Clear.com

Old netbooks don’t ever die. They just end up getting promoted by wireless broadband providers. The latest case in point? WiMAX service provider Clear is offering a Samsung NC10 netbook with an integrated 4G WiMAX modem. The NC10 was released in 2008 and Samsung had largely replaced it with the Samsung N110/N120 series. This month, the company launched its even newer line of netbooks with Intel Atom Pineview processors, making the NC10 seem even more dated.

That said, the NC10 is a nice little 10 inch laptop, and with up to 6 hours of run time on a charge, it was one of the top contender for netbook battery champ of 2008.

The laptop has a 10.2 inch, 1024 x 600 pixel display. 1GB of RAM, a 160GB hard drive, and a 1.6GHz Intel Atom N270 CPU. If you sign up for a 2 year plan with Clear, you can pick up the NC10 for $199.99 plus tax.

Clear service runs $45/month with no data caps, although the first six months are just $30/month. That means that over the course of the 2 year contract, this Samsung NC10 would end up costing you about $1190. That’s not cheap, but it’s actually a pretty good deal compared to most of the subsidized, 3G-enabled netbooks out there. Of course, you’re taking a slight gamble in betting that Clear and/or WiMAX will still be around in two years… but what’s the worst that could happen? You get out of your contract early?

After checking out the CLEAR launch event in Philly last week I decided to give the WiMAX service a try and I signed up for a $50 for life plan that gives you both a USB modem for mobile use and and a home modem that you can hook up to a WiFi router to run a home network. That’s just a few bucks a month more than I’m paying right now for Verizon DSL, and it gives me the freedom of roaming around the city of Philadelphia with my WiMAX modem and a netbook. The service is also available in about two dozen other cities around the country, including Las Vegas where I’ll be spending about a week for the Consumer Electronics Show in January.

My CLEAR hardware arrived today, and it’s pretty no-frills stuff. The USB modem is fairly small, but if you don’t like the way it sticks out from your computer, you can use an included adapter to angle the modem so it shoots upward or runs along the side of your laptop.

CLEAR also ships a 32MB USB flash drive with the software you’ll need to connect to the internet using the USB modem. Unfortunately, the version of the software that’s included on the flash drive doesn’t support Windows 7, so you’ll need to download the latest version of the connection software from the web if you have a Windows 7 system.

The home modem is much easier to use. You just plug it in, insert an Ethernet cable and run the cable to your PC or a WiFi router. That’s it. You should be online in a few seconds.

That’s the good news. The bad news is that the CLEAR modems are pretty sensitive to location. I’ve been both the USB modem and the home modem in my office for the past 45 minutes or so, and my internet connection has already dropped out once. My upload and download speeds have been averaging somewhere in the 3-4MB/s down and 0.2-0.4MB/s up ranges. That’s significantly short of the 6MB/s down and 1MB/s upload speeds CLEAR promises.

But after wandering around the house a bit, I discovered that it’s a completely different story on the other side of the house where I get close to the advertised speed. What’s the difference? From my office window I have a nice view of the three-story building across the street. On the other end of the house, there are no tall buildings blocking our view. I’ll probably wind up sticking the home modem in the third floor window on that side of the house and plugging in a WiFi router.

If things don’t work out, I have two options.

1. CLEAR offers a 7-day money back guarantee, so if I decide to return the equipment this week I won’t have to pay anything.
2. I’m on a month to month plan, which means that I could keep the service for a few months, cancel, and then sign up again in a year if I want to. The only extra charges I would have to pay for would be the activation fees.

CLEAR is also available in Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas, Austin, Las Vegas, Portland, and a few other cities.

You can check out some photos I took while I was ripping open the boxes this afternoon in the gallery below.

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CLEAR launched its citywide WiMAX network in Philadelphia a few weeks ago, but the company held an event today in the iconic LOVE Park to kick things off. I stopped by to check things out, and you know what? Citywide internet access doesn’t make for a whole lot of exciting visuals. You know, cause wireless broadband is kind of invisible until you plug it into your computer. And you can only look at so many setups of computers plugged into modems and USB dongles.

That said, the folks at CLEAR did make things interesting by hosting a balloon drop ceremony. There were about 200 balloons and each had a code for a prize. I got $8 in music downloads. Somebody is supposed to have gotten a laptop.

If you’re not familiar with WiMAX or CLEAR, here’s the deal: It’s sort of like a citywide WiFi network. You can either get a modem for your home which you can plug directly into a computer or into a wireless router to host a home network. Or you can get a USB dongle that will work from your home or on the go, but only with one computer at a time.

CLEAR promises download speeds averaging between 3 and 6Mbps with bursts of up to 10 Mbps, and download speeds of about 1Mbps. That makes it generally slower than many cable modem services, but similar to or faster than many DSL plans. And it’s a lot cheaper, with plans starting at $25/month for home use and $35/month for mobile use — with no data caps.

That’s a heck of a lot cheaper than mobile broadband modem plans available from 3G cellular networks. The down side is that CLEAR isn’t available in nearly as many parts of the country yet. It’s available in about 2 dozen cities in 9 states right now.

There are some launch specials now including an online deal where you can get a home and mobile plan for $50/month lifetime plan. CLEAR also offers voice service, so you could sign up for home internet and voice. There’s also an internet special right now allowing users to signup for home, mobile, and voice service for $70/month for life.

One feature I especially like is that you can sign up for month to month plans. You have to pay a $17.50 activation fee if you go month to month, while it’s waived if you sign up for a 2 year plan. But that’s a lot better than the signup and cancellation fees you have to deal with from most other broadband and mobile broadband internet service providers.

You can check out more photos from the CLEAR launch event in Philadelphia after the break.

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