Sprint MiFi - Wireless Hot Spot

[BJatSprint]

Some of you have probably already heard about the Sprint MiFi, a great new way to bring a mobile hot spot where ever you go.

Sprint will launch this device for early sale on the web on 6/1. The vanity URL to buy it will be www.sprint.com/mifi

The MiFi has been getting a lot of great press already, Guy Kawasaki tweeted this about it last night:

"The Sprint MIFi gadget is lifechanging. Now my iPhone is fast! And I can Skype from anywhere."

http://twitter.com/GuyKawasaki/status/1801947042

If you want to read a very detailed article about the Sprint MiFi check out this Engadget write up:

http://www.engadget.com/2009/05/13/n...omes-to-sprint

[gbm85]

Would be wonderful except for the 5GB data cap.

[gutrrob]

I use a cradlepoint router mbr 1000 with my TP and dont have to worry about 5GB cap because its a phone...The router is gps ready and is wimax ready. Oh yeah dont pay anything for the service. Another alternative is wmwifirouter

[Laos101]

wmwifirouter is better since (with a custom rom) they cannot detect the tethering and you can reach nearly 20 GB before they get suspicious. But you can always make excuses

[autumndaze23]

Originally Posted by laos101

wmwifirouter is better since (with a custom rom) they cannot detect the tethering and you can reach nearly 20 GB before they get suspicious. But you can always make excuses

Ok I feel like a complete r*t*rd!!! I am trying to figure out how to tether a cell phone to a PC or laptop. You know, use my unlimited web access cell phone to act as a modem to my PC. I have not upgraded my phone yet with Sprint just in case this can only be done with a certain phone ---and I was trying to figure out how to do this without having to get the mobile broadband monthly charge. Am I making any sense? Does anyone know if this is possible????

[jbearamus]

Originally Posted by gbm85

Would be wonderful except for the 5GB data cap.

thats exactly how i looked at it, just a quicker way to hit your limit and incur overages; actually, wasn't it "people sharing their broadband cards" that prompted the 5GB cap anyway? at least thats how my Sprint-Radioshack liaison explained Sprint corporate's reasoning, seems hypocritical to me

[gbm85]

Originally Posted by jbearamus

thats exactly how i looked at it, just a quicker way to hit your limit and incur overages; actually, wasn't it "people sharing their broadband cards" that prompted the 5GB cap anyway? at least thats how my Sprint-Radioshack liaison explained Sprint corporate's reasoning, seems hypocritical to me

Actually all these limits are a way of hiding the truth from the public.

Most people think that it actually costs the carrier money when you make a call or use the Internet. It doesn't.

The carrier pays for maintenance of the towers, and for connections to the Internet and the phone system. Their infrastructure costs are pretty much static, no matter how many or how few people use it. So why do they charge by-the-minute or by-the-megabyte? They are managing their resources.

Their towers have a fixed Internet connection. Assuming it's 50Mbps, they can support 50-100 cell phones per tower no problem. But what if I have a mobile broadband card and I want the full 2Mbps I'm paying for? Then they can only support 25 of us.

Therefore, they introduce the "data cap" and "overage charges" to make people think twice about getting on 3G and slowing everyone else down.

They don't have a cap on phones because they use so little bandwidth (or are supposed to, anyway, when they haven't been hacked for tethering).

A similar situation for minutes. A voice tower can only support so many users at once. (With CDMA, it's even trickier than other standards because there is no set limit on how many. It will allow tons of phones to connect, but once you put "one too many" on there, the entire tower becomes unusable.) That's why you pay for minutes... to keep people from chatting on the phone all day and possibly crashing their towers.

So there it is. It has nothing to do with direct cost, and everything to do with managing resources.

[jbearamus]

Originally Posted by gbm85

Actually all these limits are a way of hiding the truth from the public.

Most people think that it actually costs the carrier money when you make a call or use the Internet. It doesn't.

The carrier pays for maintenance of the towers, and for connections to the Internet and the phone system. Their infrastructure costs are pretty much static, no matter how many or how few people use it. So why do they charge by-the-minute or by-the-megabyte? They are managing their resources.

Their towers have a fixed Internet connection. Assuming it's 50Mbps, they can support 50-100 cell phones per tower no problem. But what if I have a mobile broadband card and I want the full 2Mbps I'm paying for? Then they can only support 25 of us.

Therefore, they introduce the "data cap" and "overage charges" to make people think twice about getting on 3G and slowing everyone else down.

They don't have a cap on phones because they use so little bandwidth (or are supposed to, anyway, when they haven't been hacked for tethering).

A similar situation for minutes. A voice tower can only support so many users at once. (With CDMA, it's even trickier than other standards because there is no set limit on how many. It will allow tons of phones to connect, but once you put "one too many" on there, the entire tower becomes unusable.) That's why you pay for minutes... to keep people from chatting on the phone all day and possibly crashing their towers.

So there it is. It has nothing to do with direct cost, and everything to do with managing resources.

I kinda figured that was the case but that was just the excuse my Rep gave me but I still think its a contradiction to sign people up with the 5GB cap, soft or hard, and then turn around and provide people with a way of burning through their "allotment" much much faster

[gbm85]

Originally Posted by jbearamus

I kinda figured that was the case but that was just the excuse my Rep gave me but I still think its a contradiction to sign people up with the 5GB cap, soft or hard, and then turn around and provide people with a way of burning through their "allotment" much much faster

Yeah that is pretty lame.