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I tried an ATT aircard for my laptop, and the reception was terrible. My iphone would have 5 bars and the laptop with the air card would have 2 bars. I took it back. Folks have told me that they have better reception with the Verizon air cars (in the Gulf Coast- beach area). I looked at the Verizon aircard, it is the same 3" X 1" usb device that ATT uses. I'm worried that I will have the same poor performance from the Verizon aircard. Anyone have experience using the aircard in the Gulf Coast onshore/offshore areas?
GT
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As James said, it's the network, not the card. And also the location. A Verizon card is different internally from an AT&T card because they use different technologies (EvDO for Verizon, HSDPA for AT&T). But both are comparable under the best-case scenarios for the two carriers. I have both an AT&T aircard and a Verizon MiFi. In side-by-side tests the AT&T slightly outperforms the Verizon when both have a good signal - I can get 1.5 Mbps on the AT&T, and 1.4 Mbps on the Verizon. The BIG difference is that Verizon has more "best case scenarios" than AT&T does. Where EvDO and HSDPA are not available Verizon and AT&T both fall back to older technologies. In these cases AT&T performs better generally. But again, Verizon's EvDO coverage is better than AT&T's HSDPA, so you will fall back less often.
Now to location. What matters is not which is better on average, but which is better where you will be using it. You have a better chance with Verizon because the network is broader overall, but you should verify that it works where you need it to a level of performance you find acceptable.
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Also, there are cases where you might see different signal strength on EVDO vs. 1x. For example, in a market with 800MHz 1x and 1900Mhz EVDO (Greenville, SC for instance), the EVDO will not penetrate buildings quite as well as 1x. Higher RF frequency is physically able to move more bits but can't propagate as far or through as many obstacles. That is the idea behind using the 700MHz band for LTE in the future.