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SD Wireless Card for PDAs

-40 points posted to Accessories (Keyboards, etc.), Broadband and Mobility by fischerjade 12/31/07

This might sound too simple but why hasn't anyone come out with a SD card that you can use like a Wireless PC Card to access the internet. I mean: (Axim) + (Wireless SD Card) + (Wireless carrier that isn't out to screw you!) + (Skype or Ribbit) = Big Buck$. If there isn't a wireless carrier out there that is reasonable there will be after they auction off the TV spectrum in Jan 08. If there are cards out there please tell me I would love to use my AXIM to call people without shelling out money to use a hotspot.

matt_d
Jan 1		 I know nothing of this product, however, it was mentioned in my Jan/Feb 2008 issue of Technology Review (a perq of being an alum). Page 30 lists a product by Eye-Fi (www.eye.fi) that claims to be a 2GB SD card with a WiFi adapter, intended for use in digital cameras. It stores your pictures like an SD memory card, then uploads them to various services using WiFi. I don't know if it can be used directly as a wireless card from something like an Axim, but it shows the possibility exists...
fischerjade
Jan 2		 I'm sorry I probably didn't make it as clear as I should have. I meant in my post that I wish Dell would come up with a card that would connect to a cell phone's network like the pc cards that Sprint and Verizon offer. The existing cards aren't for PDAs they are for laptops. I'm sorry I didn't mean wireless in the sense of WiFi I meant wireless like cell phones. I just wanted to know why dell or anyone else hasn't come out with something like a SD Card that would connect to cell phone networks. That would be the final link that we would need to dust off our PDAs and make them our smart phones through the use of Skype or Ribbit. Dell could make a bundle in this area because Dell could make apps with Ribbit for nothing or a small cost.
fischerjade
Jan 4		 Merged Idea originally posted 12/31/07
SD Wireless Card for PDAs

This might sound too simple but why hasn't anyone come out with a SD card that you can use like a Wireless PC Card to access the internet. I mean: (Axim) + (Wireless SD Card) + (Wireless carrier that isn't out to screw you!) + (Skype or Ribbit) = Big Buck$. If there isn't a wireless carrier out there that is reasonable there will be after they auction off the TV spectrum in Jan 08. If there are cards out there please tell me I would love to use my AXIM to call people without shelling out money to use a hotspot.
zmatt
Jan 4		 Merged Comment originally posted Jan 1
In short you are asking a near impossible task. You request has many problems, first. Secure Digital as an interface was designed as a way for a pc to communicate with small flash storage devices and nothing more. Secondly WiFi equipment compared to other components is large and requires a great deal of power. It simply would be too costly if not an engineering impossibility right now to but a reliably performing 802.11G chipset into a form factor the size of an SD card. I highly doubt that SD interfaces could even provide enough power to run the card even if such a card could be made. Your idea is interesting and in a perfect world it would be nice but almost all modern PDAs and smart phones have built in WiFi radios as it is, and there are many USB, pci, and pcmcia wireless devices around fop pcs to use. So essentially you have a solution looking for a problem.
wnahorn
Jan 4		 Merged Comment originally posted Jan 2
While it sounds nice, I am not convinced it is feasible.
fischerjade
Jan 4		 Merged Comment originally posted Jan 2
You can buy sd wifi cards all day long I just looked and you can get one for about $55. I meant in my post when I wrote wireless network I meant the cell phone wireless network that way you could use skype to call people without a hotspot.
fischerjade
Jan 4		 Merged Comment originally posted Jan 2
Just a FYI SD card slots aren't just used for memory. There are many things that can be used in the SD slot on a PDA. There are WiFi sd cards, Blue Tooth and even SD cards that you can use as a barcode scaner. Just go to socketmobile.com and you will find 4 different models for scaning bar codes.
zmatt
Feb 3		 Well these are news to me. But seeing as that this unknown company is the only one out there making them and no big names in the industry have caught on I'm not expecting much. Notice they don't give you solid numbers on performance or cost/ PCI wifi cards only work half the time, so how well will one in SD work?
 
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