I would just like to let you know how entertaining I found Rafe Needleman's article "Tales from the Trip" in your June Special Report on Mobile Computing. I don't travel very frequently with a laptop machine, but quite a few of my colleagues do. I shall certainly be recommending your article to them.
Huw Evans
Glasgow, U.K.
huw@dcs.gla.ac.uk
My group recently purchased a Dell Latitude XP laptop, which we plan to take with us when visiting customers and branch offices in the U.S. and Europe. Could you give me more information on the type of cable that your associate picked up from the Hotel Latzen?
Bryan Guthrie
bjguthri@cca.rockwell.com
Teleadapt Ltd. specializes in international fax/modem phone cables: You can reach them in London at +44 181
421 4444, fax +44 181 421 5308 or in the U.S. at (408) 370-5105, fax (408) 370-5110. E-mail is teleadapt@delphi.
com or 100111,2713 on CompuServe.
--Rafe Needleman
As the CEO of a non-profit who works away from my office a significant amount of time, I readily identify with your trials and tribulations on the road. The big problem with international travel is the presence of government-owned phone services which use proprietary connections in order to discourage competition from other equipment suppliers. Most European PTTs still maintain a list of "approved modems" which may be connected to their systems; they tend to be slow and very expensive. But a few well-chosen adapters can be a big help!
William Saal
73417.3242@compuserve.com
In your articles "Let's Put on a Show" (May, page 12) and "Tales From the Trip" (June, page 162) you make comments such as "we had only one reliable phone line back to the States." and "doesn't seem to recogniz
e American touch-tone signals." and "I'm only getting 2400 bps on the German guest house phones." Americans tend to think that whatever they do and have is good and everything else is bad or strange. Our phone lines are as reliable as yours.
Martin Burtscher
mburtsch@iiic.ethz.ch
While at the CeBit trade show, and a few hotels I visited, I had no problems connecting at high speeds (14.4 Kbps). I think telephone service in Germany is at least as good as in the U.S. Unfortunately, it was not as good in the guest house where we stayed. --Rafe Needleman
Observations of the Trip
