Lenovo and Vodafone deliver 3G broadband laptops

Stan Beer
Tuesday, 16 May 2006 10:27

Your IT - Home IT

Lenovo in Australia today announced the availability of Vodafone's 3G mobile broadband connectivity on selected high-end notebooks. Customers in 3G coverage areas will be able to get 384Kbps and, later this year, 1.6 Mbps access to the net, without the need to use external mobile data cards. However, both the service and the notebooks are expensive.

The ThinkPad T60 and X60 notebooks provide built-in mobile data connectivity to the internet, wherever a Vodafone signal is present, with 384Kbps performance in 3G coverage areas. Vodafone's 3G service is currently available in Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra, Brisbane and the Gold Coast metropolitan areas but not yet in Adelaide or Perth, which are expected to come onto the network later in 2006. Outside those areas, internet access will be limited to Vodafone's GPRS network, which provides a slow 40-50Kbps connection.

According to Vodafone Australia, when it incorporates High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) into its network later this year, ThinkPad customers will be able to upgrade their notebooks firmware to take advantage of the new higher speed mobile broadband solution, which will boost current 3G download speeds by approximately four times to around 1.6 MBps.

Hastings Singh, national channel manager at Vodafone Australia says: “Lenovo’s latest generation ThinkPads with embedded 3G mobile broadband connectivity gives business people access to everything they need at high speed – email, internet and business applications – anywhere within 3G coverage areas. Data access is also available in Vodafone’s GPRS coverage areas.”

“We’re putting 3G inside laptops so customers don’t have to worry about the technology that makes it work. Once customers choose a data

bundle, activate an account via connection manager and meet our standard credit test requirements, mobile broadband will be available each

time customers turn on their laptops in the same way they connect in the office or at home – it’s really simple and easy to use.”

Peter Di Pietrantonio, marketing director, Lenovo ANZ says: “This partnership demonstrates Lenovo’s leadership in bringing innovative technology to the market first,  With Vodafone, we will provide ThinkPad customers with a truly mobile computing environment. The integration of 3G broadband capability added to existing WiFi and Ethernet connectivity, when managed by Lenovo’s Access Connections software, allows seamless roaming between wired and wireless networks while minimising complex configuration and reducing the overall total cost of ownership.”

Speaking of cost of ownership, the offering from both companies is obviously targeted at the high-end business market because it will not come cheap.

The new 3G notebooks start at AUD$3399 for the ThinkPad X series, while the ThinkPad T series start at AUD$3849.As far as connection costs are concerned, the capped price service limits downloads to 1G for AUD$99.95 with a whopping 30c per every 1M over the limit. Thus, a user who downloads 2G in a month can expect to pay AUD$399.95.

By comparison, an iBurst mobile wireless broadband connection, which has similar coverage in Australian capital cities, costs just $299 for a laptop modem and for AUD$99.95 a month a service provider will give you 1Mbps internet access with 2G download limit. What's more, users do not have to pay if they go over the 2G limit; instead the service is downgraded to 64kbps, unless the user chooses to pay 12c per additional 1M. A 10Gbps download can also be had for $199.95 a month. iBurst developer ArrayCom also promises a 4M wireless broadband service in 2007 and an 8M service in 2008.

To be fair to Vodafone, however, its service does provide a level of ubiquity not currently provided by iBurst and other wireless broadband technologies, albeit at a price with average performance.