On 10/11/2011 9:28 AM, Art Todesco wrote:
I'm looking for a cell modem/service for a laptop to be used when
traveling. It would be nice to be able to shut off the service when not
using it without huge penalties. Anyone here using such a beast. Thanks.
lot's of answers deleted

Thanks for all the discussion. It led me to search out a few
possibilities. One would be to replace my present Verizon dumb-phone
with a new dumb-phone capable of tethering in the 3G world. Verizon
will allow you, in this case, to turn on and off the data plan whenever
you like, with a reasonable rate. As the phone which I now have
(Verizon), is piece of junk, this should be pretty painless. Verizon
has been bugging me to "upgrade" my phone for the past year. I'm sure
that Verizon really wants me to get a smart phone, however, with a
computer available pretty much all day negates any need to pay for a
data plan for the entire year.

The second possibility would be the Virgin Broadband pay-as-you-go plan,
as was mentioned. It too, allows you to active whenever you want within
a 12 month window. If you don't add data, which usually expires in a
month, for 1 year, they do drop you. You do have to buy a modem for
about $80. Virgin uses Sprint towers which have very good coverage
along the Interstates, but if you go slightly perpendicular, you'll be
without service. I used to have Sprint voice and it seemed very good
until we drove from the Interstate to an RV park about 1/2 mile away.
Here the service was very spotty.

Both of these are 3G and, according to their web sites, should give
between 700k to 1.4 meg downloads. Not too bad for reading emails and
going to a few sites, while traveling in the RV. Of course, most RV
parks offer wi-fi ... most of them free. The Verizon coverage seems to
be much better. I'm sure there are other options from other companies.

Thanks again for all the discussion and info.