Verizon EVDO Issues

Wed Apr 8 18:41:03 UTC 2009

Alexander Harrowell wrote:
> On Tuesday 07 April 2009 22:10:24 Charles Wyble wrote:
>> Been troubleshooting a very strange problem for a couple of weeks now.
>>
>> I have a few hundred systems deployed throughout the United States
>> utilizing EVDO connectivity with Verizon as a carrier. They are stationary.
>>
>> Over the past few weeks clusters of them in SF and Lewisville TX and a
>> few other areas have been failing intermittently. They are offline for
>> several days, then online for a few days then go offline again. They are
>> running Linux and PPPD.
>>
> 
> Do they maintain a continuous data link in normal operation (like, say, 
> connectivity for a LAN, or backhaul for a camera or some such), or do they 
> request the data link when they need to send [whatever] (like a discrete SCADA 
> system)? My (user only) experience is that cellular data service doesn't 
> handle long sessions well. 
> 

I have a few Sprint EVDO cards. They go into standby when nothing is
actively going on and fire up within seconds when there is something to
do. I regularly use everything from SSH to streaming video without any
issues. I only notice the delay with SSH when I don't type anything for
a few minutes and it has to come active again, but I can leave it idle
for hours and it never drops.

As far as the OP goes, let them replace the cards if they think that's
the problem. You and I may suspect something else is up, but if that's
on their checklist, it is what it is.

~Seth