UK Mobile Internet Use for an Australian Visitor for 2, 3 or 4 weeks

[Guest]

[roger]

Examination of their site reminded me I did not proceed with T-mobile because it was so difficult to ascertain just what they were offering for PAYG WWAN.

[charlieboy]

Roger

Keep it simple mate. Go into their shop and tell them you want the 3g PAYG sim. It comes as standard with a daily Maximimum charge of either £1 or £2 i forget which. If you only for example look at 2 web pages in the day you might just get charged £0.50 because you have not hit the max charge. Really simple. I think you are trying to find a catch that is not there. They are not great at documenting things on the web site. But it is important to make sure you get the 3g and not the 2g sim.

Charlie

[roger]

Go into their shop and tell them you want the 3g PAYG sim.

I bought a T-Mobile USIM from Carphone Warehouse, Southsea and 10GBP credit after telling them I only wanted it for data. It did not connect immediately and I was told that activation may take 24 hours. The clearly had no idea about data only use and had no idea what an APN was let alone what T-Mobile's was. Anyway this was not needed with my Option 225.  3 speed was 213/47kbps and T-Mobile's 368/55. I will report experiences as I now have 2 broadband roaming accounts.

What I now need is a SIM card holder!

[roger]

Internal Error #1002 returned when trying unsuccessfully to make a Skype out call using T-Mobile connection. No problem with 3 connection.
3 offers free Skype calls as an incentive under conditions I have fulfilled so perhaps their network is optimised for Skpe use.

[roger]

On page 23 of the 'T-Mobile Hello' booklet in the Web''n'walk legal stuff section it states 'We do not permit use of this service to provide modem access for a computer ...'

[charlieboy]

Roger

This is why i suggested you go to the t-mobile shop and buy the 3g data sim, the other reason is the 3g data sim often runs faster than the voice and data combined sims. You have been sold the wrong type of SIM by the carphone warehouse. Also on the web and walk standard package it does not support VOIP so that might be the reason for the non operational  Skype.

It does not matter massively, but if you are worried then throw it away and go to the t-mobile shop and buy the 3g data sim. The sim is widely used by people as a prepay mobile broadband product whereas i think the sim you have is the Web and walk which is a voice sim with data mainly marketed to young people who have a 3g handset and want to download a bit of music and browse a few web pages on their phone. T-mobile even sell a bundle with the 3g dongle to plug into the USB port.

I did offer to get one of these posted to you before you arrived to save you all of this hassle. I work in the business and i used to have dozens of the things sat on my desk.

Charlie

[roger]

I get the impression that T-Mobile expects customers to buy a modem before PAYG internet is provided.

[roger]

I get the impression that T-Mobile expects customers to buy a modem before PAYG internet is provided.

Chichester T-Mobile shop confirmed this when I called in today. Apparently modem sales provide their profit for WWAN PAYG internet access for computers.

They said no support was provided for access using their USIM in a user owned modem but fair use policy limited downloads to 40Mb per day.

[roger]

We are now in central London staying near Marble Arch on the last days
of our UK holiday. Still using 3 PAYG WWAN, the only service I was
able to identify as providing PAYG WWAN internet access in the UK for
visitors with their own modem.

Service remains very slow and congested. Clearly there is insufficient
capacity to provide service to paid up subscribers. Currently (2100) I
can't connect to anyone and am writing this in notepad. ('Internet
Explorer cannot display the web page' reports being received no matter to
which site connection attempted.) GlobeTrotter Connect program reports
'Connected to 3' but network centre icon indicates 'Access: Local only'.

Of course this could be a Vista problem. Rebooting removed the
problem.
 
Measured speeds earlier today were 1169/43 and 909/47 a lot less than
the advertised 7.2 Mb/sec.

Planning tomorrow's activities disrupted.

Attempts to register for an account so I could top up my London
Transport 'Oyster' card foundered for the endemic UK software problem
- only UK post codes are recognised.

It's impossible to believe that there is a financial crisis. The traffic is
heavier and faster than I have ever experienced. Supermarkets are full of
food. Shops are crowded with purchasers.

Must be great to be a banker. Mismanage your affairs and the
government will throw more money at you in the hope you can sort out
matters for them.

Governments have no money and none of their spokesmen have yet
explained how they intend to raise taxes to pay for their 'rescue funds
billions' and how they expect taxpayers to cope with another tax on top
of increased fuel prices and mortgages.

Interesting times indeed!

 

[Stuart]

A little slower and you'll be USA high speeds

[roger]

A little slower and you'll be USA high speeds

5000/350 is normal in rural Newrybar.

[roger]

On the way home. Presently at Heathrow terminal 4 BA lounge. It has
been a great WWAN experience in the UK. I will post a 'child's guide' in
due course.

It is a pity travel by Qantas is such an unpleasant experience. Rather ruins
a holiday but has to be endured to get here and back - more of that anon.

[roger]

 
http://www.speedtest.com.sg/ test result from WLAN QF-BA-JCL1 in BA Lounge.

Does not progress from 'Preparing Download Test' stage for a considerable time.

Reported result 22/20 kbps.

Ping result:

Ping (Hostname/IP Address):    Ping Result:

PING 203.118.57.177 (203.118.57.177) 56(84) bytes of data.

--- 203.118.57.177 ping statistics ---
4 packets transmitted, 0 received, 100% packet loss, time 2998ms

[roger]

I'm home ... and my OQO HDD looks to me as if it is no longer working.

All I get is a Windows Boot Manager screen telling me to repair my computer with the report:

     File:       \Boot\BCD
     Status:  0xc000000f
     Info:      An error occurred while attempting to read the boot configuration
                  data.

Using my purchased Vista Ultimate SP1 install disk, I can not find any operating system
and the detected C: drive displays no data.

Last thing to do is identify if there is a driver for this disk which when loaded changes matters.

I am now over jet lag and have just fixed, with Big Pond assistance, a problem in not being able to connect to the Internet with my Acer Aspire M1640. (My Belkin Router was causing the problem.)

Talked with eXpansys Australia at 1700 yesterday and they told me to ring back today. Talked with OQO technical Support this morning and they indicated repair cost of $US300 likely.

The UK WWAM roaming experience was very helpful - but its great to once again have a decent speed internet connection.  http://broadbandguide.com.au/broadband-speed-test just reported 6227/326 kbps download/upload which is 7 times faster than anything experienced in the UK.

Is there any life if you get yourself involved with computers ?

[roger]

Curiously, when I use my "3" UK USIM in my iCON 225 USB modem here in metropolitan Sydney where "3" Australia has a heavily promoted UMTS network, the associated   GlobeTrotter Connect program reports "Roaming to YES OPTUS UMTS" (a rival network) but will not connect.

I asked in a local "3" shop why this was so when "3" UK heavily promotes "like home rates" for which I registered in the UK and was advised that other "3" UK accountholders reported the same problem of being unable to connect to "3" Australia.

I was told I could buy an Australian "3" USIM and get PAYG rates. When I asked for a demonstation USIM to test out my hardware, I was told none was available.

Where I live in rural New South Wales, the Telstra BigPond 850 GHz network is the only network available for UMTS HSDPA so a long-term "3" contract is not an option and even a "3" PAYG without a demostration is deemed a waste of money.

Advice from Option is that their GlobeSurfer iCON HSUPA will connect to the BigPond network. I can no longer buy one from their eshop which has been removed from their website.

Advice of any experience with the Ooption GlobeSurfer iCON HSUPA modem would be appreciated.