Starbucks/ T-Mobile Hot Spots

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Iconz

Gawd
Joined
Dec 16, 2003
Messages
636
My company signed up for the T-Mobile 802.11b Hot Spot program at Starbucks. I found myself extremely impressed as I answered emails and checked out the forums from the parking lot with a surprisingly fast connection.

It got me thinking, maybe I should run a Sandra Internet Connection benchmark and see how it compares to the performance of my Linksys wireless router at home on my Road Runner cable connection, as well as hard linked into the router. I also have a T1 at work, and thought it would be an interesting comparision.

Can you benchmark wireless with Sandra? If not, is there something else I should use? I hope to have something up early next week, thanks.
 
Dont know about that, to test connection speeds i always just use bandwidthplace.com or dslreports.net.

I thought about getting tmo hotspots with my phone, but i would be more inclined to go for the faster GPRS plans first, Bluetooth rox! :)
 
It's T1, I checked with DSLReports.

What sucks is that it hijacks your outgoing mail connection and makes you use a TMobile relay, which unfortunately is blacklisted in a lot of places.

When I complained they said it was "just how the system worked"
 
the connection between your notebook's wireless card and the wifi hotspot (assuming you are near the access point and have a good signal) is way faster than any widely-available, affordable internet connection, including a T-1. it should run at 11Mbits/sec, unless you are far away and the card auto-negotiates to a lower speed to increase the reliability....even then, i think the lowest speed it will drop to is 1 Mbit.

what this means is that the wireless connection itself should not have any effect whatsoever on a bandwidth speed test, as the fastest connection that i have seen (other than OC-type connections) is a 7.1Mbit DSL connection (www.dslextreme.com). for all intents and purposes, it should run exactly the same way it does for you at home....however, you need to keep in mind that at a wifi hotspot, the location's bandwidth is going to be divided between multiple users, so it may not give you an accurate account of the true internet connection.
 
Besides the T-mobile thing, there are other places that usually give you access for free, nothing to do with T-Mobile, you just have to ask for the key. Even parks sometimes have a hotspot. Though, it might be tough find what's available in your town.
 
Originally posted by kleptophobiac
I've never used the starbucks thing... how does it authenticate the user?
Click to expand...

Bump cause I'd like to know an answer to this as well!
 
yo i was wondering.. do all starbucks have wifi hotspots?? if so how would i be able to surf the net???? i have a toshiba laptop with 802.11 B wifi integrated lan.... could u plz temme how i could enable my wifi or rather the steps so as to like probably surf the net using the Starbucks hotspot???

also, would the same method apply to use the net in an airport or in any other hotspot for that matter??


thanks
 
Originally posted by wazzup
yo i was wondering.. do all starbucks have wifi hotspots?? if so how would i be able to surf the net???? i have a toshiba laptop with 802.11 B wifi integrated lan.... could u plz temme how i could enable my wifi or rather the steps so as to like probably surf the net using the Starbucks hotspot???

also, would the same method apply to use the net in an airport or in any other hotspot for that matter??


thanks
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You have to pay for the service from tmobile. It's about $300 a year.
 
Airports are similar. Google for "Captive Portals" and you'll get a better idea of how they work.

The difference between commercial hotspots like the Starbucks one and what Airports offer is that the airport offerings are usually located in the business centers, which means increased rates. For example, the last I heard its like $25 per day in Hopkins. (If this isn't the case anymore, please let me know. I'll be flying out of there on May 12th.)
 
Originally posted by BobSutan
Airports are similar. Google for "Captive Portals" and you'll get a better idea of how they work.

The difference between commercial hotspots like the Starbucks one and what Airports offer is that the airport offerings are usually located in the business centers, which means increased rates. For example, the last I heard its like $25 per day in Hopkins. (If this isn't the case anymore, please let me know. I'll be flying out of there on May 12th.)
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Sorta off topic: $25 at Hopkins? Damn, guess i wont be using wifi there, im flying out of there this summer. I got lucky when i was in Detroit, they were still testing there wifi so i got free access during 1 leg of my trip. on the way back they wanted $12 for a day of access, but it wasnet working quite right. my question is why sell "Day" access? The longest ive ever been in a single airport was 4 hours last trip. im much more willing to pay a few bucks for a hour of service than $25 for 1 day of access
 
I got a T-Mobile account for use at my local Borders. Very nice.

