Option's option for ExpressCard HSDPA

by Chris Ziegler posted Dec 7th 2006 at 7:22PM

Nipping at the heels of Novatel's similarly-styled XU870, Belgium's Option Wireless Technology has announced its GlobeTrotter EXPRESS 7.2. As the name implies, the ExpressCard promises 7.2Mbps downstream on the wings of your carrier's HSDPA airwaves -- if said carrier supports such blazingly fast speeds, of course, and as of right now 3.6 is as good as it gets. For what it's worth, the XU870 currently tops out at 3.6Mbps with a software upgrade to 7.2 slated for down the road, so the GlobeTrotter takes the strictly-theoretical speed crown in the meantime (and if the GlobeTrotter were actually shipping right now like the XU870 is, that'd be even cooler). Thanks to a nifty little feature Option calls "Zero CD," drivers for the card are embedded in the card itself, meaning that no separate driver installation is necessary when you shove this puppy into your lappie of choice. No word on availability yet, but with support for triband HSDPA and quadband EDGE, we wouldn't be surprised to see this one take the whole world by storm.

[Via 3G.co.uk, thanks Bram]

Filed under: Peripherals, Others, GSM, GPRS, EDGE, HSDPA, UMTS

Tags: data, edge, expresscard, globetrotter express, GlobetrotterExpress, gsm, hsdpa, modem, option, others, peripherals, umts

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Neutral

Rich Cornia @ Dec 10th 2006 5:01PM

How about Mac compatibility?

Neutral

Stuart @ Dec 18th 2006 4:30PM

No word on availability yet:
http://www.option.com/news/detail05.cfm?newsitemgroup_id=498
"GlobeTrotter EXPRESS 7.2 is currently sampling and initial shipments to leading network operators are scheduled for January 2007."

How about Mac compatibility?
http://www.option.com/products/globetrotter_expresscard72.shtml
Drivers: Windows™ 2000 Pro, Personal and XP Pro/Home, Vista and MAC OS X.

Neutral

Jeff R @ Apr 25th 2007 4:18PM

Now if the northstar state minnesota can even get high speed internet from Cingy/At&T

Neutral

Kelly @ Jul 9th 2007 11:01PM

Big problems with the Option GlobeTrotter Express 7.2.

Yes it's here and the news isn't favorable.

Three new laptops...three GlobeTrotter cards and problems with all of them. (NOTE: Notebooks; 2 HP and 1 Gateway.)

Cingular support tried to work out the issues for a week without success.

Cards were returned for the new AT&T USB cards which worked like a charm the first time for all 3 notebooks.

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