Having some sort of cellular wireless connection built into your laptop can be a double-edged sword: yes, it’s one less dongle or modem to plug in, but decide to change carrier and your choice might be limited according to which network type the cellular modem supports.  Qualcomm and HP announced at the Mobile World Congress that they’re working on including the chipset company’s Gobi platform in selected 2008 HP notebooks; Gobi is a 3G data chip that supports both EV-DO and HSPA networks.

The two companies appear to have enlisted the support of Vodafone as official carrier for the 3G HP notebooks.  Selected models from the ultra-portable, balanced mobility and performance ranges will get the Gobi chipset as an option, similar to Sony’s HSDPA option on certain laptops from their VAIO range.