Thread: Boost mobile?

following this thread with great interest, I acquired boost i450 from best buy a couple of weeks ago, $80 as promised included $10 usage charge which I'm still, ever so slowly, eating thru. Hardest part about getting that running was opening up the stupid plastic slash-your-fingers packaging - after that, smooth sailing, phone works, simple simple simple.

Few days later purchased usb power/data cable from icywu - they del'd the cable quickly, but it was wrong cable (data only, no power), and the USB plug end of cable has already split open, and the CD they shipped was blank - other than that, they were perfect. My advice, find nextel store as someone else advised, and get cable there - it seems the first tech advice on these things is scrap the crap cable and buy quality.

Once cable plugged in, did the webjal / mologogo thing, took a few tries but it did finally get going (switched from media center PC to XP pro, seemed to help) and once webjal saw i450, all was good. Then took i450 (without any pc) in the car for a ride, with mologogo app running, got home, and VIOLA, I'm on a map. pretty amazing.

Question for anyone still reading - if i450 can reroute NMEA or whatever the GPS is providing up to mologogo site and have it assimilated there, can it do the same thing onto locally attached PC instead? How?

Also, can i450 run the mologogo app and be a data modem for tethered pc at same time?

Greatly appreciate all the tips, esp Purdoom's tutorials. Not sure how I would've ever figured out the phone number is "S=2#777", for instance.

Just tried mologogo and modem at same time, agreed that it works - though with weak cell signal, not sure it's worth it. Gotta go figure out this WiDen thing next.

Originally Posted by devious

Few days later purchased usb power/data cable from icywu - they del'd the cable quickly, but it was wrong cable (data only, no power), and the USB plug end of cable has already split open, and the CD they shipped was blank - other than that, they were perfect. .

They did the same thing to me - I filed a claim with PayPal and they eventually refunded part of the cost. No replies from seller.

Originally Posted by devious

Greatly appreciate all the tips, esp Purdoom's tutorials. Not sure how I would've ever figured out the phone number is "S=2#777", for instance.

I just use S=2 and it seems to work fine

Originally Posted by devious

Gotta go figure out this WiDen thing next.

Please post your speed results - I find it hard to believe my i450 from BestBuy was the only one that had WiDen enabled out of the box.

cable:

went to find brick & mortar nextel today - not as easy as you might think:

• called nextel store from work - no, don't have cable, call mall store
• called mall store, male voice, yes have cable. with power attach? yes
• go to mall, stop at first nextel kiosk - get martian look, from only clerk, who is female (hmmm) - advised to go to radioshack for cable
• walk by second nextel kiosk, with male clerk, but figure the two kiosks, being across from each other, are connected and speak with common voice - noob mistake
• go to radioshack (opposite end of large mall), told they will have cables end of July
• go back to beginning of mall, calling the nextel number I'd tried earlier - again, male voice, again, yes, we have one data cable with power - I say "which nextel are you" and he says "the one closer to Brookstone". So, pays to ask.
• arrive at second kiosk, with male clerk - wait wait wait - notice this kiosk seems to be humping the boost mobile stuff - bunch of phones, including i450 at same price as best buy ($79), plus looks like maybe a $20 add'l credit (like Rafster got earlier in thread) but not sure on that point - worth a look (or call) if anyone shopping
• clerk frees up, we discuss cable, look at cable, satisfied it's the right thing, purchase it - $30.
• ask about power, he explains how it works, ask what their car charger costs, $35 (pass)
• ask about widen, he says "purchase premium plan" - grrrrrr, pass
• Go back to radioshack, purchase $10 igo attach for i450 - we double check that it plugs into cable, before paying - is good
• finally get back to car and am eternally grateful when cable and igo all plug together as they should and appear to be working fine, so I don't have to go back in mall for a long time.

performance:

got a range of readings using broadbandreports.com , from 11kbit to 57kbit, with a big bunch clustered in the 15-23 range, and then another, much smaller bunch scattered around mid 30's to mid 50's - wasn't able to correlate to signal strength while driving, so not sure what to make of these numbers - most numbers while moving on highway, highest reading was stationary (plan to go back to that spot and dig a little deeper). Travel route is mostly along I-91 in and north of Hartford (mall run was over to Buckland in Manchester, CT).

tried winamp streaming, found one spanish station ("modem" not "broadband") to actually lock in and hold for quite a while - it's a start.

did a little research on nextel / widen / iden - think I saw that they have to maintain existing network til end of '07, as part of the sprint acquisition deal - but don't take that to the bank - having trouble finding any definitive description of where iden stops and widen starts, either on a map or in text or in person