Inital Review of Clear Wimax Ubee PXU1900 USB Modem

I’ll get a full review up in a couple days but just a quick rundown.

Hardware

Not bad build quality about on par with the Motorola w25100 Modem.  The built in USB port with the rotating USB port is something that was badly needed on the Motorola modem.  LED lit Clear logo, solid red when not connected, flashes green (based on traffic) when connected.  The flashing logo is extremely obnoxious and visually disturbing.  The Motorola modem as a tiny LED compared to the Ubee and it did not disturb me have it sit off the notebook.  I do have the Performance Dock on order but for the moment I only have the modem itself.

Connection

Just ran a couple tests of the Motorola modem side by side with the Ubee modem.  The tested throughput speed on speedtest.com are really not any faster.  Ping times are about 20ms faster on the Ubee PXU1900.  The CINR and Tx Power values are drastically better than the Motorola modem.  So I would expect this to give a better connection in low signal areas than the Motorola modem.

Is it worth $10 more?

At this point I would say yes.  Especially for the added benefit of adding the performance dock in the future if needed.

Added 3/25/10

Clear Spot aka Cradlepoint PHS300

I am happy to report that the Clear Spot (aka Cradlepoint PHS300) is in fact compatible.  No modification needed, simply plug it in like you did with the Motorola modem.  You may have to flash up to the latest modem file + firmware (I did this months ago already).  Also you may plug in the Performance Dock + modem into the Clear Spot if you so choose (however this is not at all portable).  So if you are hesitant to upgrade due to already having the Clear Spot no need to worry.  It is rather odd in that the LED pattern changes while connected to the Clear Spot.  Once connected the LED remains lit green constantly which is not nearly as distracting as the flashing business while directly connected to the computer.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 24th, 2010 at 1:04 pm and is filed under Reviews, Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

2 Responses to “Inital Review of Clear Wimax Ubee PXU1900 USB Modem”

Kelly Hardy June 8th, 2010 at 6:48 pm

This modem is a piece of crap. it will work for a month or two and then overheat and drop connections like crazy. Hopefully clear will give me another one instead of having to pay for another one. The problem is so bad that I wish I had not gone with clear in the first place.

Sean June 14th, 2010 at 9:19 pm

I’ve not had any heat related issues with the Ubee modem. The Motorola modem in my experience gets a lot hotter than the Ubee. But perhaps you have a defective device.

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