Lemonade from Lemons
Posted by TFG on July 17th, 2007
IPhones flooding wireless LAN at Duke University - Network World
That’s because the misbehaving iPhones flood the access points with up to 18,000 address requests per second, nearly 10Mbps of bandwidth, and monopolizing the AP’s airtime.The access points show up as “out of service.” For 10-15 minutes, there’s no way to communicate with them, Miller says. “When the problem occurs, we see dozens of access points in that condition,” Miller says. The network team began capturing wireless traffic for analysis and that’s when they discovered that the offending devices were iPhones. Right now, Miller says, there are about 150 of the Apple devices registered on the campus WLAN.
Silver lining: That’s one powerful processor from Genius Steve Jobs, cranking out eighteen thousands ARP requests per minute and killing access points for 15 minutes at a time! Frankly, I can’t believe the WiFi dudes didn’t anticipate correctly and understand the power of the brilliance of the iPhone. Idiots.
Dark cloud: I’m probably going to have to buy an iPhone — Palm is circling the drain, the Helio Ocean doesn’t support Outlook sync, Windows CE Mobile Smartphone Xbox Zune-a-rooni can’t decide what it wants to be and it’s a hideous interface, to boot. At least with Apple, I’d be in the cozy confines of Brother Job’s velvety glove and I’d never have to decide what I want and just buy whatever he tells me to.
July 17th, 2007 at 9:00 am
I don’t have an iPhone, don’t have the money to get one and could definitely find better things to spend ~$650 on — like putting it towards a Dan Wesson Razorback, the company’s famous full-size 10mm 1911 — but I do have a MacBook laptop. Bought it back in March and love it. Everyone’s still saying caveat emptor at this point with MS Vista, and from what I’ve read about it I can’t blame them. I’d give it at least a year before I bought a computer with that OS, if I had any interest in it, that is. My Mac works fine for me. Whoever doesn’t like them, that’s fine too.
July 17th, 2007 at 9:18 am
Psst…. MOGUL!
July 17th, 2007 at 9:49 am
Yeah, my pals have the pre-Mogul. It sucks very, very badly. Bad battery life, difficult interface for the phone, horrible call quality. Every bit of that might be the WinCEMobSmartPhone OS, though. And HTC might have ironed out all the bugs, too.
I got Vista on my new laptop, and it’s only been a minor annoyance, so far, about what I’d expect from any new OS upgrade. It’s definitely not the bugabear that some seem to think, but I’m less and less interested in such things these days. I considered the MacBook, but I have business apps that I need to run, and didn’t want to take a chance on Parallels not working correctly, and I definitely didn’t want to dick with a dual-boot setup. Maybe one day I’ll get out of this startup zone and I can get one of those Apple laptops — I’d enjoy futzing with it, maybe start liking computers again, even.
July 17th, 2007 at 12:22 pm
I just synced my Outlook calendar here at work to my iPhone today. Took me about 60 seconds, and most of that was waiting on the computer. Now it is synced to my music, videos and calendar on my home computer, and my calendar at work. (Haven’t synced contacts on either, because I have just used my old contacts from my old phone.)
July 17th, 2007 at 4:41 pm
Shouldn’t that third sentence be, “iDiots!”?
July 17th, 2007 at 4:42 pm
TFG: you want to give an iPhone a workout, give me a call, you can test with mine. I’ll be downtown, drinking coffee…
July 17th, 2007 at 5:54 pm
Honestly, I can’t live with ATT/Cingular, Kramer. Their coverage and service nationwide is just too spotty. I’m very sweet on the Verizon network, for no reason other than it’s never failed me while other biz dudes carriers, at one time or another, are crapping out. I might make too much of it, but I’m simply tied to the phone 24/7 in my dayjob, and I can’t afford to be in BFE and not have my network, my 3G, my email, my web, etc.
I just wish so badly that Palm had 1/10th of the energy and creativity that they had five years ago. It’s a sad thing to watch iPhone re-invent the Palm. But that’s life in the geek lane, innit?
July 17th, 2007 at 8:20 pm
The HTC 6700 is that bad? It has a lot of devotees on the HowardForums and SprintUsers. I’ve never played with one though.
Honestly, I can’t live with ATT/Cingular, Kramer. Their coverage and service nationwide is just too spotty.
I constantly hear that and I constantly read that the CDMA networks have far better coverage in the US, but all I know is that when I was a Sprint customer, there were LOTS of holes in coverage in rural areas where Callie had full coverage w/Cingular. My T-Mobile has actually been a big improvement in those rural areas compared to Sprint (circa 2004, they may be better now), but there are still places where Callie’s Cingular has coverage and I don’t.
That said, the Sprint SERO deals are so dang good and I like my HTC/TMobile Dash so much that I may go back to their service just to give the HTC Mogul (EVDO rev a capable via update, allegedly) a try. I can always bail within the 30-day window if it sucks. I won’t be giving Cingular’s slow iPhone/EDGE combo a try, though. I’ve got a more capable phone/service already combo in the TMob Dash.
July 17th, 2007 at 8:44 pm
It’s just anecdotal data about the non-CDMA stuff, and what I’m really saying is that with Verizon, I’ve never been off the net, while others in my party with various and sundry carriers have been, at places all over the US, over the years, too. I’m sure their services have all gotten better over those years, but I’m willing to pay a little extra and forego the flashier phones to have a good net that’s served me pretty well.
I’m probably missing out, but it’s like my Ford trucks — decades of good service, so why switch?
July 18th, 2007 at 9:58 am
Actually, I’ve consistently heard the best things about Verizon’s network quality and coverage, but just have no firsthand knowledge.
Since it’s not business-critical for me, the answer to your question “Why switch” is pretty simple — unbelievable 30 bucks/month deal on Sprint 3G with some sort of smartphone (Mogul or Q) for 450 mins, 7pm n/w, unlimited data, unlimited text msgs. But that also brings the possibility of no coverage in parts of rural OK and TX, when I have to ask Callie to hit google maps on HER phone (embarrassing).
July 18th, 2007 at 11:22 am
Yeah, you never want to be forced to ask your lady to do the maps thing for you, heh heh.