Thank you Mike for the good information. You gave me exactly what I'm 
looking for. I have read mixed reviews on the net about the various 
providers, but it's hard to know in the Phoenix area which one is good 
or not good. I asked this list hoping that others have had experience 
for one of the reasons you mentioned, it's expensive and you are locked 
in for some time. I like the idea of the freedom that I would be able to 
have access from about anywhere and not have to worry about finding an AP.

And thank you Lisa for letting me know that the Sprint EDVO solution 
will work. I happen to be with Sprint now, so it sounds like that will 
be the best option.

storkus@storkus.com wrote:
> Joe, you should know as far as providers' services go, Verizon is
> probably the worst because of a fairly hard 5GB bandwidth cap, not to
> mention the widely documented problems with their phones every geek/nerd
> should know about and try (usually hopelessly in my experience) to relay
> to friends and such.
>
> OTOH, generally speaking, Sprint has the best service as far as data
> goes, with consistently the best speeds.  Their 3G (EVDO Revision C)
> also has the widest coverage, but that's no saying much since most
> carriers' 3G coverage footprints are a fraction of their voice coverage.
>  Sprint has a preferred data roaming agreement with Alltel, so your
> device will work without any surprises on their network as well.  But
> there's one thing no one has mentioned that's SOOOO important: Sprint
> has a data reseller called Millenicom who has the HUGE advantages of no
> contract and that they handle the customer support rather than the
> (notoriously bad) Sprint call center.
>
> Keep in mind everything I said is for data only; voice is another matter
> entirely.
>
> As far as devices, quite a few USB devices are supported natively in
> Linux: just go into the USB menu in the kernel and you'll see the
> majority in the USB-Serial sub-menu (as you'd expect); in particular,
> Sierra Wireless has been very good the last few years in supporting the
> writing of FOSS drivers in the kernel tree.  In addition, the device
> Millenicom was selling (I can't remember the name right this second) had
> explicit support for Linux by including the driver in a USB storage
> device on-board: once the driver's loaded, it "switches personalities"
> and becomes a serial device.  (From what I've seen, this is becoming
> quite common with all sorts of networking devices, including WiFi.)
>
> Finally, if you phone does a decent job of supporting 3G and your
> carrier doesn't sock you with a contract extension for adding or
> removing it (like Verizon does (and maybe T-Mobile?)), tethering to your
> phone may be an option that can save from from having to buy a separate
> device or get stuck in a contract, not withstanding the above.
>
> Finally, don't forget these data plans are *E*X*P*E*N*S*I*V*E*!!  Are
> you *SURE* you can't reach an access point?
>
> Mike
>
> On Thu, 02 Oct 2008 12:16:37 -0700, "Joe" <joe@nationnet.com> said:
>   
>> Does anyone use one of those 3G wireless network cards with their Linux 
>> system? If so, what provider and how well does it work. I'm currently 
>> with Sprint and was thinking about going with their USB wireless card 
>> for data access and others said Verizon might be better.
>>
>> Thoughts? Experiences?
>>     
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