Wireless Internet & ATR

[keesha]

Has any member tried to access ATR through a wireless connection? Thanks to all in advance.

[ggpagels]

I use ATR on my wireless network with my laptop at home every day.:D

[km]

gg' was referring to his in-house wireless network. ATR works great that way, I can use it anywhere in the house and maybe 50 feet outside my driveway. But no further.

If you meant can you use it at commercial wireless locations such as Starbucks, Borders or Internet cafes, the answer is probably yes, I believe Fred4Now said he used it from his car while parked nearby.

The third method is the one I think you are getting at though. That is the ability to use the laptop and ATR while completely mobile anywhere. In other words, take the laptop in the car, the mountains, or a perhaps a tournament room and use the on-line tote. Right now, you can attach a cell-phone hookup to your portable computer, but the dial out is about 14.4k bps, and real slooooooow. I know of one subscriber that has used it successfully to download data and use ATR a bit, but there is quite a delay in receiving the information due to the slow connection speed and it is not reliable or really feasible for more than one track at a time. The scratch function helps him though.

In the near future I'm sure there will be laptops sold that include the ability to stay connected to the Internet through a built in cellular connection or satellite feed at higher speeds. Then we can go anywhere in the world with our portables and play the horses, maybe even on the moon.

[MikeDee]

maybe you can play on the moon, but not in a vegas race book. If they get wind of built in cell phones in laptops, then all of the books will be banning them.

[keesha]

Ken You are exactly right, would like to sit at the local OTB and have access. Wonder if the New Centrino technology and a Air Card would work? Verizon has an unlimited plan for 79.95 a month. Your thoughts. Thanks

[km]

Keesha, before you subscribe to the wireless web, ask them what the connection speed is. If it isn't 28.8k bps or more, then ATR will run too slow to bother. Also, ATR has to be able to connect to the Racing Channel through the wireless network. The new Centrino is supposed to allow greater mobility, but I'm not sure how, you still have to dial out on some sort of a cellular connection, which is always volatile in a busy indoor environment.

I have wireless web 'pay per minute' on my cell phone. There are a some text based websites to view, but no way to connect to Racing Channel or even this website that I could figure.

[keesha]

Ken Talked to Verzion today they said the average speed would be around 65bps. When you have time stop by your local Verzion store to see if the stories match. The one here says there should be NO PROBLEMS. Wouldn't it be GREAT. Thanks

[fred4now]

bps? as in bits per second vs. kbps kilo bits per second.
Big difference.

[keesha]

fred4now,good catch. The guy at the Verzion store said he would guarantee it would be faster than my dial-up connection witch is around 50 kbs.

[km]

The speed sounds great Keesha, but another issue is whether you must subscribe to wireless web service, some are as much as $100/month with a commitment for 1year. Don't pay for that until you find out for sure that you can use the ATR + Racing Channel at a reasonable speed from anywhere the cell phone works. Please let us know more of what you find out and if it works as well as you hope.