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Novatel MiFi 2372 Personal GSM Wireless Router Review
Novatel's MiFi 2372 is a new addition to their MiFi family of Intelligent Mobile Hotspots which allows sharing of wireless broadband internet via WiFi with up to 5 devices. Previously there was MiFi 2200 for Sprint and Verizon (CDMA), the MiFi 2352 GSM variant for Europe and new Mifi 2372 which adds the GSM 3G frequencies for AT&T and Rogers Wireless. Unfortunately this iteration doesn't support the 3G frequencies for T-Mobile. The MiFi 2372 supports speeds up to 7.2 Mbps (HSDPA) dowload and 5.76 Mbps (HSUPA) upload.
The MiFi 2372 supports
The MiFi is very compact and is slightly larger than a standard business card. It is about as thick as an iPhone and slightly thinner than an HTC Touch Diamond cell phone. The unit is very pocketable, but does get a little toasty during use, so a pant pocket may not be the best location for it while in use. The unit comes with a variety of power plugs for use while traveling the world which connects to the microUSB charger. Also included is a USB to microUSB cable for tethering the MiFi to a computer.
Specifications:
Setup The MiFi 2372 is fairly easy to setup for use. The unit was configured for use with AT&T. The information needed prior to setup is the APN which for AT&T is either isp.cingular if you are using a GSM SIM from a wireless GSM modem or wap.cingular if the GSM SIM is coming coming from an existing 3G cell phone. If you use the isp.cingular with a SIM coming from a 3G phone and was not on a tethering plan, you may be charged extra usage fees.
After installed the SIM and battery, the device was charged for 4 hours (until charge light turns amber). The status light has several modes:
In order to configure the device, it will need to be connected to a WiFi enabled device in order to access the setup web page. The URL is either http://192.168.1.1 or http://MiFi. I've found in some cases while connected to the HSPA network that I have to use the IP address rather than http://MiFi to access the configuration application due to the name server thinking this is an external page. The Setup web page allows one to configure the devices DHCP server, wireless security (WEP, WPA and WPA2). It also has features to turn off SSID broadcast and also MAC filtering to only allow known devices access to the device given their MAC address. Once the SSID and security is set, then all that needs to be done is to add the APN for the cellular provider to the Internet profile. The MiFi allows multiple profiles to be set and one can select the active one. The AT&T APN used in testing was isp.cingular since the SIM was transferred from a USB Broadband dongle (Sierra Wireless USBConnect 881). One nice feature that is enabled via the configuration page is whether or not the MiFi connects to the Internet upon power on. The default configuration is for the user to access the MiFi config page and turn on or off the internet access after connecting via WiFi to the unit. With the power-on internet access, one can just turn on the device and it will connect to the 3G network automatically. The internet access can then either be turned off via the configuration page or by just turning off the unit. Programmability The MiFi 2372 has a Linux back-end and a software development kit is available from Novatel. There are a couple of applications that have been described by Novatel. One of the cooler ones is integration into the Eye-fi. The Eye-fi is a SD card with a built in WiFi transmitter. The MiFi 2372 integration allows the Eye-fi to transmit the pictures taken with a digital camera to the microSD card on the MiFi. The MiFi will then reduce the size of the picture and upload to a picture sharing internet site. The original picture (non-modified) remains on the MiFi microSDHC card. Alcatel-Lucent will also have a suite of security products geared for businesses for the MiFi 2372. Novatel may have an app store for the MiFi given enough support by the development community. Performance: The MiFi 2372 was tested individually with 4 different devices and tested using the FCC Broadband Test. The test was performed with the MiFi and connected devices in the exact same position. The area where the test was done had a weak signal, getting only 2 bars. This was not an issue with the MiFi, but the signal strength in the area.
In order to test the access in an area that had strong AT&T signal and also in a moving environment, the unit was tested on the San Diego North County Sprinter train. We boarded the West to East train which travels from Oceanside to Escondido. With only one person logged into the MiFi, we were getting 2.5 Mbps download (per Speed Test on DSLReports.com). We had initially 4 people log into the MiFi to see how it reacts. All 4 people were able to log in fairly quickly with no issues.
We then had 5 people logged in: 4 laptops and 1 iPhone.
The bandwidth dropped from around 2.5 Mbps to a little over 650 Kbps. This was more than adequate for everyone's surfing pleasure since no one was streaming video.
Conclusion Overall the MiFi 2372 worked admirably and battery life has been close to 3.5 hours of use. Even with 5 people surfing for 20 minutes, the device still had 2 bars on the battery meter and hadn't been recharged since it was initially setup and tested a couple of days before. So far the device has been extremely handy in that I can pull out my Windows Mobile Phone or iPhone to access the internet prior to boarding the train and then swap to my laptop without having to hassle with launching a separate connection software or entering a passcode since it has already been entered via the WiFi settings. Please e-mail info@terracode.com with any comments or questions. Terracode LLC, copyright 2010 |
