Hey everyone,
On my lunch break today I walked over to a Fido storefront to inquire about
the GPRS PC Card they are now offering. (Fido is a Canadian cellular
service company that operates their own GSM/GPRS network).
The store I went to (First Canadian Place in Toronto) had a laptop setup to demo the service. The actual GPRS card (a No=
vatel Wireless G100) was kept
behind the service counter :) The salesperson slipped the card into the
laptop (an IBM ThinkPad of recent vintage) and started the connection software. In about a minute, it was connected to t=
he network. (The
salesperson said that the long connection time was because usage was very high
at 1pm in downtown Toronto, and voice access has precedence over data access
on the network.) I checked out a few websites, and they loaded at a decent
speed - similar speed as a 28.8 modem, in my opinion. The signal strength was
only 51% because the store is in an underground mall.
Doing a lot of research online didn't yield much technical info about the card. I'm fairly sure it implements a normal se=
rial modem interface with an
extended AT command set, just like the Merlin Ricochet. The problem is that
Metricom has the support information hidden behind a form that requires you to
enter the model number of the modem, which is only on the back of the card.
If anyone with a Merlin card (of any type: CDPD, Ricochet, or GPRS) can e-mail
me the seven-digit model number from the back of the card (in the form
xxx-xxxx) then I should be able to get the full command set reference.
If I can do that, then I'll go back to Fido and plunk down the $525 for the
card. Fido offers a 15-day satisfaction guarantee, so I'd have two weeks to
get it to work. It's quite a bit of money, but if it can be used with the
Newton then maybe I'll cancel my barely used voice access.
If anyone has any questions about this feel free to ask. The salesperson at
the store answered all my questions and I haven't included everything here.
Fido's info page about the Novatel GPRS card:
http://www.fido.ca/portal/en/info/Discover/Equipment15.shtml
Novatel G100 Support page:
http://www.novatelwireless.com/support/support_merlinG100.html
The form that I need to get by in order to get the command set:
http://www.novatelwireless.com/support/downloads.html#2
-- Victor Rehorst - victor_at_newtontalk.net - chuma_at_chuma.org Newtontalk List Administrator - "List Dad"-------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ .
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