Using WiMAX To Replace a Phone?

vigmeister writes "I've decided to explore the possibility of using a netbook/MID as a phone while eschewing the services of a cellphone provider. Now that Atlanta (where I live) has WiMAX from Clear, I ought to be connected to the Internet everywhere within the city (once I sign up). Theoretically, this should mean that I will be able to use my netbook as a cell phone. Of course, there are some very real issues to overcome and I am simply putting this experiment together to see if it is something that is realistically possible. This could possibly extend to uncapped 3G connections (if they exist any more) as well. Are there any obvious problems you would foresee? Is there anything I have missed or any other questions I should attempt to answer in this 'experiment' of mine? A major issue is, of course, the fact that my pseudo-netbook has to be carried everywhere and always left on."

Wimax phone

[rshimizu12]

I like this idea, but I am more enamored by the idea of a Wimax enabled phone. HTC will be offering a Wimax Android phone soon I believe. This is cool, because the it's carriers can't lock down the phone since it's OSS. A even cooler solution would be deploy your own Wimax router at home and have free Internet/Voip service miles from home. When you are out of range you could use a prepaid phone.. I do think laptop Wimax Voip solution would be good especially for outgoing calls.

Re:Wrong tool for the wrong job.

[svnt]

It depends. I live in Portland, Oregon and tried this with Clear, Skype, and call-forwarding.

For me personally (and I assume at least multiple other people reading this website), I primarily use my cell phone at home and at work. It works reasonably well in this situation assuming you have good coverage at both ends. The battery life is a non-issue because it is primarily plugged in. I don't answer my phone when driving anyway, so most of my friends will leave a voicemail.

The biggest issue is network latency. It is like having a conversation over (forgive me) NAT-blocked Xbox Live. There is a very noticeable lag in the conversation.

When going out, I used my cell phone for texts. You can have Skype transcribe your voicemails and SMS you with their contents [skype.com]. Then you can respond via email/SMS.

All in all it worked decently, although it was fairly involved to set up. I stopped using it in the end because of the lag, the fact that Clear wouldn't support the Nokia n810, and finally I got tired of lugging the netbook around. It was an interesting experiment and you could probably make do with it, but it is not very practical just yet.

Re:Wimax phone

[rshimizu12]

Some of the Wimax routers go for around $600. As Wimax router chips become more plentiful the price will drop.

Re:You're delusional

[afidel]

Damn, Clearwire IS using ~120Mhz in the 2.5Ghz area of the spectrum. The 700Mhz WiMax deployments are still awaiting the shutdown of the analog tv signals later this year.

Re:iPod Touch

[dcowart]

Yes, you can actually. I got the apple earphones(needed to replace old ones) & mic set from my local mac store and I hooked them up to an ipod touch with the skype app and was able to make calls easily. This was using only 802.11b/g connections that were open where ever I was located. The biggest problem was spotty wifi connectivity and coverage. Also since I ride a motorcycle I was more worried about having access to emergency services, so I didn't go with it as a solution to totally replace my cellphone.

I could see that if it were economical, you could have all calls go to skype & skype-voicemail and talk when you're close to a wifi connection. While also having a prepaid cell phone for emergency calls. I was very close to doing this but since I'm on a family plan and my cell phone is only $10 extra it wouldn't really save me anything to go that route.

 

Using Skype with a number from DID Worldwide

[Cyborganism]

When I first moved out of my hometown to another city after graduating, my first concern was staying in touch with friends and family without using my phone to save on long distance calls. I also wanted them to be able to call me without extra costs. So here's what I did. Using my laptop I was able to get a full "voip" line using Skype with the Skype-Out service and getting a phone number through DID Worldwide. Skype-Out costs around 3$ a month and the DID number costs 5$ a month. This way for approx. 7$ I was able to make and receive calls through Skype. To go a step further, you could get a Skype Phone so you won't have to carry around a netbook or a laptop.