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Review: Mobile Broadband for everyone from Three / 3 operator in UK May 25, 2008 [Wireless (Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, ...)] | By Edward J. R. What is the point of having a Windows Mobile phone with 3G/HSDPA and full web browsing capability if you can't use them without a fear of being overcharged? The same with UMPCs, mini-notebooks and other notebooks. Here we present a review of the Mobile Broadband kit on Pay As You Go from 3. Note: this Mobile Broadband offering is also available as add-on for mobile phone users on 3's network. 
Mobile Broadband over cellular networks (at last) arrived to UK! Read on! Mobile operators in UK, unlike their counterparts in USA, Japan or Germany, do not provide truly unlimited mobile Internet access over their cellular networks. Furthermore mobile operators in UK hinder mobile Internet usage by imposing outrageously high prices per one MB once the monthly limit has been exceeded before the end of given month, and some of them throttle then the speed to an ancient dial-up rate or just are cuttting their customers off! When it comes to mobile Internet access over cellular networks, UK is therefore not on par with other developed nations, but it is changing right now thanks to "3" operator, that brings a mobile broadband that is cheap, and that can easily be extended without any fears, that you will be penalized after exceeding the limit... and HSDPA coverage of 3's network in UK is now greatly improved as we have just tested it in a completely rural areas! Even better yet: you don't have to sign any contract to use it! Main worry of mobile broadband users in UK was by now, that once a monthly limit is exceeded they have to start paying a lot of money per one megabyte... that, after you use your allowance within the 30 days, you have to pay as much as £1 per MB! With Mobile Broadband on Pay As You Go from 3 operator these worries are over! In case of Mobile Broadband on Pay As You Go from 3, if after exceeding the limit, you don't apply Mobile Broadband add-on (available in sizes 1GB, 3GB and 7GB) then indeed you pay higher price, but if you however apply this Mobile Broadband add-on once your limit is exceeded, then you are not charged 1 pound for 1 MB but: 10 pounds for 1GB, 15 pounds for 3GB, 25 pounds for 7GB. To test it, we did the following: we charged the SIM with 10 pounds Mobile Broadband add-on, we downloaded 1 GB of files, Internet stopped working, we charged the SIM with 10 pounds Mobile Broadband add-on, we downloaded much more than 10 MB, and Internet was still working! Conclusion: if you exceed the 30-day limit you are not overcharged at 3 operator in UK! * * * * * Now let us take a look at Mobile Broadband on Pay As You Go from 3! Firstly it is worth mentioning that you can get it not only from 3 stores on the streets and online, but also you can get it at other mobile phone distributors, like Phones4U, etc. This what you get is a package in a case of a size of DVD case. Sometimes you have a choice of one of 3 existing HSDPA modems: 
... but sometimes there is only one model on sale. We tested the one with HSDPA modem from ZTE (see photo above) that also features external antenna socket (left to the text "ZTE"): 
Which modem to chose? It is not so much relevant and we advice you just to take a look at physical construction and chose the one that you like the most. Some people like E169G because it can be used also without a cable like a USB memory dongle, but some other people don't like such usage because it is easier to break it coincidentally. It also worth mentioning that one can use Mobile Broadband from 3 as add-on to an existing contract or Pay As You go SIM card - as an add-on and in existing mobile phone... and you can also use built-in HSDPA of your notebook if it has one (Toshiba, Fujitsu and Dell are offering internal HSDPA modems). When it comes to speed, here is the result of our tests: 
Generally operator 3 offers HSDPA of nominal speed 3.6 MB/second what in practice means over 1 MB/second. It is true that it is slower than offering of Vodafone UK for example, that offers nominal speed 7.2 MB/second but Vodafone does not offer such cheap mobile broadband as 3, and if you exceed the limits at Vodafone you have to pay a lot of money... not to mention that Vodafone is not offering mobile broadband on pay as you go so cheaply but only for 24-month long subscribers. HSDPA modem drivers and connectivity manager are located inside of the HSDPA modem and are installed from a logical drive that appears once modem is connected to the computer. There is no CD-ROM. No need to download drivers from the Internet too. The most important thing is that drivers for your HSDPA modem are installed properly, otherwise one gets "?" in device manager: 
Once drivers for the HSDPA modem are installed properly you see it with a proper name in the list of modems: 
... and "3" icon appears in the bottom bar of your computer: 
Then connectivity manager must be installed and once it is launched you can start connecting to the Internet by pressing the "Connect" button: 
Once connected this dialog appears: 
You can also observe mobile data usage: 
... what is insofar important that you should buy a top-up and charge account with mobile broadband add-on to avoid expensive charging per one MB. You can also use website of 3 to check your balance: 
... but remember that to charge your account with top-up purchased at some shop or petrol station, you need to log-out and enter special page at www.three.co.uk/my3 available upon clicking on "Activate Voucher - Pay As You Go Mobile Broadband". Conclusion: if you live in UK and you would like to surf Internet worry-free then forget O2, Orange, T-Mobile and Vodafone, and instead start using 3!  Post your comment (free registration is required to post, but if you register you can edit your posts later) [ 6 Comments ]
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