Hasta La Gadget!

If you’ve been paying even a slight bit of attention to carriers over the past year and change, you’d know that a number of ’em are resorting to citywide WiFi networks in order to relieve some of the stress being placed on their 3G networks. It’s definitely a viable solution for a problem that requires oodles to time (and far too many signatures) to plant new cell sites, but there’s a looming issue: compatibility. Naturally, the Wi-Fi Alliance is all over it, today launching an initiative to transform the user experience in hotspots. The Wi-Fi Certified hotspot testbed will address authentication and provision of service for public WiFi networks, essentially acting to “facilitate the seamless handoff of cellular traffic from smartphones, tablets and other portable electronics to WiFi, helping service providers manage demands on constrained licensed spectrum.” We’re told that the program will allow devices to “discover and automatically choose networks based upon user preferences, operator policies and network optimization,” and in many cases, they’ll be automatically granted access to the network based upon credential mechanisms, such as SIM cards. Hard to say what this will mean for limits and structuring, but we’re bound to find out more as the 1H 2012 target launch date draws nearer. Full release is after the break, per usual.

Continue reading Wi-Fi Alliance launches hotspot certification program, aims to ease cell-to-WiFi handoff woes

Wi-Fi Alliance launches hotspot certification program, aims to ease cell-to-WiFi handoff woes originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 22 Mar 2011 08:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Sidekick line’s newest installment, the Android-running Sidekick 4G

The T-Mobile Sidekick, which recently got its data services put to rest for good, will be getting a second life as the Android-based Sidekick 4G.

The Sidekick 4G will be the first Sidekick to include a touchscreen, in this case a 3.5-inch display, but other than that, the looks stay true to the brand’s signature stylings: the same overall shape, the same 5-row QWERTY keyboard. The display slides out with a “pop-tilt” hinge (not the swiveling screen of old), and an optical trackball has been put in place of the old physical trackball.

Group Text and Cloud Text apps appear to be key features of the device, letting users send messages in a reply-all fashion while texting groups and friends from multiple devices, such as your laptop or desktop computer, in addition to the Sidekick.

“We’ve reinvented the messaging experience that made the Sidekick such an iconic device, and supercharged it with communication and entertainment experiences that take full advantage of our 4G network,” says Andrew Sherrard, T-Mobile’s senior vice president of product management.

The T-Mobile Sidekick is the phone that (arguably) started the smartphone revolution in 2002. Before the iPhone burst onto the scene, wowing us with its capacitive touch display and light, slender form, the Sidekick kept us connected with instant messaging through its signature spin-out display and QWERTY keyboard. It was an especially big hit among teens, whose texting habits primed them to see the value of a keyboard (and who were about as likely to use a BlackBerry as they were to wear a navy blue blazer).

Over the years the Sidekick got upgraded, and upgraded again, but it eventually lost out to a new breed of app-filled, touchscreen smartphones.

The Sidekick 4G built by Samsung is an attempt to make the iconic name competitive with today’s best smartphones. Accordingly, it’s got the obligatory 1-GHz processor (a Cortex A8 Hummingbird). It runs Android 2.2 Froyo, a respectably recent version of Google’s mobile operating system.

According to a T-Mobile statement, “Android continues to be a strategic bet for T-Mobile, and we’re expanding the current lineup to offer a robust messaging experience on a popular platform — at speeds as fast as your home broadband.”

The Sidekick will also act as a mobile hotspot for up to five devices, and it will connect with T-Mobile’s 4G network, wherever that is available.

Of course, 4G doesn’t mean what it used to. In this case, it refers to T-Mobile’s HSPA+ network, which the carrier claims will give you 5 to 10 Mbps of download bandwidth.

If you used to own a Sidekick, would you ditch your current phone for a 4G Android version? Sound off in the comments.

