EVDO

The LW and I have discussed her moving about the country while working and the main problem that came up was that she needs to be hooked in during the day and available on her work IM-type-setup when we're away from our home internet connection. It doesn't sound like much of a problem - hey, just find wifi hotspots, right? -- until you figure in the child factor, the money and time involved in tracking down a usable wifi hotspot, and the restricted travel timing.

Recently, that telephone company from Overland Park, KS and it's rivals started releasing what's called EVDO Rev. A in certain cities. It's mobile broadband that runs from cell phone towers and it's pretty fast for what it is. It's supposedly up around 2meg-down/500k-up in some towns. It seems as though Verizon limits bandwidth, even though they say that they don't in their marketing stuff, so they were out. I did a bit of research on the forum that the folks at the 3GStore.com maintain and this technology looks like it'll clip the travel tether that we're on and allow the LW to work as we zip down the highway to Gramma's and back. This morning I picked up a Pantech PX500 card and we'll test it locally and on the way to TX soon. The only downside is that it's $60 per month for service, but for the freedom to stay wherever we want and go wherever we want without worrying about somebody's sketchy wifi setup, it looks pretty good.