mobile data comm

Hi all,

Does anyone know of a cheap mobile long distance (20+ miles) data
communication service that would work in a large city environment?

I'm looking into communication of prognostic data on vehicles.
Basically a bunch of vehicles would be traveling around within a
certain range of a main building. They would each send data back (say
once every 5 min) for processing.

Cost is a main factor. I've looked into cell modems, but I'm not aware
of any service without a substantial recurring cost. (For example $30/
month for 200 vehicles adds up fast). Radio modems can operate in
license free bands, but I'm worried about the amount of noise as well
as the distance that would be achievable in a city.

Any thoughts / relevant experiences would be appreciated.

Thanks

Andy

awk2861@gmail.com wrote in news:876a8f80-7f9e-477e-9a62-7824c037f828
@e39g2000hsf.googlegroups.com:

> Does anyone know of a cheap mobile long distance (20+ miles) data
> communication service that would work in a large city environment?
>
>

Nope. Those in power will do everything they can do to keep such a system
off the air.....to protect their revenue pot.

<awk2861@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:876a8f80-7f9e-477e-9a62-7824c037f828@e39g2000hsf.googlegroups.com...
> Hi all,
>
> Does anyone know of a cheap mobile long distance (20+ miles) data
> communication service that would work in a large city environment?
>
> I'm looking into communication of prognostic data on vehicles.
> Basically a bunch of vehicles would be traveling around within a
> certain range of a main building. They would each send data back (say
> once every 5 min) for processing.


It's hard to make a recommendation without knowing the amount and type of
data you're transmitting.

All of the "long range radio modems" I've seen can handle 20 miles or so,
but that's line of sight- no way that's going to work in a city environment,
which probably leaves cellular as your only reasonable option.

> Cost is a main factor. I've looked into cell modems, but I'm not aware
> of any service without a substantial recurring cost. (For example $30/
> month for 200 vehicles adds up fast). Radio modems can operate in
> license free bands, but I'm worried about the amount of noise as well
> as the distance that would be achievable in a city.

Unlimited cellular data plans are certainly expensive, but that means you
need to take a hard look at the amount of and type of data you want to send-
is this "simple" data (i.e. lat/long location and maybe a few bytes of
vehicle status?) is this data that REALLY needs to be sent "every 5 minutes"
rather than just logged and read when the vehicles come "home" at the end of
each day?

AT&T offers prepaid data on their "GoPhone" prepaid plans- it's expensive
($0.01/kb, IIRC) but if you're sending just a few bytes a session, a $30-70
"unlimited" plan might be overkill. Alternatively, can this data be
packaged and sent as e-mail or an SMS message? Unlimited SMS bundles are
available for less than data plans. If the drivers are carrying phones
anyway, perhaps the vehicle equipment can be connected to the drivers'
phones via bluetooth or a cradle, and send e-mail or SMS with the pertinant
data through the existing phone.

Just because something is technically possible doesn't make it feasible. A
friend of mine was doing a cost analysis for his company where they wanted
to give all of their drivers nifty little WinCE-based PDAs to barcode scan
shipments and deliveries and upload the data to the main office, to save on
data entry personnel. Between the wireless units and cell data service,
they esimated the rollout would cost over a million dollars in the first
year, and would only eliminate two or three sub-$40,000 data-entry jobs.


> Any thoughts / relevant experiences would be appreciated.
>
> Thanks
>
> Andy

On Apr 26, 2:37 pm, "Todd Allcock" <eleccon...@AmericaOnLine.com>
wrote:
> <awk2...@gmail.com> wrote in message
>
> news:876a8f80-7f9e-477e-9a62-7824c037f828@e39g2000hsf.googlegroups.com...
>
> > Hi all,
>
> > Does anyone know of a cheap mobile long distance (20+ miles) data
> > communication service that would work in a large city environment?
>
> > I'm looking into communication of prognostic data on vehicles.
> > Basically a bunch of vehicles would be traveling around within a
> > certain range of a main building. They would each send data back (say
> > once every 5 min) for processing.
>
> It's hard to make a recommendation without knowing the amount and type of
> data you're transmitting.
>
> All of the "long range radio modems" I've seen can handle 20 miles or so,
> but that's line of sight- no way that's going to work in a city environment,
> which probably leaves cellular as your only reasonable option.
>
> > Cost is a main factor. I've looked into cell modems, but I'm not aware
> > of any service without a substantial recurring cost. (For example $30/
> > month for 200 vehicles adds up fast). Radio modems can operate in
> > license free bands, but I'm worried about the amount of noise as well
> > as the distance that would be achievable in a city.
>
> Unlimited cellular data plans are certainly expensive, but that means you
> need to take a hard look at the amount of and type of data you want to send-
> is this "simple" data (i.e. lat/long location and maybe a few bytes of
> vehicle status?) is this data that REALLY needs to be sent "every 5 minutes"
> rather than just logged and read when the vehicles come "home" at the end of
> each day?
>
> AT&T offers prepaid data on their "GoPhone" prepaid plans- it's expensive
> ($0.01/kb, IIRC) but if you're sending just a few bytes a session, a $30-70
> "unlimited" plan might be overkill. Alternatively, can this data be
> packaged and sent as e-mail or an SMS message? Unlimited SMS bundles are
> available for less than data plans. If the drivers are carrying phones
> anyway, perhaps the vehicle equipment can be connected to the drivers'
> phones via bluetooth or a cradle, and send e-mail or SMS with the pertinant
> data through the existing phone.
>
> Just because something is technically possible doesn't make it feasible. A
> friend of mine was doing a cost analysis for his company where they wanted
> to give all of their drivers nifty little WinCE-based PDAs to barcode scan
> shipments and deliveries and upload the data to the main office, to save on
> data entry personnel. Between the wireless units and cell data service,
> they esimated the rollout would cost over a million dollars in the first
> year, and would only eliminate two or three sub-$40,000 data-entry jobs.
>
> > Any thoughts / relevant experiences would be appreciated.
>
> > Thanks
>
> > Andy

Thanks for all the info. I agree that cell is my best option. Guess
I'll have to bargen with the cell providers

I did find a few off the shelf units that may do the job (ZyWAN,
BlueTree, etc), but I'm waiting to hear back on the base unit costs.