X61S Sierra Wireless Card and Verizon 3G unlimited plan

[tslats]

Can't recall the last time I posted here but good to see the X61s world is still thriving. Only upgrades I've made are RAM and SSD. Went smoothly. Machine is primarily used as internet junk devise at this point.

Have older unlimited Verizon data plan (circa 2006ish) for the originally installed Lenovo/Verizon internal modem. Connects fine and on the VZ Access software you can see where it connects all green bars to broadband (sometimes shifting back to 1x).

Few months ago the speed crashed to 120 kbps up and down, basically 1G .. no matter that the VZ Access screen was depicting that I was connected to 'broadband mobile'. Very noticeable as I'd been doing pretty well with Verizon's 3G service prior.

I live in downtown DC.

I did contact Verizon and they went thru their routine, checking nearby towers, latest VZ software installed, etc. and deemed it .. 'not them.'

Any thoughts here? All other comm aspects of ye olde X61s (office router connecting, Comcast hotspot connecting) all work just fine. In fact, the computer reports it's connected at 900ish kps .. but I'm not getting that speed on any speed-test or the eye-test.

I'm still thinking it could be Verizon but wanted to shake out any things I could have wrong on my end before I go back to them. Hardware? Any common software conflicts?

There were rumors a bit back that Verizon was metering older unlimited 3G accounts (I probably burn 4 GBs per month on average on that unlimited plan) but they reportedly abandoned that notion.

Thanks

[Pokrzept]

Do you have any information what transmission protocol Verizon uses for 3G transmission? Haven't they change it lately? x61 3g card is quite old for today standards and may have some compatibility problems. As far as I remember mc87x5 cards support only HSDPA protocol, and if your service provides uses anything else your card will switch to EDGE transmission technology which can provide up to 236.8 kbps.

[tslats]

Good question. I do have that Sierra card-type.

If I can't stumble on to anything else I'll make sure to ask them (Verizon) when I check in with them next week.

I'll probably take a peek at the card and antenna connections to make sure nothing jostled loose recently.