- Playing with my iPhone has made me reconsider the speeds available on mobile broadband, giving me an experience that actually matches the speeds, unlike the "meh" performance of my old Nokia.
- Spending a week in a WiFi-less flat in Norwich, helping Mum through chemo, makes the idea of mobile-based broadband so much more attractive.
- I got busted at work. For the last 18 months or so, I've been hooking my personal MacBook up to the company network each day, initially because it took a couple of months to sort me out with a PC down in our corporate HQ, and later because I missed too many of the applications on my Mac. The network guys finally spotted it, and booted me off the network.
So, when a guy from 3 Mobile dropped me an e-mail asking me if I would like 3 free months' of 3G mobile broadband in exchange for blogging about my experiences good or bad, I debated the ethics of the situation, thought about the pros and cons of the offer, and then remembered that he'd said "free" and said "yes, please".
My dongle (a word Sam the PR guy from 3 is having far too much innuendo-laden fun with in his e-mail subjects, if you ask me) turned up a week ago. I plugged it into the MacBook and it asked if it could install some software. That turned out to be the dialler below:
Click "connect", and off you go...
Honestly, the first 24 hours made me wonder if the effort had been worth it. I could barely hold a connection in any of the places I tried, and eventually gave up. I pretty much forgot about the dongle for 24 hours, before trying again on Wednesday morning when I badly needed to get at something blocked by the corporate firewall. And it worked smoothly. And it has done since.
At it's best, it feels like being on slightly sluggish WiFi - like being in a coffee shop when every third patron has their Apple laptop open and sucking bandwidth. Fast enough to use comfortably, but not up there with your own ADSL line. And, seeing as they've given me unlimited bandwidth for the time being, I've been abusing it thoroughly. Downloading podcasts: fine. Downloading small software apps: fine. FTP to my blog host? No probs. All good.
I have had a few on-going issues. It seems unable to hold an iChat connection for any length of time, which is intensely irritating when I'm in the middle of a conversation. And there are "spikes" of poor connection speeds, which leave me tapping my fingers in irritation on occasion.
But when it works, it works well. I'd certainly have liked one of these during those weeks in Norwich. The only thing that concerns me a little is how much bandwidth I'd actually burn using this on a paid plan. Based on 3's website, the cheapest plan is £10 a month, and gives you 1Gb of usage. I've racked up 60Mb today, on fairly light use, but that's enough to blow me right past that limit. £15 gets you 3Gb, but that feels tight if I'm going to be out and about. So it's be the £25 7GB plan for me. Is it useful enough for me to justify that? I'm not sure. I guess we'll find out when the three months is up...
Anyway, the next couple of weeks are going to give me the chance to test the little white dongle more extensively and in more demanding situations. I'll report back.
Update: My later experiences have not been so good.
April 21, 2008 10:24 PM | Reply
My self-financed dongle from a rival supplier is a joy - though like yours it has lousy Mac interface (the Windows one keeps better track of everything).
Train journeys especially...and when the copper wire plays up at home.
April 22, 2008 12:01 AM | Reply
We've been considering getting one of these for the office -- as a 'whoever needs it grabs it' tool on pay as you go. The lack of tethering on my iphone is frustrating on long train journeys where I have done some work and want to email it. This might be useful.
April 22, 2008 5:43 AM | Reply
Interesting. I've been relying on mobile broadband since spring 2006 as it's been the only sensible solution for me as a freelancer travelling a lot and based in Norway where wifi connections can be far and few btwn.
It's been invaluable in that I more or less always have a connection wherever I go in Norway, though often frustratingly slow, fragile and volatile - even gives me something to fall back on when I'm abroad and can't find another connection (terribly expensive to use abroad though). I pay about £50 incl VAT for unlimited monthly access in Norway.
Whenever I'm in the UK I'm usually able to find a wifi connection though. But since mobile broadband can be a slow and volatile thing, my online provider's customer service reps tend to tell me that 'all Norwegians' use a landline-based broadband as well (another £50 a month), which seems a bit absurd to me. Anyway, am now changing to a USB modem, new mobile broadband provider, hoping it will be better (I've succumbed to buying into the promises of the former state monopolist here that because they've been in the game so long their coverage is far surperior to anyone elses. Yes, am desperate for a better connection)
Come to think of it though, I can't remember one online provider or telecoms company in England or here worth cheering for. Think Compuserve was the least bad (perhaps because it was my first online provider)....
May 20, 2008 11:26 AM | Reply
hi there ive had 3's mobile broadband for 24 hrs now and i had a sluggish nigh but seems to be working ok what i have found out is that within 24hrs it stays on a temporary proxy server and now its on a dfferent ip and server but as to say everything is ok better than 4yrs ago when they had their own 3 internet and couldnt do much
i will post more if any probs or good things happen
shaggyuk
June 3, 2008 9:21 PM | Reply
I tried 3 broadband as an Addon on my contract phone for a month. I used a Asus modem given by a friend. It was OK. I got disconnected or fate connection occasionally, but overall it was not bad. So I took a new 18-month contract with 3 with 3G allownce and canceled the Add-on, because I wanna a dedicate SIM for broadband. I got a free usb modem as on the photo. It is a jok compare to my old modem. I got disconnected almost every half an hour (Windows xp), and can not reconnect without a reboot. I have tried to call 3 services (500). I was put on hold for about 20 minutes. I tried three times, only got through once. After telling the guy the connection is very slow (have not got a change to tell him about modem problem), the guy said he would check if there was any technical problmes, then I was put on hold for another 15 minutes. I gave up finally, not believe the guy would pick up my phone ever again. Now I am using my old Asus modem. But I still feel the speed is lower than before when I used Add-on. I wanted to cancel this contract and return the modem, and found out I need to return everything within 3 days, not 15 days on their website because I took the contract from a store.
June 4, 2008 8:43 PM | Reply
That's a pretty unhappy story, mate.
June 25, 2008 7:07 PM | Reply
I've had 3 Broadband for 4 months. Was good sometimes, slow and unstable other times. Updated the modem firmware today, and what a difference - works great now! Found the info at: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055293008&page=2