Mi - Fi

[Hadenough]

http://www.t-mobile.co.uk/shop/mobile-broadband/wireless-pointer/

Thinking of doing away with the land line at home and getting one of these Mi - Fi thingys for broadband access at home and on board. Anyone got any experience? What are the pros and cons?

 

[Bobc]

I've got one, and it's brilliant.

 

[Richard10002]

http://www.t-mobile.co.uk/shop/mobile-broadband/wireless-pointer/

Thinking of doing away with the land line at home and getting one of these Mi - Fi thingys for broadband access at home and on board. Anyone got any experience? What are the pros and cons?

I've got the Three MiFi with 15Gb per month allowance and it's great. If 10Gb a month is enough for you, and the Mifi dongle is OK, the t mobile deal is good, because they don't charge for going over the fair usage limit.... Whereas Three would charge if I use more than 15Gb.

I get between 7Mb and 13Mb in speed terms..... Not sure what make/model the t mobile unit is, so it might not allow the latest speeds.

I'd be tempted to use it at home, but we get unlimited from Sky for £5 while we use their full package, so not really anything to save.

 

[telford_mike]

I bought an unlocked 3 Mifi from ebay, so not tied-in to any particular network provider. If you don't use too much data the PAYG 3 SIMs from Amazon seem very good value.

If you do get one make sure it's the E586 model which supports the faster speeds.

Works a treat pretty much anywhere.

 

[colvic987]

i use the older white one on the boat, but they have been upgraded to the black faster speed ones, and only thing i moan about is paying £15 as i only use around 2 mb a month, home broadband is not negotiable for me to lose, as it costs me nothing for the fastest package...

 

[padipaddy]

I have one also and they are great. Wouldn't sail without it now.



Rab

 

[VicMallows]

I get between 7Mb and 13Mb in speed terms...

That sounds an incredible speed over 3G. What speedtest service are you measuring it with?

 

[BrendanS]

That sounds an incredible speed over 3G. What speedtest service are you measuring it with?

That's pretty normal with the more recent dongles and MiFi. You won't get those speeds with the dongles or MiFi from a couple of years ago.

 

[VicMallows]

That's pretty normal with the more recent dongles and MiFi. You won't get those speeds with the dongles or MiFi from a couple of years ago.

Impressed. To what degree is that influenced by contention? Do you know if that sort of speed is rolled out throughout the networks, or just confined to 'big cities'.

(I have noticed that I consistently get 1-2 Mb on 'old' dongles which is itself a vast improvement on earlier times and ample for me.)

 

[BrendanS]

It depends on your provider. Like the OP is considering, I did away with a landline, as I rarely use the landline phone, and the landline broadband locally (very rural, edge of Cotswolds) is sub 1Mbps. 3 on the other hand, despite being very rural, gives me consistent 6 to 11 Mbps. Vodafone, there is zero signal.
I have a 3 iphone, 3 dongle (used for my home broadband) and 3 MiFi (for work) and use them all over the country.
The only time I noticed any really significant contention issues was in London during the Jubilee, when there was effectively no service at all - but given that a million people had just descended on a very small area, was not surprising. With HSPA+ connection, I'd be very disappointed to end up below 3 MBPS, and rarely go below 5, and usually have 6+ no problem.
Overseas, the providers are not consistent in rolling out fast mobile broadband, so if you travel, you may experience much slower speeds

 

[VicMallows]

Thanks Brendan; very interesting information. Vic.

 

[dk]

mobile wifi

I find my HTC mobile does it for me on the boat by setting it up as a wifi hotspot. Don't know what speed it is - never checked, but it's quicker than my home broadband which is between 4-7Mb on a good day with the kids in school and faster than the marina wifi, which gets very flakey at low tide!

 

[BrendanS]

Thanks Brendan; very interesting information. Vic.

It's quite astonishing to sit back and think about it when you are consistently getting such speeds from a stick, mobile, when not long ago, 6 to 13 on a landline would have been considered blisteringly fast. It means I can connect at a decent speed almost anywhere I go. Of course, there are parts of the country which aren't covered, but expecting 100% coverage is probably unrealistic, but not being tied to a landline is incredibly useful, and having such speeds whilst mobile is something I never dreamt I'd see in my lifetime when I first started using the internet.

 

[BarryH]

I have one from T Mobile. Get anywhere near the edge of Kent and it roams and uses the french services.

There is a way to stop it roaming, but I haven't found it and the "techno nerds" at T mobile are all hair gel and Elizabeth Duke........hey ho

 

[BrendanS]

I have one from T Mobile. Get anywhere near the edge of Kent and it roams and uses the french services.

There is a way to stop it roaming, but I haven't found it and the "techno nerds" at T mobile are all hair gel and Elizabeth Duke........hey ho

which model do you have?

 

[Hadenough]

Thanks all. Useful feed back, I think I'll be going for the Tmobile deal as we get good Tmobile / Orange coverage at home and in our sailing area. Can do away with the land line then so costs wil be roughly the same.

 

[lustyd]

If you don't use too much data the PAYG 3 SIMs from Amazon seem very good value.
.

Are they as good value as the T-Mobile one in my iPad which costs £5 for a year? I get 500MB a month which does not count web or email data - those are unlimited! I posted a thread about these a while ago

 

[Hadenough]

Are they as good value as the T-Mobile one in my iPad which costs £5 for a year? I get 500MB a month which does not count web or email data - those are unlimited! I posted a thread about these a while ago

I've looked but can't find your thread about this. How does this work at £5 a year??

 

[EugeneR]

I've got one, and it's brilliant.

+1

In fact, my Samsung tablet is faster using the MiFi over Wifi than using it's own 3G connection. Same network.

You can buy SIM cards on EBay that offer three months + 3GB of data on the 3 network for around £9. Typically, I buy two each year i.e. less than £20 to cover my internet use for a summer's boating. They are more available at certain times than others - seems they come with phones which are then sold with other networks' contracts etc.

I'm considering locating the MiFi in the radar arch with a dedicated power supply so it gets the best 3G reception whereas the wifi covers the entire boat (and probably neighbouring boats as well...)

 

[lustyd]

I've looked but can't find your thread about this. How does this work at £5 a year??

It's the iPhone payg sim. Buy one in the shop and get them to activate it, officially this is £10 but I payed £5. Then insert it in your device. This gives you 12 months of Internet access with no further top ups. I've had mine for a few months and it still shows a £5 balance on the sim.