Due to the Isabel blackout this week, I've been testing the waters of roaming Wi-Fi. Yesterday, still without power since 9/18, I bit the bullet and bought a t-mobile day pass ($10) which is good for 24 hours. While I believe t-mobile's pricing is too high for the casual user I thought this as good a time as any to try it. Even though I got power back at 1 am today (9/24), I didn't have any food in house so I thought I'd keep up my wi-fi test and travel to another Starbucks for breakfast this morning and use some more of my day pass. After I leave my present location (Starbucks, Chevy Chase Lakes), I am headed to Bethesda Ave to try out the rumored free Wi-Fi at that location. My day pass runs out at 2 pm today.

As usual, the marketers have missed an opportunity. Business news reports have said the t-mobile subscriber rates have been very slow for their hotspots. This says that they have a poor pricing model. I already pay $60 a month to Comcast for cable internet and have a wi-fi rig in my house. I'm not going to pay another premium for the occasional starbucks wi-fi connection. Starbucks should offer a deal with a latte purchase of maybe $2 or $3 dollars extra for some wi-fi access. The $6 minimum for one hour of access is just not compelling unless you are desperate.

I'm also on the hunt for a new PDA. Palm is releasing a couple of hot new pda's on 10/1. I'm interested in the Tungsten E which will retail for $199. I went to Office Depot and CompUSA and both were clueless. I am anxious to nail this one down since I expect to sell out quickly. We'll see.

Got my new Dell 19" LCD for my upstairs pc rig on Monday. Of course no power, but I set it up and it looks real nice. I'll get a chance to use it this afternoon when I get home.