Mr Rogers reminded me of the recent post by Mr OnionBagBlog decrying the performance of his 3 mobile broadband dongle, querying how this tallied with my own experience.
Well, in all honesty, in the best part of three weeks I've been in Suffolk, dealing with Mum's death, the 3 network has failed me utterly. I have not been able to find the slightest sniff of a signal anywhere. Indeed, this has been my experience of the dongle every time I step away from a major city.
This is clearly not a general problem - 9 times out of 10, the dongle can see signals from the other networks. There's just no 3 signal to be found. My free time with this dongle must be coming to an end and, while I'm keen to get one for my own use, the coverage problems mean that I won't be using 3 in any circumstances.
THANKS FOR YOUR INPUT ON 3 MOBILE DONGLE I WAS GOING TO GET ONE TO BE ON THE BALL AS I HAVE 3 MOBILE IT WAS USELESS FOR THE FIRST YEAR BUT NOW SEEMS TO BE BETTER THAN ORENGE COVERAGE FOUR YEARS AFTER MY FIRST CONTRACT I NOW GET A SIGNEL AND ABLE TO USE MY PHONE ANYWHERE I GO... AS I LIVE IN BUDE CORNWALL ITS FINE HERE SO I THINK I WILL LEAVE DONGLES ALONE UNTILL THE CONECTIONS GET BETTER AND NO DOWNLOAD LIMITS THEN I WILL THINK OF BLOWING B.T AND AOL OUT OF MY LIVEING ROOM FOR GOOD..
My 3 Dongle works ok at Buckfastleigh in Devon, probably because my cottage is close to a 3 transmitter. But despite following all the instructions, the email Send facility is very off and on. Sometimes it will send, but most times not. But having bought the Dongle to replace dial-up, other than the email issue, it's a vast improvement connection and speed-wise.
letchworth garden city average speeds on 3
1.5 mb/s down
0.4 mb/s up
not bad, cannot complain
Hi Adam, sorry to hear that your dongle experiences have not been so good. Did you check the mobile broadband coverage on the 3 site before buying? (http://www.three.co.uk/Mobile_Broadband/Coverage_speed?id=1183)
- reason I ask is that it would be interesting to know how reliable this service is.
I didn't buy the dongle - it was on loan from 3 for blogger review. So I never really had reason to consult the coverage map.