So I’ve got my Treo 700p hooked up to my PowerBook and I use it as a wireless modem. It works great when I get good reception, this leads to the questions how do I get a faster (stronger) signal. Someone recommended this “Freedom Antenna” external antenna . Which works great!!! It snaps into an antenna connectior on the back of the phone and it’s ready to go! It’s got suction cups to stick it to a window and a little pedestal to set it on a table (so far I haven’t gotten any better reception when sticking it to a window). It probably increases my plain old phone signal too…
Download speed is generally excellent! Somethings it’s only great, but it’s never crappy (if it’s slow I just turn the antenna a little and it generally gets way better). It was pricey, $69.99, but I see it’s $10 lower now. It only took a few days to ship, I wish I had purchased it before my trip up north…
Th only thing this thing needs is some kind of carrying case, I’m afraid of screwing up the wired connections for it. FYI, they make it for the other Treos and other kinds of wireless phone devices (see below).
Geeky Info – I’m generally getting 450-580 kbps on the download speed tests. Sometimes more (up to 700 kbps, but I got low 800s once), sometimes less but still greater than 300 kbps. It helps upload a little but not much.
Heres the thing: It helps best in low signal situations. If you’ve got a great signal, it doesn’t help much. But if you’ve got a great signal, why would you buy it?
Originally I tried using the phone as a modem via bluetooth (intermittent connections at best) but I decided running with it wired was the best solution. So I tried a program called USBmodem which supports USB connections (and bluetooth, but still not as well as wired). I think the 700p is still pretty buggy with the bluetooth.
They have separate models for the Treo 700w, 650, 600, and 700wx (but I’m guessing they’re all the same adaptor cable). I see they also have it for sale with: Merlin S620 and S720; Novaltel v620 and v640; Audiovox PPC6700 and PPC6600; Samsung SCH-i730; Verizon XV6700; Sprint PPC-6601.
So I’ve been using this for a while. And I definitely get some intermittent results. Occasionally it just doesn’t help at all while other times it helps a lot.
At home it actually seems to hurt the performance (my condo generally has very low numbers 50-250 kbps downloading and for some reason this doesn’t help).
But lately in the neighborhood I’ve been getting phenomenal results. Just topping over 1000 kbps the last week or so, I’ve never broken 900 without the antenna.
Gary,
I have a Treo 700P too and I too just purchased the Freedom Antenna. My problem is that the adapter they shipped doesn’t seem to want to fit my antenna jack. When I remove the gray plastic plug from the back of my Treo all I see is a brass-circle that looks like a rivet.
What does you external Treo jack/socket look like?
They don’t seem to carry this as it’s own product now. I think you just get the antenna and the adaptor cable.
As I’m getting much higher speeds in the Detroit/Michigan area I’ve been using the antenna less, but when used it does seem to help.
(My Treo connector looks like a little rivet, you have to push it on hard until it snaps on).