On 23/09/2009, at 4:29 AM, William Herrin wrote:
On Tue, Sep 22, 2009 at 11:59 AM, Scott Berkman <scott@sberkman.net> wrote:
Some people use a serial interface to a specific model cell phones to directly send the message over the carrier's cellular network. This is good in the event of isolation of a location from any IP connectivity to a carrier gateway.
The Multitech Multimodem GPRS model MTCBA-G-EN-F4 has an ethernet port. Add a SIM card from your favorite wireless carrier and you can send and receive SMS messages via "AT" commands over a TCP socket. Problem is, it seizes up or otherwise founders every few weeks and has to be power cycled.
Has anyone heard of other products with a good reliability record?
That is shocking. I have had a fantastic track record with a Maestro 100 GSM modem with a serial interface. One of my customers has one powered on for about a year now, and it's never missed a beat. They apparently support TCP/IP and the datasheet mentions something about email, but I have no idea what that really means, and don't really care so much. I send it standard GSM AT commands, and it just works. I've done the whole old nokia handset thing in the past several times and it's *ok*. Now though, I say don't bother, this thing is maybe a couple hundred dollars, and saves you oodles of time fooling around making it work reliably. -- Nathan Ward