USB EVDO Modem Without PCMCIA

David Ciccone writes to tell us that he got a first look at Sprint's new USB EVDO card. The new USB wireless card can help users connect their non-PCMCIA equipped devices to the Sprint Power Vision Network. Very few details are available for the card, but David was able to capture a few pictures and the couple of speed tests he ran seem halfway decent.

Re:Why oh why?

[ip_fired]

Is it just greed?

Yes.
It is just greed. I mean, does a 10 byte text message actually cost 10 cents? If that were the case, then it should be costing me $30.00 per minute to talk to people. It's just plain old greed.

Durable?

[Superblargo]

It doesn't look very durable. The antenna should probably be more attached to the modem. Also, I imagine that the USB connector would bend fairly easily. If I was using that setup, I would hook the thing up to a USB extension cable and attach that to the back of the device. It might not be all that attractive, but it's better than breaking it.

Re:Why oh why?

[RasputinAXP]

Sprint offers a data plan for tethering or bluetoothing your phone as a modem; it's called the Sprint Phone as Modem Plan [sprintpcs.com] and it's an additional $40 on top of your usual fees.

Re:Why oh why?

[crazyjeremy]

$40 in addition to any vision / internet fees?

Great but....

[Cherita Chen]

This is great but they (Sprint/Nextel) still have a long way to go before this technology is relevant to the majority of sprint users. Sprint's EVDO network is awesome when you have connectivity, that being said, for the majority of the United States, service is spotty at best.

Would be good for a MacBook

[doormat]

Since the MacBooks dont have PCMCIA (the Pros have ExpressCard, the regulars have nothing).

Re:Why oh why?

[blank axolotl]

I don't actually know how it works, but it's not necessarily so simple. There could be an initial cost of simply making the connection,
and then after that the low cost of maintaining the connection. Eg 8 cents to make connection, and then some very small cents/byte after that. Maybe that's why they charge per minute on the minute (at least mine does), so there is a minimum one minute cost.

That said, I still think you're right about greed being involved, the prices don't feel right.

Re:Why oh why?

[TheRaven64]

Getting it to and from the base station may be free, but they still have to route it over the network. If it terminates on a landline then (in the UK, at least), there is a normal phone call for the last hop, and the message is read out using speech synthesis.

The cost is non-zero, but it is much less than 10 for 160 bytes. This works out at 64/KB or $655.36/MB. If data really cost the carriers this much then there is no way they could operate. I get 40MB of data included with my plan, and this means I can connect to an XMPP server, handshake, sync my contacts, and message for about half an hour for about the cost of a single SMS.

Re:Why oh why?

[Scarblac]

It is just greed. I mean, does a 10 byte text message actually cost 10 cents? If that were the case, then it should be costing me $30.00 per minute to talk to people. It's just plain old greed.

That's a bit naive. A large telco has a lot of costs that aren't directly related to sending a single SMS message, that still need to be covered by things like SMS messages. Plus it's perfectly normal for them to want to make a profit on top of it all.