Laptop Internet connectivity at sea... How?

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keelbolt

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Unlikely to find a WiFi hotspot a few miles off the coast, but mobile signal is fairly good. So what's the best way of keeping my laptop connected to the internet when a few miles off the coast? A few years ago I had success by connecting the laptop to the mobile phone via bluetooth, then hoisting the mobile phone up the mast in a sock. But it does seem a bit 'Fred Karno'. Surely there's a better way? What do other folk do?
 
keelbolt said:
Unlikely to find a WiFi hotspot a few miles off the coast, but mobile signal is fairly good. So what's the best way of keeping my laptop connected to the internet when a few miles off the coast? A few years ago I had success by connecting the laptop to the mobile phone via bluetooth, then hoisting the mobile phone up the mast in a sock. But it does seem a bit 'Fred Karno'. Surely there's a better way? What do other folk do?
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Use a USB dongle or tether to my mobile phone.
 
I have considered buying a usb dongle for my laptop but is there one which will work in UK and France. I asked at the orange shop but they did not know. Anyone any experience of this?
 
Get yourself an unlocked mifi. This works in the same way as a 3G/4G dongle but connects to the laptop (or iPad or anything else) via a wifi signal. We have one that we use when cruising and, for the most part, it just sits in the saloon and generates its own wifi hotspot for us to use. In areas of poor reception, we hoist the brick up the mast for better reception.

For going from country to country, you will need to buy a data sim for that country unless you can find a UK based company that will give you access to data at a reasonable rate when roaming outside of the UK. I know that costs have come down a lot recently so it may be possible to do without using country specific sims.
 
horatio_nelson said:
get a Three PAYG dongle, you can them in France no problem, using your 'UK' data allowance

I like the phone-in-a-sock-up-the-mast idea :D I may well try that!
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+1 for 3 mifi dongle. I took mine to France late December for the family ski holiday - we had three laptops and four phones hanging off it. Now worries, and all inclusive. Mine is on contract for about £10/m, but I use it when working from the boat too. The problem with tethering is that you can't then make or receive calls, so it seems.
 
basic said:
I have considered buying a usb dongle for my laptop but is there one which will work in UK and France. I asked at the orange shop but they did not know. Anyone any experience of this?
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This refers to a micro SIM for my iPad but the same device goes in a Dongle.

(Reposted from CA Mednet forum) We were in France over Xmas and New Year 2014/2015 in our motorhome. Before going I downloaded information about purchasing PAYG SIM cards from a motorhome website. We understood that SFR (Vodafone) has the best coverage in France, so at the hypermarket at Calais that was our first attempt. After queuing for an hour to be served we presented the detail from the website but were told that it is now not possible for a visitor to buy a SIM card in this way. Unfortunately my French and the shop assistant's English were insufficient to explain exact reasoning for this but she was adamant that we could not buy what we wanted.

We then went next door to the Orange shop and had exactly what we wanted with no paperwork within 10 minutes. We subsequently received messages that we needed to verify the account with our home address within 30 days to keep the SIM 'live' for 12 months but we didn't bother as it is unlikely that we will need it again within that time.
 
Ru88ell said:
+1 for 3 mifi dongle. I took mine to France late December for the family ski holiday - we had three laptops and four phones hanging off it. Now worries, and all inclusive. Mine is on contract for about £10/m, but I use it when working from the boat too. The problem with tethering is that you can't then make or receive calls, so it seems.
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I have never experienced that. my phone is a hotspot every time i am o/b in the UK
 
I bought a payg Orange Domino mifi in France about 3 years ago, got it unlocked and have used it in UK, France and Spain with local payg sims no problem.
The only thing you have to watch is to turn off auto update, as the pc, tablet, whatever sees a wifi connection so thinks it ok to download updates!
 
duncan99210 said:
For going from country to country, you will need to buy a data sim for that country unless you can find a UK based company that will give you access to data at a reasonable rate when roaming outside of the UK. I know that costs have come down a lot recently so it may be possible to do without using country specific sims.
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http://www.three.co.uk/Discover/Phones/Feel_At_Home

3 have always been the best for this.
 
We found it very hard to organise a couple of years ago in the Baltic. In Germany, we got a local SIM which worked, but Denmark wanted a local address before we could get one. Eventually we persuaded one shop to sell us as a danish pay as you go SIM. We gave up in Sweden.

Last year, we used a Gymsim which worked very well, though the rates are not that good, but at least we could use it in all countries we visited (UK, NL, D, DK, S). If 3 start using their at home service in Germany, I may try them, but for now, I'll stick with Gymsim ( so the OP could have a look at Gymsim.com)
 
duncan99210 said:
Get yourself an unlocked mifi. This works in the same way as a 3G/4G dongle but connects to the laptop (or iPad or anything else) via a wifi signal. We have one that we use when cruising and, for the most part, it just sits in the saloon and generates its own wifi hotspot for us to use. In areas of poor reception, we hoist the brick up the mast for better reception.

For going from country to country, you will need to buy a data sim for that country unless you can find a UK based company that will give you access to data at a reasonable rate when roaming outside of the UK. I know that costs have come down a lot recently so it may be possible to do without using country specific sims.
Click to expand...

Spot on, exactly what I do... You can get them with sockets for external aerials too and there are plenty of hi gain options...
 
It depends how serious you are about maximising range?

If you want to achieve the best possible performance the only solution hinges on a really good external GSM aerial. This can be mounted somewhere convenient and will achieve a far better range from the base transmitter than any other solution mentioned.

The aerial can then be connected to one of the many 3G routers (I use the Zoom router) which conveniently offers a sim slot so that you can source the cheapest local sim that suites you or even use your sim from another device if this works for you. I find the router happily runs off the 12V supply as long as the voltage isnt allowed to fall to low.

The largest element of signal loss is between the aerial and router so use the best quality cable and keep the cable run as short as possible.

Of course, being a router any device on board can then connect to the 3G source via WiFi just as you would do with your home router or by ethernet cable if you prefer to hard wire the router to a computer. With the "right" router VOIP is also available which "opens up" cheap phone calls while abroad.

I find up to ten miles is possible off shore, compared with around 5 miles with luck otherwise. The extra cost is the aerial.

Beyond that satellite broad band is the only solution. In case it is of any interest I was suspicious about the speeds and reliability. However using a fleetbroad band system I can report that the reliability has so far been 100% connectivity any time any place, and the speed far faster than I had expected - really not that noticeably different from your home WiFi assuming you are not loading numerous complicated pages - its unfortunate the cost doesnt exactly encourage you to do any more browsing than strictly necessary! - but when you want a weather GRIB in the middle of Biscay there is nothing quite like it.
 
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