personally I would go with an air card, I have one for my netbook so I can use it when traveling, it gives you that option should you ever need it which satellite does not. Satellite can be affected by weather such as heavy rain, clouds and sun storms. I have direct tv for tv and do experience outages at times for those reasons. I would make very sure you have good 3G coverage in your area though before going with the air card, do you have good verizon cell phone coverage now? You can look at their maps but they are not that reliable, I would definitely make sure you have at least a 30 day period in which you can return it and cancel the contract and not pay anything should you run into a problem with it like not being able to get good coverage in your area. The 5 gig cap never was a problem for me because if I had something big to download I would just plug into my cable to get it so it did not affect my aircard usage, you will not have that option of course so the cap may affect you more. I was told I would get the air card it self free after I paid $99, they would refund it to me in a rebate, I never ever got the rebate which really makes me mad, had I known that I would not have got it. The monthly fee of around $60 to me is way too high compared to other online costs. But when it is the only option people will pay it. However I did hear of a new one available that uses the same 3 G networks and cost much less recently, it is called DataJack cost $40 a month and has an unlimited usage rather than the 5 gig cap and says it has National coverage and no contracts which is awesome. The Data Jack with any of the air cards you can do exactly the same things you do with dial up or dsl or any other method so if you want to check email yes you can do that, I was not given an email address with it but I use webmail, hotmail and gmail so no need for another email.

Microsoft Security Essentials may be a little better for you, download it to the desktop from the link below, don't double click the set up file just yet. http://www.microsoft.com/security_essentials/ Once you have the set up file for Microsoft Security Essentials, visit the link below and download the AVG REMOVER choose the 32 bit or 64 bit according to your system. http://www.avg.com/us-en/download-tools AVG Remover eliminates all the parts of your AVG installation from your computer, including registry items, installation files, user files, etc. Once the AVG remover has done it's work you can now double click the Microsoft Security Essentials set up file and proceed to install it. Once those steps are complete, run the temp file cleaner following the instructions below: Clean out your temporary internet files and temp files. Download TFC by OldTimer click Here to your desktop. Click the Save file tab, save it to the desktop. Then double click it to run it. Double-clickTFC.exe to run it. Note: If you are running on Vista, right-click on the file and choose Run As Administrator TFC will close all programs when run, so make sure you have saved all your work before you begin * Click the Start button to begin the cleaning process. * Depending on how often you clean temp files, execution time should be anywhere from a few seconds to a minute or two. * Please let TFC run uninterrupted until it is finished. Once TFC is finished it should restart your computer. If it does not, please manually restart the computer yourself to ensure a complete cleaning. Let us know how it all goes.

For those looking for a "router" for sharing data over cell services, there are additional alternatives to using a USB dongle with a portable router: - A "mobile hotspot", a combined cellular "modem" and router in one small package. Offered by the major carriers. Cost- wise, it's like having another phone, you pay to buy the device and have a (usually 2 year)contract with monthly access and data usage charges. - Most smart phones can operate as a mobile hotspot. Also called "tethering". The advantage with this is that there's nothing additional to buy and (at least with some carriers) no contract is necessary. You can turn it off and on as you wish, and apply usage to the phone plan you already have. The disadvantage is if you're not plugged in, the steady stream of cell data and wifi usage will eat through your battery life. I don't know if a tethered connection can be encrypted. It's convenient for occasional use, with my carrier, it's $ 20 per month prorated for the days it's turned on, so it's like 70 cents per day.

I have directv...now they are owned by att....I was TRYING not to have all the eggs in one basket, as I have never been thrilled with att, but soon I suppose they will scarf up Hughesnet !! Att is the ONLY cell service with enough coverage for DH when he travels the hinterlands for his job. We have been experimenting with unplugging the equipment in various ways to see if something is sucking up data overnight. We lost a little bit last night with the thing completely unplugged!! How is that possible?