Huawei's E583C mobile hotspot: looks so good, you'll wish it weren't portable
By Darren Murph 
posted August 3rd 2010 3:21AM
posted August 3rd 2010 3:21AM
Huawei Debut Next-Generation Personal Mobile Wi-Fi Device - HUAWEI E583C - in Hong Kong
"Wi-Fi in Your Pocket" enables unlimited infotainment on the go
HONG KONG, CHINA, July 27 2010: Huawei, a leader in providing next-generation telecommunications network solutions for operators around the world, will make it even easier for Hong Kong consumers to enjoy high-speed Internet surfing anytime, anywhere with the Huawei-branded E583C, its next-generation mobile Wi-Fi device. Huawei has been providing innovative telecom infrastructure equipment and terminal devices such as smartphones and USB mobile broadband modems to major Hong Kong operators for many years.
Huawei's first-generation mobile Wi-Fi device, the E5, set the trend in Asia for mobile Wi-Fi hot spots, and had achieved unprecedented successes around the world, including the UK, Hong Kong, and Japan. Based on the solid foundation of E5, Huawei has made further improvements in E583C's performance and stability. With an E583C in their pockets or bags, users will be able to enjoy immediate access to mobile broadband network anytime, anywhere, without the encumbrance of cable connections.
The E583C converts 3.5G HSPA mobile signal into an umbrella of powerful Wi-Fi coverage, automatically creating safe group Internet access and individual Wi-Fi hot points for up to five Wi-Fi-enabled digital devices. The E583C can also provide simultaneous internet access to a sixth device when it is connected to a laptop computer via a USB cable. Its design is fashionable and handy (with net weight of 90 grams), and comes with a 1-inch color OLED display which can clearly show information such as operator-network details, signal strength, Wi-Fi connection status, and battery level. The E583C enables easy wireless data transmission or online gaming on a wide range of Wi-Fi-enabled digital devices, including iPads, iPod Touchs, netbooks, laptop computers, portable multimedia centers, game consoles, personal digital assistants (PDAs), handsets and digital cameras.
Like all Huawei mobile broadband products, the E583C is a plug-and-play device, eliminating the hassle of installing any drivers to their laptops. Windows, Mac or Linux laptop users can enjoy high speed data transmission speeds of up to 5.76Mbps (uplink) and 7.2Mbps (downlink) through the networks of major Hong Kong 3.5G HSPA mobile broadband Internet service providers. This allows users to instantaneously upload or download music and video files. The E583C also has a built-in microSD memory card slot (maximum 32GB) that can serve as a USB memory stick. Business executives, particularly when working away from the office, as well as gadget lovers can now experience the excitement of on-the-go wireless internet.
HUAWEI E173u USB Mobile Broadband Modem
Huawei's USB mobile broadband modems have always been highly regarded in the marketplace. According to ABI Research , Huawei mobile broadband terminal products ranked number one in terms of global market share in 2009., and as of May 2010, Huawei has shipped more than one billion units of related products.
About the size of a small key chain, the E173u USB mobile broadband modem is handy and convenient to carry around. Similar to the E583C, the E173u is a plug-and-play device which allows Windows, Mac and Linux users to enjoy immediate access to high-speed HSPA networks. The USB modem also has a built-in microSD memory card slot (maximum 32GB) which can serve as a memory stick.
"Our unmatched R&D capabilities have enabled us to continually bring innovative, top quality mobile devices to Hong Kong," said Tiger Lu, Chief Representative, Hong Kong Representative Office of Huawei. "We are confident that Synergy Technologies (Asia) Limited, through its strong distribution network and solid market experience, will allow more consumers to be able to enjoy and learn about the unprecedented user experience with Huawei's products."
Francis Fong, General Manager of Synergy Technologies (Asia) Limited , said: "Wireless Internet connectivity has become a part of everyday life, and the trend is to simultaneously get online with more than one device, wherever a user may be. We are happy and excited to work with Huawei and introduce the E583C and E173u to the Hong Kong market. We believe that users will definitely like these two high-functionality devices."
Availability and suggested retail prices
The E583C and E173u will be available from August, and sold through digital equipment retail stores and retail outlets at major computer shopping malls in Hong Kong. The suggested retail prices of the two devices are HK$1,380 and HK$498 respectively.
why do we need an oled screen for this? use them for cell phones, theres a shortage here you know!
