Wirelessnorth.ca

I’ve been trying out a 3G (Rogers HSPA) pc card for about a week now. A more full review coming, but a few remarkable observations:

• It’s really great to be connected anywhere. And the device works most anyplace (in the city) you can get a cell signal.
• Celular broadband is immeasurably better than rogers/bell Wimax-like “portable” internet.
• It’s fast. Or at least fast enough to be indistinguishable from wired broadband for general websufing
• You immediately want a smaller/lighter notebook to take with you everywhere. I have 3+lb 13″ notebook. I now want something smaller.
• The device works quite well in streetcars, buses, taxis if you can balance a laptop on your knee in those places (see above)
• Smart phones and RIMs are nice, but something with a real keyboard and just enough screen to show a whole webpage is even better.
• The days of cheap, paperback sized micro-laptops are coming. With 3G, these are going to sell like crazy.
• Unlike in other countries, 3G data plans are still not quite cheap enough for the mass market in Canada. But they may be worth it already for you.
• The pricing of the devices by the big 3 is all wrong. $399 + activation fee without a 3 year contract is ridiculous. Signing a 3 year contract on a data card doesn’t make any sense at all because the devices and networks are changing too quickly. In other parts of the world, dongles go for free with a 1 yr contract. And the carriers sell them by the wheelbarrow load.
• In Canada, Telus has the best plans and pricing but Rogers as Canada’s only GSM/HSPA carrier (sigh) is compatible with more devices, like you can get an unlocked data card for cheap on eBay (hint). HSPA devices take SIM cards just like GSM phones.
• Soon though it won’t matter. The new EeePC from Asus or others (the whole micro PC) will only cost $399. And it will come with HSPA or EVDO built in.
• It’s wonderful to go anywhere and bring your own connection with you.
• Wifi in general becomes much less important. (and works great at conferences)
• No more hunting for open wifi and minutes of frustration trying to connect to flaky base stations.
• You IT department is in big trouble.
• Want to surf facebook, monster.com, or anything else at work and not have your web use monitored? Just bring your own connection. This will be increasingly prevalent as the price of devices and plans relentlessly falls.

ABI research forecasts global celular 3G modem sales to grow from 5M 2006 to 68M by 2012. Compare this with 65M wifi units sold last year

Play with it yourself. Recommended.