Reliable Wireless Email Through Cellphones? 26
neuroticia asks: "I recently purchased a cellphone and went with voicestream service with the expectation that I would be able to send emails through the cellphone using that service. However, my experience thus far is that only one out of every 5 outgoing emails gets through, and only 2 out of 3 incoming emails gets through. Has anyone found a wireless carrier who has a higher rate of success for delivery of emails sent through their service? Or even better- does anyone know of a wireless provider that *notifies* you when your email will not get through?"
Sprint & QCP-6035 (Score:3, Interesting)
Note, however, that this solution will require you to check your e-mail manually, which might be undesirable for you. But it does guarantee (as much as you can trust your SMTP server) that your mail will go out.
Re:Sprint & QCP-6035 (Score:1)
Beware, though: You have to specifically order the right digital package from Sprint or you'll be greeted with hundreds of dollars of unexpected charges for use of the cell modem. On the lower-priced packages, all modem usage is charged at a premium rate and not considered to be normal phone usage.
Also note that these phones work ONLY with PCS, not with GSM.
Use a PDA? (Score:1)
sms email notify (Score:2)
Re:sms email notify (Score:2)
we got GSM! (Score:1)
quote from http://www.voicestream.com/about/tech/iwireless.a
And I'm not a f-ing employee, I'm just happy with their service.
get a gprs solution (Score:2, Informative)
Where did that mail go? (Score:2, Funny)
Vodafone + Wap Works Great (Score:3, Informative)
Since you're probably in America, I'd go look for your local vodafone partner, and see if they offer a similar service. http://www.vodafone.com/ [vodafone.com] would be the place to start looking.
Move to Canada, eh? (Score:1)
I also have VoiceStream (Score:2, Interesting)
Yet, it seems that its gotten better. I have set up mail aliases for all important addresses, and i havent noticed any dropped messages. I also copy:forward all incoming messages to my real email account as well, as a backup. so if the phone is off, i'll just get it from my machine.
You can set it all up on their website.
Also, VoiceStream just got bought by Deutsche Telecom (according to a Cust. Srv. Rep i spoke to), hence the little Tmobile icon everywhere..
Maybe (hopefully) this means we'll see some of the much better services in Europe and Japan.
I'm praying...
AT&T has surprised me (Score:2)
Granted, *typing* email on a phone is dubius at best (with the keypad, et al), but I've had little in the way of connectivity problems.
For a while last year I also was with Sprint, and although they were a pay-by-the-minute company, I found it reliable for the little bit I used it.
DO NOT USE QWEST. They are an EVIL, EVIL company. Their WAP service sucks (unreliable to the extremes), and their customer service (for the wireless division, anyway) sucks worse.
Re:AT&T has surprised me (Score:1)
That's not so good (Score:1)
Blackberry just rolled out a solution (Score:2, Interesting)
up in Canada... (Score:2)
Nextel (Score:1)
Re:Nextel (Score:1)
Not too much luck in the US, unfortunately. (Score:2, Informative)
Your problems with voicestream are expected: I assume your wireless email delivery solution with them is based on SMS, and unfortunately voicestream SMS delivery is far from reliable.
You have a couple of options:
1) Get a Blackberry (www.blackberry.com). The service is *expensive* on a monthly basis, but email delivery is rock solid. I had one for a while, and got addicted to it.
2) Get a smartphone or a PDA with integrated wireless that supports POP/IMAP. There are a few on the market today (someone mentioned the Kyocera smartphone, there's also the Handspring Treo), although the current products are lacking in several regards.
3) Wait a few months there will be Smartphone and/or wireless PDA combos from Microsoft (don't hurt me, they aren't bad products), or from SonyEricsson and Nokia. www.voicestream.com has pre-signup info for the MS wireless PDA, not sure on release dates for the SonyEricsson or Nokia devices.
I know it sucks to say wait a few months, but things really will get better shortly. Most of the new devices rolling out are capable of real data connections back to your corporation through dial-up or VPN, and therefore don't have the security issues of forwarding mail through a gateway. The newer devices also support lots of local storage, so the viewing interactions are far better than with wap phones, where you have to be in coverage to deal with your mail.
Re:Not too much luck in the US, unfortunately. (Score:1)
You can also use a Palm or Pocket PC with bluetooth to talk with an Ericsson T68. We have several people at work with an iPaq and a T68 who sync their mail that way.
Motorola T900 (Score:2)
I have a Motorola T900 which uses Motorola ReFlex, which is a reliable, economical service. The T900 is way cheaper than a Blackberry (~$49 vs. ~$399) and cheaper service (~$19 vs ~$39). It has a keyboard and a 4-line display and is about the size of the smaller Blackberry, but thicker as it folds. Plus it comes in colors other than black [slashdot.org].
It works great. There are some dead areas in town, but it picks up the messages when you come back into service because it polls for messages, so it works quite reliably. Based on the polling response, it lets you know on the display whether it can receive messages, send messages as well, or has no service. It calls the latter situation "Storing Messgaes", and in fact, I went on vacation and when I got back to the US, it buzzed me with messages when I got off the plane!
I think TigerDirect has them for $49, or maybe Radio Shack. There are a variety of services plans: Arch Wireless, Verizon. I use a WebLink Wireless [weblinkwireless.com] plan which was my only option when I bought the T900 from Motorola (who directed me to Positive.com [positive.com]. It's $19.95/mo for 100K bytes.)
Consider Nextel... (Score:2)
The gotcha with nextel to watch for is to send stuff to @messaging.nextel.com. If you send to @page.nextel.com its basically SMS and costs a few pennies a page after 300. The former method sends an alert to your phone and you have to connect to their network to grab the message. The SMS method delivers message to the phone so its right there.
I've used this in a number of areas on east coast plus everywhere between Phoenix, Vegas, and Los Angeles. Coverage is remarkably good (just a few dead spots between phoenix and las vegas, south of I-40).