The Unofficial Cingular Weblog

The Sierra Wireless AC860 is set to hit stores in the Dallas area as early as next week. The Type II PCMCIA card will be UMTS category 11/12 capable (HSDPA) and will have EDGE and GPRS fallback. The card will average download speeds of 400-700 kbps with a burst maximum of 1.8mbps. Upload speeds will max at 384kbps. Although the card is quad band capable (850,900,1800,1900 MHz) UMTS roaming is only available on the 850 and 1900 MHz bands. The majority of international roaming will be limited to EDGE and standard GPRS as UMTS is fairly standardized on 2100MHz overseas. Users will have to obtain a new 3G compatible sim card from Cingular, and an updated version of the Connection Manager.

Although HSDPA is live in scattered markets across the US, Dallas/Ft.Worth will be the only area to offer it now.