[NTLUG:Discuss] Ricochet Greetings!

[Chris Cox]

I met with Rick Spies of Wireless Web Connect and he lent
me a Ricochet Wireless Modem (http://www.wwc.com).

What's that?

Well, simply put, it's about 128K of bandwidth and its
mobile.  You can access the Internet from the baseball
park, or wherever you go!

You will notice that I'm sending this message from Win98....
I couldn't get the USB port on my laptop to talk to the thing,
so I'm trying it out under Windows.  It works fine with
the serial converter under Linux though (took all of 3 seconds
to set up via Kppp), just can't get above 84K using that
approach (I actually was getting about 72K down and 86K up....
don't ask me why the upload was so much faster).

Another interesting this is that I'm located OUT OF RANGE
according to the Ricochet folks.... I'm in far North Frisco.

I'm impressed so far.

HOWEVER, this is still a niche product.  The Ricochet network
is not everywhere... primarily only in major metropolitan areas.
So... it's not a solution for folks out in rural areas.... your
best bet is still satellite.  So this mainly appears to the
mobile user who wants Web access within a certain area.
It's also very expensive today.... about $75/mo. ($30 activation
fee and cost of the special modem... varies ~$100)  If the Ricochet
network expands, the device will rival Digital PCS phones current
network with regards to availability.

Still, I think everyone should be able to browse from the park...
especially at reasonable speeds (Cell phones tend to bog down
to about 14.4K tops).  If you need high speed mobile wireless
internet, I don't think there's anyone else who has what
Ricochet has today.  There are some fixed wireless setups out there,
but nothing I know of with regards to mobile wireless (apart
from the plethora of people making promises today).

I'm going to do a small write up on the device for everyone
and we'll probably have the rep come out and talk.

More about Ricochet at www.ricochet.com
Local Dallas distributor www.wwc.com

Regards,
Chris