Sidekick 4G [T-Mobile via MobileCrunch and Android Community]

Say it ain’t so! According to this here slide, which details a bit of insidery AT&T information about the impending release of iOS 4.3, Ma Bell’s iPhone 4 will have its Personal Hotspot restricted to use with just three devices. Just about every MiFi / mobile hotspot device we’ve ever seen — including Verizon’s iPhone 4 — has supported five WiFi devices, but unless AT&T pulls a 180 here, it’ll be limiting its iPhone to just three connections. What’s wild is that we’ve found AT&T to actually have superior 3G speeds when you can actually get a signal (and thus, be more conducive to tethering five devices at once), and since you’d be on a data cap anyway, it’s not like AT&T risks losing millions from five P2P servers being ran over one’s iPhone. Granted, it’s possible that some unicorn crafted this piece of paperwork to throw us all off, but we’ve reached out to AT&T and are awaiting comment. You know, just in case.

Update: Based on Apple’s iOS 4.3 page, only three WiFi devices are supported through the Personal Hotspot connection. If you’d like to tether five total devices, the other two will need to be over Bluetooth / USB. Don’t go blaming AT&T here — we’re guessing Verizon’s model will be set up the same way. Thanks, Christian!

[Thanks, Anonymous]

AT&T Mobile Hotspot for iPhone 4 limited to just three WiFi devices (update: it’s an iOS 4.3 thing) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 04 Mar 2011 14:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We can’t all have 3G or 4G wireless wherever — sometimes we need to get friendly with a plain ‘ol hotspot. Skype is making that a little easier, expanding Skype Access in partnership with eight international WiFi pushers:

• BT Openzone
• Fon
• M3 Connect
• Row 44
• Skyrove
• Spectrum Interactive
• Tomizone
• Vex

Fon will probably be the most familiar if you’re in America, but combined the program covers 500,000 hotspots, including 500 hotels. Users will be able to pay for WiFi by the minute using Skype Credit, with prices ranging from a nickel to $.19 per currently. No word on whether that will be changing with this new announcement.

Skype Access expands, now unlocks over 500,000 hotspots originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Feb 2011 14:49:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Verizon iPhone’s exclusive new feature is hot-spotting: the ability to share the handset’s data connection with up to five devices. Hot-spotting will cost you an extra 20 bucks per month on top of your voice and data plans, but it’s really sweet.

Apple made the hot-spot feature extremely easy to get up and running over Wi-Fi. You launch the Settings app, tap the Personal Hotspot option, set a password for the network, and turn the slider to On.

The Verizon iPhone then appears on the list of Wi-Fi networks in your area, under the name of your iPhone.

So for example, on a computer or any device with a Wi-Fi connection, I’d go to the network list and select the Wi-Fi network “Brian Chen’s iPhone.” Then I’d be connected to the internet using the iPhone’s data. (See screenshot at right.) I connected an iPad and a computer to the hot spot over Wi-Fi within seconds.

There are also options to connect to the iPhone’s hot spot over USB or Bluetooth, which were also easy to set up.

(Note that you must install the latest version of iTunes, 10.1.2., because it contains necessary drivers to make Bluetooth and USB hot- spotting work with the Verizon iPhone. I had problems using these options with an older version of iTunes.)

Once you connect the iPhone with USB to a computer, a window will appear saying a new network device has been detected. From here on, you should just be able to select the iPhone in your network list and connect to the internet. (See above.)

You can also choose to connect to the hot spot using Bluetooth by pairing the iPhone with your computer. On your computer, after you select the iPhone from the Bluetooth menu, a notification gets sent to the iPhone with the same passcode that’s displayed on your computer. Once you hit OK, the devices should start pairing, and after a few seconds you’ll be connected to the hot spot.

Of all these options, the Wi-Fi hot-spotting was the smoothest and fastest to set up, and I imagine most people will be using that most often.

The Verizon hot-spot feature costs an extra $20 to get 2 gigs of bandwidth per month. AT&T has said it’s working with Apple to bring hot-spotting to its iPhone as well.

Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com