@Hell Angel
Yeah I'd prefer a functional screen over one which unnecessarily increases the price. That extra money could go towards some like optional antennas for when you need to boost the signal a bit.
@Hell Angel
Aren't oleds supposed to be more power efficient?
lol it looks like the NBC logo
@deepspacebar *sings the NBC jingle* Hu-aw-ei! In all seriousness, this company must have kidnapped some kids fresh out of design school because their newer products are looking much better than the older ones.
Hua also means flower/floral in Chinese:
http://zhongwen.com/d/170/x225.htm Hence, Huawei's logo is a flower.
Seriously, saying that it looks like the NBC logo is like saying that the Japanese flag looks like the Circuit City logo. *facepalm*
Seriously guys, this is like someone on Engadget Chinese saying that the logo looks like a rip-off of the fruit of the loom logo and being totally ignorant of what the company's name means. Hilariously terrible.
Their 2009 hotspot (i-mo) also offered 7.2 down and 5.6 up, USB, & support for 5 devices so is this just a design refresh?
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/13/huawei_intros_i_mo/
I suppose an increase in battery life couldn't hurt but there's no mention.
bring this look stateside, that's pretty hot
What is the point of a device like this when most modern smartphones can do this?
@JFH
most, but not all, also not everybody even owns a smartphone.
Luckily my Samsung i8910 does the job well with 5 Mbps up/1 Mbps down :)
@GGG
oops, i mean 5 down and 1 up
@JFH If you have multiple devices, then they can all share one mobile connection, which would be better value than separate plans for a 3G tablet, a 3G dongle for a computer and a phone with a data plan.
Also, it's just cool to be able to have a wifi access point in your pocket.
@OliverTaylor
I think JFH's point is that if you have a smartphone with a built-in mobile hotspot like the Droid X (also built into Android 2.2) then you can do without the MiFi and have one less device again since your laptop and tablet can connect to the phone and you only need one data tariff.
I have a hard time getting excited over mobile hotspot aesthetics. Now show me a sexy video card and we can talk.
@everyone - who does the best non-mobile mobile hotspot? I need one for a holiday home, but don't want people to be able to move it.
@brianM Any mobile hotspot + Gorilla Glue
HTC Legend design KIRF much?
@jack112006 Are you serious?
@jack112006 I agree with you that it's half a KIRF of HTC Legend, cos the moment i glanced at the image i looked at my phone and back, damn! It's like Legend's little brother, sharing it's same curved edge on top and chin on the bottom.
What's not funny about this thing looking good is the fact that Huawei makes shittier looking Android phones except for this u8500:-
http://www.unwiredview.com/2010/07/30/huawei-launching-u8300-and-u8500-android-phones-u9130-and-c5600-brew-phones-in-india/
I want this little beauty like NOW!
Between myself and my fella, we own 2 MacBook Pros and an iPhone each (on O2 - a 3G network so thin, you can see it's scalp).
I pay extra for a 3G dongle through Vodafone and would love to get rid of that for this device.
If this was a smartphone design, I'd be interested. It looks pretty swish.
Looks like the MiFi 2372 I was looking to get has competition now, so long as it supports all the GSM and 3G bands.
A must-have. - Jermaine Fanfair
@Jermaine Fanfair
What was your name again? I think I missed it.
Doesn't support HSPA on 850MHz: http://www.huaweidevice.com/worldwide/productFeatures.do?pinfoId=2619&directoryId=2462&treeId=462
Add a couple of Android required buttons to that and you'd have a neat phone design!
Do not trust Huawei.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article5993156.ece
http://www.itnews.com.au/News/175946,analysis-who-really-owns-huawei.aspx
@bigtoke lol, the 2nd article is really reaching there-why should companies have to be publicly listed?!? I actually think that being publicly listed for growth/funding is one of the worst aspects of western economies, since it puts an insanely heavy focus on short term profits over long term success. If you don't meet some completely arbitrary quarterly target that random Wall Street analysts set, your stock price tanks and then the board is forced to fire you because they have to "represent the shareholders' interests." even though they clearly just care about the short term. This is how Steve Jobs got fired from Apple when their earnings weren't doing so well, the reason why some really terrible CEOs get huge paydays just because the economy carries their companies along (see entire GM executive team throughout the 90's and 2000's until bankruptcy), etc. Decide to make huge gas-hogging SUVs that returned a lot of short term profits? Huge paydays and contracts that meant that they kept getting huge paydays even when things went south. Have a long term vision for your computer company that leads to some slow short term growth? You're fired. I'm not even a big Steve Jobs fan but it's just one of the many, many, examples where publicly traded companies behave as if the only thing that matters is the next quarter or the next year.
