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SPRING 2009 MOBILE WARRIOR ACCESSORIES
 
Its Spring and it's time
for something new! And, to refresh those
mobile warrior accessories we looked at over last
year's holiday article. We have two great
products here, and both are tremendous performers in
their respective fields. First, we will look
at a Samsung portable DVD burner which does NOT
require an additional power adapter. Second,
we have a unique, breakthrough product from Wilson
Electronics - a mobile phone amplifier designed to
boost signals even at the most remote or densest
urban settings.
SAMSUNG SE-S084B
The Samsung SE-084B is a
portable DVD/CD writer with one major design
advantage - unlike the HP unit we looked at last
year, this one does not require an external power
supply. Not having to carry an additional few
ounces and couple cubic inches of space adds up when
it comes to long trips and small bags for the weary
business traveler. As you can see in the image
below, Samsung bundles the drive with a special USB
cable with two host connectors. That way, it
can draw up to 1000mA of power from your computer.
Now if you have one of those ultraportable machines
with only one USB 2.0 port, then you're pretty much
SOL. The image also shows the rear of the
burner not having a DC-input jack. Samsung
should add one in a future version, with some kind
of diode protection preventing current from
traveling up the USB cable to the host PC in the
event DC power was plugged in. But this is a
microscopic flaw, because the only machine with only
one USB 2.0 port that comes to mind is the MacBook
Air... Because the choices for portable external DVD
burners are limited at best, our selection criteria
leans more toward portability rather than
performance. Having looked at the supported
read and write discs, the Samsung SE-S084B is now
our one and only choice for a portable optical
drive.
Here are the full specs
from Samsung:
 
Wilson Electronics MobilePro Wireless Cellular/PCS Dual-Band 800/1900 MHz Amplifier (801242)
We've all seen those
stick-on cellphone antenna boosters advertised on
late night TV. And we all know that its all
just marketing baloney. But here's the real
deal - the Wilson Electronics MobilePro Wireless
Dual Band Amp is an active device designed to boost
cellular signals both to and from the cell tower.
Ideal for rural use and travelers that spend time on
the road, this kit is truly innovative and unique.
It has a small plastic unit which houses the
amplifier, and comes with a magnet-mount antenna to
maximize performance, with a nice long cable so it
can be mounted on the roof of your car, truck, RV or
even yacht. The box has an internal antenna
allowing cable-free use with one or more cellular
devices in the immediate vicinity.
Here we see the bottom
of the unit, showing the USB connector where it
draws power from. That way, you can just plug
it into any available USB port on your computer, and
its up and running. Beside it is the external
antenna connector. On the face of the unit is
a circular LED indicator, which lights up green when
powered.
On the back of the
amplifier box, we see some mounting slots and a
small antenna jack. This is input antenna jack
which would allow the user to do a direct connection
to one of Wilson's phone cradles...
The kit also includes a
handsome carrying case, USB cable, and two USB power
adapters - one for a cigarette lighter plug, and
another for standard AC power. The case is
designed to safely keep the amplifier, antenna, and
other accessories neatly stored when traveling.
Here are a couple of
Wilson accessories. On the left is the Cell
Phone Cradle Plus. This awesome product not
only holds your phone with soft foam with expandable
jaws, but it also has a built in antenna so it can
interface with the amplifier above! It has a
suction mount, flexible gooseneck, and a variety of
mounting accessories. The head tilts and
swivels so it can accommodate nearly any mounting
position and any shape, size or orientation of
phone. On the right we have a special cable
which will interface the antenna of the Cell Phone
Cradle Plus to the rear input of the amplifier
above.
 
Now, we can place our
phone in the cradle, its internal antenna connected
to the special cable above, then into the rear of
the amplifier box, then out to the external antenna.
Awesome complete setup, Wilson!
Now for some real-world
tests. Using an LGVX10000 on the Verizon
network, we measured the number of bars we get with
and without the amplifier at a selected "dead
zones". Note that the maximum number of bars
is 4.
|
Dead Zone |
Without Amp |
With Amp |
|
1X |
EVDO |
1X |
EVDO |
|
Freeway |
1 |
2 |
4 |
4 |
|
Suburbs |
1 |
1 |
4 |
4 |
|
Hills |
1 |
0 |
4 |
0 |
As you can see, the amplifier
did its job in boosting the signal
significantly. Only in the Hills dead zone
did the EV-DO signal not improve. This is
most likely because there is no EV-DO coverage
in that area in the first place. Voice
calls almost never dropped in the dead zones
where it would have previously without the
amplifier. For any mobile warrior such as
Real Estate agents, truckers, delivery people,
and similar vehicle-based occupations, the
MobilePro is a necessity.
Next, let's look at data speeds:
 
Without the amplifier, we get
140kbps down, and 90 kbps up. With the
amplifier, 620kbps down, and 120kpbs up.
That's about a 4.4x increase in download speed!
More importantly, the ping times decreased from
979ms to 251ms. Amazing! Note that
this was done in the middle of the High Desert
of SoCal.
More info on cellular amplifiers here!
Well, if you're a mobile warrior
that needs the latest and greatest, the Samsung
SE-S084B and the Wilson Electronics MobilePro
are definitely tops in their respective
categories. Not only can you burn just
about any CD or DVD format with the least amount
of hardware in your messenger bag, but you can
stay on the net just about anywhere you can get
a faint cell signal. Until someone makes
similar products smaller, lighter, faster, and
more convenient, these two are #1.
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