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-- Will the Xircom's Wireless Ethernet Module Live or Die? (http://discussion.visorcentral.com/vcforum/showthread.php?threadid=14963)

I've been waiting for a wireless 802.11b module that would let me roam my home and office with broadband connectivity. Unfortunately the pricing for the module (not including the transmitter/receiver for home) at $299 is between two and three times as much as I am willing to pay for the gee whiz factor. With the Palm Vx now priced at only $200 I could get all the wireless connectivity I <i>really </i> need for a $10 a month Palm.net subscription.

I see this as yet another in a long line of springboard modules whose price far exceeds the relative value to the casual business and home user.

May not die, but it will sputter

Reasons it will have trouble -

Price - 300 bones? you've got to be kidding! that's not even including the base and additional infrastructure.

Wireless - they didn't even build a wired version on which to build any kind of customer base.

Like the previous post, you have to appeal to the casual user as well as the hardcore. I can buy a Handera and a CF ethernet for less than the price of the just the xircom and a wireless hub.

I do believe the tool will be a success. I have participated in the Xircom beta test on a college campus where there is an extensive wireless Ethernet network. Using a Prism with the beta test SWE installed, I have sent e-mail, hotsynced, surfed the web with Blazer, used AOL IM, ICQ, etc. without difficulty. It's easy to access AvantGo to acquire information from the public server and the private server we use to provide students with course content. All this has been done in classroom buildings as well as out-of-doors in our external wireless corridor.

How about this? Sitting in a meeting with top level management where the BS is so pervasive that two of us (one using an iPaq)IMing each other saying the meeting is a "waste of time".

The price will drop as the marketplace changes. We all have seen what Handpring has done with pricing over the last two weeks.

I'd expect to see certain programs in ROM (Blazer) on the module making it a more attractive product in the near future.

__________________
D. Watkins
Please rescue a Greyhound

Beta Carotene

But did you have to pay $300 for the beta module?

I don't think anyone questions the potential and the functionality of the unit, only the total price of the installed wireless solution.