
a big data rate again. I don't think SIP is particularly better than
Skype in this respect.

Dennis Ferguson

Todd Allcock

2007-02-10, 10:33 pm

At 10 Feb 2007 12:58:46 -0600 Dennis Ferguson wrote:

> The problem seems to be that they consume this bandwidth
> by sending a whole lot of small packets, instead of a few large ones
> like the speed tests do, and the per-packet overhead of the wireless
service
> seems to cause the actual throughput to drop significantly this way.

That makes a lot of sense- T-Mo's EDGE service seems to have a high
latency, which is obviously a bigger problem for lots of tiny packets
rather than a few large ones.

Similarly, while file transfers on T-Mo EDGE are speedy enough, loading
large web pages with lots of individual elements is very sluggish- it
feels like dialup.

> No, the codec used by Skype for SkypeOut is G.729, the same as the SIP
> services use. Only the Skype transport protocol (and the PC2PC codec)
> is non-standard.

I didn't know that- thanks.

> G.729 is an 8 kbps codec, it's leaner than the GSM
> codec. The only problem is that it generates a packet every 10 ms
> (i.e. 10 bytes of data), and when you add a 20 byte IP header and
> 12 or more bytes of transport header to each packet you end up at
> a big data rate again. I don't think SIP is particularly better than
> Skype in this respect.

Well, so much for that, then! Next, I'll bet you're going to tell me
there's no Santa Claus, too! ;-)

John Navas

2007-02-11, 10:33 am

On Fri, 09 Feb 2007 23:45:35 GMT, John Navas
< spamfilter1@navasgro
up.com> wrote in
< e71qs2hiq9dtoituit08
gmdas91cde9bli@4ax.com>:

>Last time I tested my Sony Ericsson GC82 (EGPRS Class 10) in a good
>signal area:
>
>* 12 KBytes/sec uplink on Cingular as measured by net FTP throughput, or
>about 96 Kbps.
>* 19-20 Kbytes/sec downlink, or 150-160 Kbps.
>* Average ping latency of 315 ms.
>
>Those are pretty big differences, especially the latency.

Test this morning in Walnut Creek, CA, FTP download of compressed file,
measured with Windows XP Performance Monitor of Network object:
* Average: 24.6 Kbytes/sec, or 200 Kbps
* Peak: 28.1 Kbytes/sec, or 225 Kbps
Actual performance graph: http://i7.tinypic.com/34skksk.png

--
Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/ Cingu...less_FA
Q>

John Navas

2007-02-11, 10:33 am

On Sat, 10 Feb 2007 16:29:41 -0700, Todd Allcock
< elecconnec@AmericaOn
Line.com> wrote in <eqlqrd$7oc$1@aioe.org>:

>At 10 Feb 2007 12:58:46 -0600 Dennis Ferguson wrote:
>
>
>That makes a lot of sense- T-Mo's EDGE service seems to have a high
>latency, which is obviously a bigger problem for lots of tiny packets
>rather than a few large ones.

Only for switching voice directions, not for streaming in one direction.

>Similarly, while file transfers on T-Mo EDGE are speedy enough, loading
>large web pages with lots of individual elements is very sluggish- it
>feels like dialup.

Much depends on what software is on each end -- later version of HTTP
are much less affected by latency. You may want to try different
browser(s).

--
Best regards, FAQ FOR CINGULAR WIRELESS:
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/ Cingu...less_FA
Q>

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