HP’s Connection Manager software allows you to chose the connection speed: 2G or 3G or Auto for either.

All this is fine.

The trouble is when the coverage is dodgy: the HSPA connection automatically switches to UMTS but Windows doesn’t like this so your ability to use the connection is in effect removed. You have to then disconnect and reconnect.

Very annoying, especially when it happens multiple times each day!

Changing the Connection Manager to only 3G doesn’t help as it classifies both UMTS and HSPA as 3G.

Grr!

A fabulous example of this is Microsoft’s Live Messenger and their long running and unresolved failures to actually support audio-visual conversations for users running a Mac.

I use both a PC (actually a Tablet PC) and a Mac and I have just bought another laptop running Windows Vista (with an upgrade to Windows 7 coming in due course). On the Windows platforms I can run Live Messenger and hook up a webcam to have a face to face conversation with another Windows Live user.

If I’m at my flat on the Mac, I cannot.

Back in December 2008, Microsoft announced a forthcoming beta release of Messenger for Mac which would offer A/V support in 2009. Now, some 10 months later, there’s still no sign of it on the horizon, far less a final release version.

Pathetic!