When you start up your web browser, you are taken right away to an authentacation page. Until you sign in you will always be taken to the authentacation page, no matter what URL you type into the address bar. Once you enter in your user name and password a pop-up appers that will let you log off. Now since I use Firefox that pop-up is blocked, so I generally connect using Safari and then browse with Firefox. You also logs you off if you are not on the network for a few minutes.

The connection is a full T-1, and at last reports the user rate is not what they were hoping for. $6 will get you a hour a month with each minute after the first hour $0.10, or another $6 a hour. $30 a month or $40 a month for unlimited access, depending if you agree to a 1-year contract. You can also get a 24-hour day pass for $10 a month I think. They offer one day pass for free to try out the service.

Visit t-mobile.com and enter in 'STDAYPASS0802' for the free daypass.

10,000 AAdvantage® miles special
 
Originally posted by Rombus
Sorta off topic: $25 at Hopkins? Damn, guess i wont be using wifi there, im flying out of there this summer. I got lucky when i was in Detroit, they were still testing there wifi so i got free access during 1 leg of my trip. on the way back they wanted $12 for a day of access, but it wasnet working quite right. my question is why sell "Day" access? The longest ive ever been in a single airport was 4 hours last trip. im much more willing to pay a few bucks for a hour of service than $25 for 1 day of access
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I agree. When I'm there I'll doublecheck the prices.
 
Our corporate account was already set up the first time that I used it. Basically, you can log on using one of two methods. Either you can download the T-Mobile Hot Spot utility and it will save your information for you and automatically adjust your wireless settings to compatible settings when you walk in the door. However, that is kind of a pain when you have wireless at home too because you don't want the utility to run there. My card is the Cisco Aironet 350, and comes with a basic user utility program. When I go into Starbucks, Borders, Kinkos, or airports, I just change my SSID to tmobile, and when I open my web browser it automatically takes me to the login page where I enter my user name and password, which is my preferred method. I hear an individual account is about $30 a month, but I use it almost every day, so it is well worth it to me.
 
Originally posted by xXaNaXx
the connection between your notebook's wireless card and the wifi hotspot (assuming you are near the access point and have a good signal) is way faster than any widely-available, affordable internet connection, including a T-1. it should run at 11Mbits/sec, unless you are far away and the card auto-negotiates to a lower speed to increase the reliability....even then, i think the lowest speed it will drop to is 1 Mbit.

what this means is that the wireless connection itself should not have any effect whatsoever on a bandwidth speed test, as the fastest connection that i have seen (other than OC-type connections) is a 7.1Mbit DSL connection (www.dslextreme.com). for all intents and purposes, it should run exactly the same way it does for you at home....however, you need to keep in mind that at a wifi hotspot, the location's bandwidth is going to be divided between multiple users, so it may not give you an accurate account of the true internet connection.
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Well I know people who pay ~$50 a month for 100 Mbit connection so...

Also the 11 mbit number is taken from the network speed, the internet connection still has it's own speed, for example if you have a 256 kbit DSL connection and that's being sent wirelessly to another computer even though the network speed is 11 mbps, your internet speed is still only 256 kbps. However, if you have a T3 (44.376 Mbps I think) Over b wireless it will only give you a maximum of 11 mbps connection speed.
 
I really don't want to know the optimal or peak speed of a connection, more like real numbers. So, going back to the initial topic of this thread, is there a way to benchmark these various connections? I know its trivial and unimportant, but I'm interested. I tried Sandra, and it won't work with the wireless connection, only the hard line.
 
Originally posted by xXaNaXx
the connection between your notebook's wireless card and the wifi hotspot (assuming you are near the access point and have a good signal) is way faster than any widely-available, affordable internet connection, including a T-1. it should run at 11Mbits/sec, unless you are far away and the card auto-negotiates to a lower speed to increase the reliability....even then, i think the lowest speed it will drop to is 1 Mbit.

what this means is that the wireless connection itself should not have any effect whatsoever on a bandwidth speed test, as the fastest connection that i have seen (other than OC-type connections) is a 7.1Mbit DSL connection (www.dslextreme.com). for all intents and purposes, it should run exactly the same way it does for you at home....however, you need to keep in mind that at a wifi hotspot, the location's bandwidth is going to be divided between multiple users, so it may not give you an accurate account of the true internet connection.
Click to expand...


you're aware that the most you'll ever see out of 802.11b is less than 7 Mb/s, right? and that's with uber-cisco equiptment with mega antennas, and a SN/R that's rarely attainable.

when you take into account your d-link wireless card, or centrino built in wireless NIC, and the loss of signal from going through walls, figure 3 Mb/s is all you could ever hope for from a starbucks connection. granted they each only have a t1 headed upstream, but i just wanted to make sure you guys were aware that the 11 Mb/s is purely theoretical, and never attainable.
 
