My experience with wireless data

lindq

lindq

A few days ago I made the leap to cellular wireless data, hoping to live the dream many of us have of trading anywhere, anytime.

I'm unhappy to report that it is not yet ready for prime time, at least by my experience. I contracted with T-Mobile for a wireless PC card for my laptop. Connection was no problem, but the speeds are less than 56K, and not stable. After further research, I'm of the opinion that other systems have similar problems, and it is not a problem with my vendor or card. The promises of the providers are not yet paying off in reality.

Hopefully WIFI will soon become advanced to the point where we can enjoy broadband speeds nearly anywhere. But until then, wireless isn't worth the bother.
 
Possibly just barely. But I wouldn't want to be relying on the stability or speed for any important decisions. But with ideal conditions depending on your location, you may get by. The nice thing about T-Mobile is that they will permit a two week trial, and reportedly their speeds are similar to other vendors. So I can only suggest that it might be worth a try if it is important to you.
 
T-Mobile is not the answer: In another year or two there will be numerous free hot spots in major urban centers - particularly those with a technological flavor. Here in california there are many high quality free hot spots appearing: some are run by cities and others are run by public facing businesses or even building managements. One of the nationwide telcomm providers is setting up free hotspots for their land line and cellular customers locally in my region.

Only the newer commercial WI-FI systems seem to have decent range and performance and the quality of the systems have a lot to do with the ability of the operator to properly configure the systems. More often than not they are incorrectly setup and cant handle the theoretical traffic throughput of a fully used wireless hub.
 
But of course the problem is that the hot spots are all handled by different vendors. It is really a primitive arrangment at this point. And I hope you are right, but I'm going to bet that for someone to put together a truly usable system on a national basis is going to take longer than a year or two, unless there are some big tech breakthroughs.

A few months ago I read in the WSJ about a couple guys in the S.F. area who had developed a longer range WIFI, up to a mile, and they were pitching it to telecoms. But haven't heard anything since. If that rolls out, then we will all be happy traders.

In the meantime, I'm happy to roam around my house and pool with my 300 foot range. Better than being tied to a cable.
 
I wonder what it would be like with those computer head-sets and WiFi in the future.

They have to make wifi like cellular service with reliability. I wonder how many screens you could see on a head set.

That would be the ultimate in remote/mobile trading.
 
Right now I use T-mobile's WIFI hotspots and can trade from Starbucks and Borders (or McDonald's -- but I try not to step foot in that place). So far, no problems. Speed is as fast if not faster than my cable modem at home. My wife and I have been spending about 6 weeks in NYC this summer and it's great to have so many places to connect...
 
Quote from MYDemaray:

Right now I use T-mobile's WIFI hotspots and can trade from Starbucks and Borders (or McDonald's -- but I try not to step foot in that place). So far, no problems. Speed is as fast if not faster than my cable modem at home. My wife and I have been spending about 6 weeks in NYC this summer and it's great to have so many places to connect...
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Why the hate for Mickey D's? Have you tried the McGriddle? Good stuff man.
 
Quote from MYDemaray:

Right now I use T-mobile's WIFI hotspots and can trade from Starbucks and Borders (or McDonald's -- but I try not to step foot in that place). So far, no problems. Speed is as fast if not faster than my cable modem at home. My wife and I have been spending about 6 weeks in NYC this summer and it's great to have so many places to connect...
More...

How is it with the security issues in places like that??
 
Quote from Cesko:



How is it with the security issues in places like that??
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T-Mobile has a long disclaimer on their web site regarding security at hot spots. Bottom line is, there isn't any, and they caution against sharing any secure data. Of course many sites, such as brokers, use encription for sending passcodes, etc. The tech folks at my broker, BrownCo., assure me that with their encription wireless is as secure as hardwire since the signals eventually bounce off a bird in the sky anyway. But disclaimer: I'm no security expert, and you'd need to check with your broker, etc.

If anyone on this site is a gear head into net security, I'd enjoy hearing opinions on this issue of overall security.
 
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