FreedomPop’s pseudo-free home WiMAX goes live

FreedomPop tempted users with the prospect of free home internet access — free after buying the hardware, that is — back in December. If you’ve been champing at the bit ever since, you’ll be glad to know that the more stationary service is at last live. As promised, you’ll get 1GB of free data per month after picking up the $89 Hub Burst modem and router combo. That allotment won’t be useful for much more than emergency access on the desktop, but customers will have multiple avenues for raising the ceiling, whether it’s agreeing to join in promotions or simply paying for more. A starting $10 per month subscription nets a more reasonable 10GB cap, and additional plans boost the peak speed from a pokey 1.5Mbps to 8Mbps at $19 per month. We’d think carefully about leaping in when FreedomPop hopes to switch to LTE this year, but the price is low enough that the early adopter tax will be low. Filed under: Wireless , Networking Comments Source: FreedomPop

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FreedomPop’s pseudo-free home WiMAX goes live

Sprint offers $2.1 billion to acquire the rest of Clearwire

As most observers  expected , Sprint has finally made a formal offer to acquire the rest of Clearwire. On Thursday, Sprint said it would pay $2.1 billion for the remaining 49.7 percent of Clearwire that it does not currently control. As we reported yesterday , the move is widely seen as a play for Sprint to acquire Clearwire’s valuable 2.5 GHz spectrum, which it would use to offer LTE and strengthen its position against Verizon and AT&T. The bid works out to $2.90 per share—higher than the company’s closing price on Wednesday—but analysts say the offer may not be good enough. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Sprint offers $2.1 billion to acquire the rest of Clearwire

FreedomPop launches free home wireless to compete with low-end DSL

FreedomPop’s new Hub Burst will begin shipping in January 2013. FreedomPop Just over three months after launching its free portable hotspot , FreedomPop now says its ready for the second phase of its expansion plan—a free home wireless connection. Like its portable device, which requires an $89 deposit to get 500MB of free mobile data over WiMAX, this new device (also with an $89 deposit) will offer 1GB of free data in nearly all of the 80 largest urban markets across the United States. “You’ll get speeds of 9 to 12Mbps when it’s fully optimized,” FreedomPop’s CEO Stephen Stokols told Ars, saying that it would be comparable to DSL. Read 13 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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FreedomPop launches free home wireless to compete with low-end DSL