As with cell phones, signal strength can vary, even if you don't actually get disconnected. Unlike cell phones, which get faint or noisy, a data signal loses transmission speeds when a data signal is weak. Since CDPD speeds are low to begin with, CDPD can become almost unusable if a signal is weak, timing out when connecting to mail and Web servers. Following a couple of tips will ease a lot of frustration with the CDPD cards. First, set your e-mail preferences to receive only the initial 30K or so of large messages.
Most messages are smaller, unless they have attachments or HTML formatting.
Second, if you surf the Web, turn off settings for pictures, sounds, and animations. As You Go All three cards showed a few stability problems. My PowerBook sometimes crashed after waking from Sleep mode or after switching from one modem configuration to another. The Merlin for Ricochet was the most stable in these circumstances. With the two CDPD modems, the most reliable way to connect after switching configurations was to first change all the connection settings and then restart with the modem in the slot.