phone for trading, aircard Q as well?

i'm looking to finally do some trading away from home. this will NOT happen on a regular basis, but sometimes when i take a day off and have some downtime while waiting to meet up with some friends, or am travelling with family and want to enter / exit a quick trade while in the car. am hoping for some ideas / suggestions on what i need to do.

i've done some reading, and know that some people have recommended a unit like a blackberry or iphone (which would work with the first option above, while meeting up with friends), and some have recommended an aircard (preferable with the laptop, when in the car with family). i know nothing about aircards. here's what i own:

my cell phone is 8 years old? and i hardly use it. i don't text, don't even have pictures. so, obviously, i'd have to upgrade to SOMETHING if i did this. but i've done zero research on the phones.

my laptop: dell vostro 1710, windows XP, 4GB.

what i need:

access to interactive brokers and at least one other brokerage account (i suspect tradestation would be most likely). i've seen IB has "mobile trader"

realtick: for level 2 and very simple charts. (can this even be done on an iphone/blackberry?)

i'd be watching no more than a few stocks, most likely one or two. my trades would ideally last no more than 2-3 hours.

thanks for any suggestions, thoughts, and all that sort of thing.

 

I have a Verizon aircard that I got at Best Buy over a year ago. I use it with my laptop when away from home......works well. I have Charter cable at home and have used the aircard a couple of times when cable was down. Speed is comparable to DSL....not much different except takes a minute or less to establish the connection. I think it costs around $50 per month.....not sure. I signed a 2 year contract. Stosh

 

tks stosh, that's part of the information i was looking for, and why i posted in hardware with the subject of phone for trading and aircard, and NOT in some other section.

anyone else have aircard experiences, or suggestions on phone (iphone, blackberry, etc.?)

thanks...

 

I have an aircard and I do think it's quite a little slower than my home cable connection. I feel like it's a little slower than even DSL.

With that said, the connectivity seems to work well, and it's rare that I have to reconnect due to a lost connection.

Unless you're talking about real quick scalps where you need speed on your side, it's plenty fast to trade with though.

 

my suggestion would be to do this...

Get an iphone or any large screen windows mobile phone and then download the application for www.logmein.com. You will be able to use your home computer for all the heavy lifting and use the phone to see your computer at your home.

I have the Nokia N810 (large 4.1" screen) along with a travel router and I can login my home computer almost anywhere I can find an electrical outlet and I am within my coverage. Although now with Verizon’s MiFi (http://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/...t&action=viewPhoneDetail&selectedPhoneId=4726) you can simply put it in your pocket and go and not have to worry about an outlet. This also doesn’t limit your choices only to phones. I use this on a regular basis and it works great. You are also not limited to any mobile app that may or may not be available from a specific broker. I can check my excel spreadsheet throughout the day which is something that I can’t do with a phone because my spreadsheet is simply too big and bulky.

I use IB and they have some restrictions on mobile and web trading for advisors so this is simply the best workaround that using their mobile applications. You can actually see the charts and quotes in real time updating. There is no refresh button to hit it automatically does it. However, you won’t be able to scalp using logmein because there is a very small lag between the device and your computer.

Eric

 

Great suggestion shorty. $69/year seems very reasonable for such a service.

 

I also have a Verizon USB aircard. I previously had an aircard with T-Mobile. The Verizon service is much better since they seem to have a better and wider network. I trade on a laptop and when I have to go out or am out of town, I just plug in the aircard and click "connect" and in less than a minute I am connected to the Verizon network and my IB TWS gets the data just as when I am connected to my broadband service.

I pay $60 a month to Verizon under a two year contract and it is worth it. I rarely have lost a connection.

 

Actually you can use the free service with logmein. So the only monthly/annual costs are the service for wireless broadband.