Cobb: EVDO At Last

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August 10, 2005

EVDO At Last

So me and my new professional colleagues are gelling fairly well. In fact, my reputation as a conservative is making me the butt of some halfway decent humor. T-2, one of the few alpha-geeks who could very easily pass for a generic type-A, has got me as a closet queen who only pretends to oppose gay marriage. I'll be thinking of some clever comebacks soon.

But the ribbing that kills me the most is that one of the sales sharks has actually outdone me on gadgetry. So the other day we're sitting in the bar of the Courtyard bitching about how we have to compete with Microsoft promises, and he's doing email on his laptop. I mention the fact that I can't get any WiFi in this joint, how could he do it? "I've got an aircard", he says. A what? He points to this Verizon PCMCIA sticking out of his T41 and I'm stunned. I knew this was coming, but I thought it was still in beta. Where have I been that I haven't heard about this?

Now one scoop is bad enough, but he fronted on me the other night about SAP's middle tier. Weblogic is going to bite the dust to SAP? It seems impossible to believe. And yet it might be. Well this and EVDO is just too much. I mean I can bear the fact that sales sharks make all the money, but scooping me on gadgets and middle tier?

I did get back at him by making a very cool powerpoint, but it still doesn't seem to make up for it. So I wound up at the Supermall of the Great Northwest's Verizon store. Within 45 minutes I was doing some serious downloads in my car. Sweet. Finally, the promise of Ricochet is real and the coverage is great. Sprint got scooped on this one.

For 90 bucks a month I now am rid of the problem of corporate firewalls. I bring my own laptop and I surf where I please. No more ssh tunnelling to lynx so I can blog during business hours. (Lynx really sucks when it comes to Typekey authentication or other https). I can IM, listen to streaming audio, FTP. Way cool.

As far as I can see, there's only one problem. I don't get to expense it.

Posted by mbowen at August 10, 2005 09:28 PM

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Comments

Sprint got scooped?

Cobb, as a third generation (two years) PCS aircard user, now macking a sierra aircard 580 1xEV-DO and getting broadband type performance, I can assure you that Sprint still got game.

Posted by: cnulan at August 11, 2005 06:59 AM

I've got a T42 so I've got him beat there. :p 7200 rpm drive, 15" screen, but I forgot to order Blue Tooth capability. Maybe next time.

I don't have an aircard but one of my former coworkers had one. The service is somewhat spotty and slow where I live (the DelMarVa Penninsula) so I can't justify the money spent on it.

Posted by: matt at August 11, 2005 01:26 PM

Cobb, I was stuck on the tarmat of some airport, next to me was a person who was surfing the net. He was using this service.

I drooled.

But he got to expense his. :-(

Posted by: DarkStar at August 11, 2005 04:46 PM

They truly are awesome, as long as you're in the broadband zone.

Try showing your bean counters the money spent last month on hotel internet access, vs. your $90/mo EV-DO card. I haven't won the fight yet, but it's getting closer.

Posted by: Scott Chaffin at August 12, 2005 04:39 PM

My new habit is blogging at the Denny's counter at lunch. I'm actually doing sit down meals at lunchtime and not sitting in the car listening to NPR. This is definitely changing my patterns.

I've also noticed that it's very good about switching off and not causing any interference when you actually get near a strong Wifi or plug in the RJ45. It's still branded a bit heavily for a network utility but I can live with that.

Posted by: Cobb at August 12, 2005 04:46 PM