There are plenty of very successfully run private companies that I respect a heck of a lot more than their publicly listed competitors. Wegmans is a supermarket chain that consistently shows up at the top of the "best places to work for" list that Fortune runs, and they're privately held (and yes, this is the supermarket whose store brand stuff you keep seeing on The Office). Being privately held meant that when the economy tanked with the recent stock market crash, they cut prices very, very, aggressively. A publicly held company would have been given like 100 lashes by their shareholders for gutting profit margins. A privately held company on the other hand doesn't have to look at the books but they can adjust for the value of keeping customer loyalty by knowingly giving up some profits in the short term.
And FYI, of course top execs will own more shares and thus vote themselves onto the board. It doesn't mean that they don't let people cash their shares out at a decent price-if they fixed the price horribly then the execs wouldn't ever get a good payday either. The article is contradicting itself, if the higher up execs are the biggest shareholders then logically they'd protect shareholder interests the most-make sure people get paid dividends, get good cashouts when they leave the company, etc. It's really not Huawei's fault that Chinese law prevents foreigners from owning shares of mainland stocks-go and try to buy stock on the Shanghai stock exchange and you'll very quickly find out that you can't. But the article makes it sound like some sort of evil excuse Huawei has cooked up to discriminate against it's foreign employees when in reality most foreign employees get higher wages than their local counterparts.
And the whole "Huawei was founded by the Chinese government/military/whatever" sounds really sinister...until you realize that being a communist country pretty much EVERYTHING was founded by the Chinese government. Or military. Or post office. Because when they first allowed privatization there weren't that many banks, or anybody with actual credit history, to make business loans. Who's gonna loan you $30 million to start a company when they just started allowing companies yesterday? So it was almost always the people already running an existing publicly owned company that branched into the private sector. And when you don't have banks a lot of these people often raised the private side of the funding by asking all their existing employees to buy into the new (partly) private enterprise. I know, totally sinister.
Another thing you have to remember is that in a place that was totally communist, where are you going to find people who know how to engineer communications products? The nonexistent private engineering companies?! Like 90% of the engineers in China were in some branch of the military. Kinda like how DARPA invented the internet and microwaves. Is it really surprising that in a country that had no private enterprise at all, someone who founded a communications equipment company would have come from the military?
Viewing things completely through a Westernized idea of economics is pretty ridiculous-completely ignoring how the Chinese economy was back in the 80's and 90's. How do you raise funds to start a company when nobody has any money (since everyone only had meager wages from their government jobs)? The only way was basically to convince some branch of government, and it's talented employees, to help fund whatever business you wanted. This is how the post office in China ended up owning bowling alleys-not because there was a sinister plot by the Chinese to hide mail snooping cameras in your bowling balls, but because the postmaster decided thought that bowling alleys would be popular. This is why so many companies hired ex-military engineers, and why EVERYONE hired ex-government engineers (because there was no other kind).
Full disclosure-I know both people who work fairly high up at Huawei, and people who decided that the post office should go into the bowling alley business (which, on a side note, made decent money until every other guy decided to start a bowling alley and nobody made any money [the Chinese economy has these hilarious "fads"-just go to any mall in China and wonder at the redundancy of 95% of the stores selling the exact same items]).
At any rate Huawei isn't without issues, but I'd say that the problems aren't so much of hidden backdoors for evil government spies so much as some routers having terrible security and being prone to viruses/malware. I remember logging onto free wifi at hotels in China and the malware compromised router was trying to inject malware into EVERY SINGLE PAGE you browsed to.
On a hunch I tried a few router admin IPs and found that there was...no password whatsoever setup for the router and that it had probably been left totally open to the internet, allowing people to put whatever shady firmware they wanted onto it. Was this likely partly the IT guy at the hotel's fault? No, because they probably didn't have an IT guy, but it was partly the fault of whichever dude set their wifi up, while also largely the fault of Huawei for not making their routers more idiot proof. Of course this was years ago so I suspect that they've improved security, but to make questionable competence in security equivalent to evil purposefully placed backdoors is pretty ridiculous.
@techdaemon
+1
great and correct reply.
Uninformed Eastern or Western cowboy judgment doesn't require much brain work.