Review by rawgerz  UPDATED: 1.6 years ago member for 5 years, 2866 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Grove City,Mercer,PA
$51 per month (24 month contract)
about 1 days
"Moble, Near T1 speeds, An option for those satellite and dialup users out there"
"IPs very random, 80ms first hop at least, many hops before outside network, ICMP blocked"
"It's wireless, so don't expect perfection or miracles"
| Pre Sales Information: Install process: Connection reliability: Tech Support: Services: Value for money: (ratings match consensus)
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3/6/2008 Connection is much more stable after putting antenna outside. Been connected 6 days straight before having to restart for something. No packet loss, ever. Billing department is poor. Been sent two copies of same bill every month since signing up. No one can fix it either, even though they say they did.
Been having DNS server issues today. I know its Sprint's fault because on site(s) that would time out, they would work fine with a VPN connection or DNS server change.
I would like to see a card built into a router, or even a stand alone box with ethernet port. --------------------------------------------------- Overall I'm satisfied. For almost the same price of an extra phone line, and a dialup account, it's a nice improvement. Most of the time, with a very good signal, I can see speeds of 150KB down, and 100KB up. But I'm 6 miles away from the tower, and with a Yagi antenna I make a decent but not great connection to see those speeds consistently. Signal strength is very erratic after 9AM. The signal will drop to nothing for a few seconds, browsing pauses, and then comes back. I think the sun has something to do with it, since it is wireless after all.
I've tried CSS and Battlefield 2, both are very much playable.
I have the Merlin S720, it does very well for it's antenna size. You can expect to see you card on your door the next day if you order online. I did  The one odd thing I didn't expect is that these cards have a phone number assigned to them.
If you're not living on a hill, have thick or metal walls, or can't get decent signal strength with a Sprint cell phone, you probably shouldn't bother trying it. You want -85 dBm or better to see decent service and speeds.
I would still mostly recommend it only for people that travel since that is it's main attraction and one person hogging bandwidth on a tower can ruin good speeds, so I've read.
Followup comments:  Brisk Qwest's Spirit Of Service Inaction
join:2003-07-11 Colorado Springs, CO clubs:
·Qwest.net
| Just something to keep in mind... quote: The one odd thing I didn't expect is that these cards have a phone number assigned to them.
And they also have telephone taxes (911 fee, etc.) Mine ended up being an extra $6.32/mo, more than my DSL USF which was about $1.50. Strange to charge a 911 fee if you can't even call 911. | |
|   Fiber Man
@aol.com | 150k? You should be able to get at least 400k if you have rev. a. With a Yagi you should be getting a decent signal so I guess you're not covered with rev. a. | |
|  |   rawgerz In Debt we trust Premium join:2004-10-03 Grove City, PA | Re: 150k? Kilo Bytes, not Bits.. | |
|  |  |  |   asta
@spcsdns.net | outside antenna How do you fix an antenna outside? I need to improve the signal strength, as I live in a valley. Can you give more details about the antenna? | |
|  |   rawgerz In Debt we trust Premium join:2004-10-03 Grove City, PA | Re: outside antenna Be more specific. | |
|  |  |   asta
@spcsdns.net | Re: outside antenna sorry, the question was a bit confusing. I want to know whether there is a possibility to connect an external antenna to the modem that i got from sprint, to improve signal strength. I mean, is there at all a possibility of an outside antenna? | |
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