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Cellular Phone Forum / Providers / Sprint PCS / July 2007T-Mobile integrates w/Wi-Fi
This is very compelling, not just because it can be a money-saver, and not just because it seems like a brilliant strategic move on T-Mobile's part, but because it goes a long way toward solving a serious problem for those of us who travel to Japan, and helps international travelers in general. http://tinyurl.com/322y7r DGI > This is very compelling, not just because it can be a > money-saver, and not just because it seems like a brilliant strategic > move on T-Mobile's part, but because it goes a long way toward solving > a serious problem for those of us who travel to Japan, and helps > international travelers in general. Yeah, this is huge. I have my cordless and WiFi on 2.4 GHz and my T-Mobile cell phone on 1.9 GHz. I have problems in the back of my house... not outside, get a signal fine there, not in front of the house, just the family room and (primarily) the master bedroom. And I'm supposed to receive pages on my call phone in the middle of the night if stuff goes down, which is less likely to happen with an unusable signal. Cool thing is, the parts of my house where the cell signal is weakest, are the parts where the wifi signal is strongest. :) > Cool thing is, the parts of my house where the cell signal is weakest, are > the parts where the wifi signal is strongest. :) Which brings up an interesting point- you don't have to be on a "Hotspots @ Home" plan to use this service. You can simply buy one of the Wi-Fi phones and use it with your current plan. The only difference is the Wi- Fi calls aren't "free"- they're billed like any other cellular call (uses your minutes, free weekends, whatever.) For those seeing this more for it's coverage enhancing abilty than for free calling, NOT taking the $10- 20/month add-on plan might be the preferable way to go.  SignaturePosted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com > For those seeing this more for > it's coverage enhancing abilty than for free calling, NOT taking the $10- > 20/month add-on plan might be the preferable way to go. Hey whatever helps this concept get legs is great. If it works as advertised, I love it. And like the article said if you use your phone with WiFi a lot you could possibly lower the calling plan, so that even with the HotSpot @Home fee you still are saving. I was also impressed that this system actually hands off in-progress calls from/to WiFi. That's pretty neat. Only downside is you can't use WLANs that use browser-based authentication (though I would imagine that wouldn't be hard to implement using the phone's browser). I'm hoping this concept catches on. A shame the iPhone doesn't have it. SignatureMike > And like the article said if you use your phone with WiFi a lot you > could possibly lower the calling plan, so that even with the > HotSpot @Home fee you still are saving. True, but I'm a "MyFaves" customer (free calls to/from 5 numbers) now, and leave 800 minutes/month "on the table" as it is! I don't need anymore "free" time even for $10! > I was also impressed that this system actually hands off in-progress calls > from/to WiFi. That's pretty neat. Yeah- apparently it's not VoIP- it uses a newer protocol (UMA?) so it's esentially "GSM over IP." Most beta testers were impressed with the quality. > Only downside is you can't use WLANs that use browser-based > authentication (though I would imagine that wouldn't be hard to > implement using the phone's browser). Seems like a glaring ommission, and is, unfortunately the deal-breaker for me at this time. I get good reception at home now, but would love this for hotel rooms with free Wi-Fi and lousy cell reception. Currently I use VoIP and conditional call forwarding for those scenarios, but would love the simplicity of @home instead. I might buy one of the Nokias just for the "gee-whiz" of it anyway. > I'm hoping this concept catches on. A shame the iPhone doesn't have it. It's a bigger shame T-Mo chose "iPhone week" to announce it. Heck, we could've been invaded by extra-terrestrials last week and it'd have been the number-two story on the news! ;-) SignaturePosted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com Does anybody know if Verizon Wireless (or any other carrier) is planning on doing the same kind of thing as T-mobile? (Hotspot @ Home) > Does anybody know if Verizon Wireless (or any other carrier) is > planning on doing the same kind of thing as T-mobile? (Hotspot @ Home) Current indusrty speculation is no- Hotspot@Home is ostensibly designed to get you to ditch your home phone service in favor of free at home calling over Wi-Fi. Since AT&T & Verizon are owned by the two largest landline telcos, it's unlikely they'd introduce a service that drives their own customers away from their core business. In Sprint's case, I assume they intend to wait until they launch WiMax before going to a VoIP type of service. SignaturePosted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com |
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