Just to reiterate a few things here.

$30/month with 1 year contract
$40/month without a contract
$20/month if you've got T-Mobile cell service

When you connect it redirects your browser to their signup/sign-in page. When you sign in I'm guessing it grabs your maching name or MAC address and allows that to browse. Once you're signed in at one location, your user/pass won't authenticate at any other location. However, you can share it between a couple laptops by ethernet, I've done this :D

The connection is usually pretty strong - they use good equipment. After that, it's just a T1. I've benched it a few times and usually get a higher upload than down.
 
T-Mobile Hotspot at Starbucks from outside on the Patio!
StarbucksHotSpot.jpg


Wireless connection at home on RoadRunner cable service
wirelesshome.jpg


Cable modem at home linked to Linksys router w/ cat5e cable
cablehomecat5.jpg


Finally a VERY troubled T1 line at the office, bottlenecked by a 10Mb switch and tons of traffic.
T1-waters.jpg


Most impressive to me is the upstream w/ the T-Mobile connection, and as expected, the cable modem has poor upstream performance.
 
I use my Sprint PCS Phone as a modem for my laptop. It connects at 160kbs, and I can get online just about anywhere I want.
 
Originally posted by xXaNaXx
what this means is that the wireless connection itself should not have any effect whatsoever on a bandwidth speed test, as the fastest connection that i have seen (other than OC-type connections) is a 7.1Mbit DSL connection (www.dslextreme.com). for all intents and purposes, it should run exactly the same way it does for you at home....however, you need to keep in mind that at a wifi hotspot, the location's bandwidth is going to be divided between multiple users, so it may not give you an accurate account of the true internet connection.
Click to expand...

DS3's and ATM IMA (not a single physical connection, but a single logical connection) can run much faster than 7.1Mbit without being at the OC level...
 
Originally posted by Zed
When you connect it redirects your browser to their signup/sign-in page. When you sign in I'm guessing it grabs your maching name or MAC address and allows that to browse. Once you're signed in at one location, your user/pass won't authenticate at any other location. However, you can share it between a couple laptops by ethernet, I've done this :D
Click to expand...

Actually, for the time being your user name will not authenticate more than once at a single location, but we have been able to sign in at multiple locations at once. I doubt that this will last for long, but it works for now.

And thanx to Omega-X for the linkage to the benchmarks.;)
 
Originally posted by NleahciM
Bump cause I'd like to know an answer to this as well!
Click to expand...

From my experience setting up wireless access points, it probibly does it this way:

When you power on, your device associates with their AP which is open to all connections. The AP is connected directly and only to a auth\network server. This server dishes out the DHCP IP addresses to everyone who connects, and also runs a DNS server that resolves ALL addresses to an auth server, probibly the same server.

The auth server can run IPTABLES or something of the sort, set to deny all outgoing traffic and reroute it back to the auth server. THis is why when you type anything into the web address bar it always takes you to the login\signup page.

When you log in, the IPTABLES rules are dynamically changed to allow your IPADDRESS requests out to the internet. When your time is up\log out, the IPTABLES rules are again dynamically changed to BLOCK your IP address and send all requests back to the auth server.

Hope this explains and helps! :D
 
Originally posted by darktiger
I use my Sprint PCS Phone as a modem for my laptop. It connects at 160kbs, and I can get online just about anywhere I want.
Click to expand...

Ever have issues with it disconnecting? I've been using Sprint to get online at least a couple times a day for about a year now, on no less than a dozen systems, and I've rarely been able to stay on for more than half an hour at a time without having to reconnect. Even with a perfect signal when I'm not moving.

If it weren't for that it'd be perfect.
 
Originally posted by Iconz
Actually, for the time being your user name will not authenticate more than once at a single location, but we have been able to sign in at multiple locations at once. I doubt that this will last for long, but it works for now.

And thanx to Omega-X for the linkage to the benchmarks.;)
Click to expand...

I tried that with a friend - at a location in Washington and California at the same time. If one of us logged on, the other would just get booted back to the logon screen until the original person logged off.

Could be wherever you were doing it just had a glitchy system, but it seems that now they're authenticating through a central server.
 
Okay, my boss bought me a Verizon Wireless CDMA card for my T23. I have to say it pales in comparison to the results I get at Starbucks with T-Mobile. Granted, I can access the internet from anywhere with my lappy now, but I think I'll be going to starbucks if I have any serious work to do.
 
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