Voicestream Quietly Releases GPRS In The U.S. 141
hidden72 writes: "Voicestream quietly rolled out their iStream GPRS wireless data service in the United States last week. More information is available from Voicestream's website. General information about GPRS can be found here. Theoretically, GPRS data rates can reach close to 170k. Voicestream's per-packet charges are quite expensive, ($40 for 10MB) but it's an always-on 28k-56k data connection available in most metropolitan areas."
Palm has a GRPS modem out.. (Score:2, Informative)
Voicestream has a page that has GRPS capable devices at: http://www.gsmworld.com/technology/gprs_terminals
Costs (Score:3, Informative)
So what does this got to do with GPRS? Well, charging per packets will be expensive, even more so as you will pay for everything in and out (I guess). WAP push will not be fun for example. And it could very very easily become extremly expensive for the cosumer, and hard to check up on how expensive it has become before it is too late. Charge me a monthly sum according to the QoS I get and I would think about it, like it is now I can not recommend anyone to use it, unless they are very rich.
In Finland... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:US joins the rest of the world... (Score:3, Informative)
(and bluetooth, and irda, and SyncML, and background pictures, and sound&pictures in SMS [EMS], and
Voicestream.... (Score:1, Informative)
It is a great idea, and the proof of that is AT&T is also building a GSM network.
Re:Unreasonable for Normal Internet Usage (Score:3, Informative)
My chap script for linux however took me about 30 seconds to get working.
'' 'ATZ'
'' 'AT+CGDCONT=1,"IP","ADF.BTCELLNET.NET"'
'OK' 'ATDT*99#'
'TIMEOUT' '30'
'~--' ''
James
Use V110 (Score:2, Informative)
With it, the connection time is practically zero as th GSM connects to the Internet Dialin port via ISDN instead of with a modem. To use it, you just need a different init string, and the other side has to support V110 (not all do, but a lot do).
I use it when connecting my laptop. I only get 9.6 kBit as I don't use it enough for the $10 extra a month to be able to use HSCSD (High speed circuit switched data) which is capable of transferring 14.4*3=43,2 down/14.4 up or something like that. And that only costs regular phone charges.
GPRS is too expensive here in Germany.
If I would use it, I would have to pay $0.35 per 10 kilobytes for the first 100kb and $0.10 after that.
So one MB would cost $3.50 + 90*$0.10 = $12.50 for one megabyte!!!
With HSCSD I only pay $0.10 per minute and get a decent connection. That makes a megabyte price if continously transferring data of $0.35
AT&T (Score:2, Informative)
Just now phones are starting to have GSM 900/1800/1900 as a standard and now we have GSM 800 as well.
Oh well.
Re:Use a palm... (Score:2, Informative)
I bet BOFH wouldn't be so pissed off if he knew he could delete a user's work or kill their processes whilst sipping a pint at the pub.
Re:Costs (Score:4, Informative)
It does at least ensure that they will get light users, so their usage figures will make them more inclined to go to flat rate.
Contrast with a couple of broadband fixed line ISPs in Australia and the UK, that are howling in outrage that people are actually using their bandwidth, and have introduced daily and monthy usage caps. Want to bet that your ISP won't follow suit if too many people actually start using their cables and DSL to leech serious amounts of data?
Unmetered suffers from chicken and egg. Until you have low prices, you won't get high takeup and therefore a sustainable base of "average" users. Until you have "average" users, you take a real beating on the service.
At least paying by the packet should ensure that (once the network snafu's are worked out) the prices will drop quickly to get numbers up, and they will go unmetered eventually, at which point you and I can jump onboard and realise the dream of being connected 24/7. Aaaaah, nice.
GPRS vs HSCSD (Score:3, Informative)
I just have to say one thing:
Here in Europe GPRS is already in use in cellular networks so I have some experience with it (the experience comes also from my job, I work at the largest cellular network provider here in Austria). Unlike HSCSD, GPRS does not provide stable data tranfer rates. 170 k sounds cool, but as experience has shown, these rates only apply if you stand directly next to a receiver. HSCSD uses multiple channels, reaches about 43 k and if you loose a channel (e.g. when the network gets crowded) you pay for one channel less. GPRS uses slots in one channel, and if a slot is unavailable - well, bad luck. Here in Austria most people prefer HSCSD for it is cheaper and more reliable, the maximum transmission speed reached with GRPS in real use is only slightly higher than HSCSD and generally speaking -> HSCSD is most times faster. GRPS is not a solution for high speed date. It is only a small step towards UMTS.
bye
johannes