Wireless

Verizon Wireless to sell Square's credit card reader for $9.97

Verizon Wireless today became the latest company to sell Square's credit card reader, giving business owners another way to obtain the mobile gadget for credit card processing.

The carrier will offer the Square Card Reader at its stores across the country for $9.97, with a $10 rebate to a Square account. After plugging the reader into the headphone jack of a smartphone or tablet, users can swipe credit cards through the device to be read and processed.

Square has quickly been gaining popularity with small businesses and larger corporations. Starbucks supports Square's mobile payments in thousands of … Read more

How to adjust network settings in OS X via the command line

If you need to adjust network settings on your Mac, the quickest route is to do so through the OS X system preferences and menu extras. However, you can also make these changes -- adding and removing ports, creating new locations, switching to DHCP from manual configurations, changing MTU sizes, and managing 802.1x profiles, among others -- via the command line.

The utility for doing this is the command "networksetup," which can be used to quickly apply a change to a specific network property. This tool covers every aspect of the Mac's network setup and you … Read more

Verizon clears Jetpack 4G Mobile Hotspot for take off

Need a way to surf almost anywhere without relying on sketchy public Wi-Fi? Verizon sure thinks you do and hopes to entice subscribers with a new Jetpack mobile hot spot. … Read more

Philips Shoqbox SB7200 review: Big sound, wanna fight about it?

The Philips Shoqbox SB7200 portable wireless speaker doesn't fill a room with sound quite as well as the pricier Shoqbox SB7300 model, but a tough shell helps it stand out among all the portable Bluetooth speakers currently flooding the category.

The hard-mesh speaker and rubber casing amplify bass tones as well as protect the unit from dirt and dust, making it a logical companion on outdoor adventures like hikes and trips to the beach. Pro tip: its light waterproofing also does equally well in your bathroom if you prefer bathing to a soundtrack. The Smart Sensor does a so-so … Read more

AT&T narrows Q4 loss to $3.9B, sells 8.6M iPhones

AT&T posted a narrower fourth-quarter loss, which was again weighed down by a change in the valuation of its employee pension plan.

Reporting results today, the company, however, added 780,000 contract subscribers in the period, and sold a record 10.2 million smartphones, of which 8.6 million were iPhones.

AT&T posted a loss of $3.9 billion, or 68 cents a share, compared with a loss of $6.7 billion, or $1.12 a share, in the same period a year ago. Excluding the pension issues, an adjustment for the sale of its advertising … Read more

Google asks FCC for wireless spectrum, but don't get too excited

Google has petitioned the Federal Communications Commission for permission to apparently conduct testing on, well, something. But it's not a new wireless service that some have hoped it would be, CNET has exclusively learned.

Steven Crowley, a wireless engineer, discovered the application, which was filed by Google last week. The application asks for permission to test frequencies across the 2524 to 2546 MHz range and 2567 to 2625 MHz range. According to Crowley, those ranges are reserved for Educational Broadband Service and Broadband Radio Service. But here's the catch: Clearwire, a company that Google had owned a slice … Read more

LTE users to hit 1 billion by 2016, says report

The rise in worldwide subscribers on 4G LTE has far exceeded expectations. In just three years since its nascent beginnings, the mobile technology has skyrocketed -- going from 600,000 users in 2010 to nearly 100 million subscribers in 2012.

Now, in a new report, market research firm IHS iSuppli is projecting that global users will double in 2013 and that by 2016 LTE will claim more than 1 billion subscribers.

"With LTE emerging as a true global technology standard, its ecosystem now faces both challenges and opportunities," iSuppli's senior analyst for wireless communications, Wayne Lam, said … Read more

AT&T spends $780 million to buy more spectrum

AT&T is spending $780 million in cash to scoop up more wireless spectrum.

The company announced Tuesday that it is buying the U.S. retail wireless operations of a carrier called Atlantic Tele-Network or ATNI. As part of the deal, AT&T will acquire wireless spectrum licenses, network assets, retail stores and approximately 585,000 subscribers.

ATNI operates under the Alltel name in the U.S. Its network covers roughly 4.6 million in rural areas in six states including, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, North Carolina, Ohio, and South Carolina.

The spectrum licenses that AT&T is … Read more

Will network operators start charging for Wi-Fi?

Wi-Fi is quickly becoming a key part of almost every broadband providers' network strategy. But is the day soon coming when Wi-Fi will no longer be free?

That's a big unanswered question as operators signal they'd like to get more value out of their Wi-Fi networks.

According to a recent survey from Analysys Mason, on behalf of Amdocs, more wireless and cable operators than ever have deployed Wi-Fi networks. But many of these service providers see these networks, which are often offered to subscribers for free, as potential revenue generating assets in the future.

Most broadband service providers … Read more