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Originally Posted by Clive Long Does anyone use a "3g" card in their laptop for mobile communications? What's the performance like on your network? Can you ramp up huge bills without knowing?
Would it be possible to have the SIM in a standard phone haddset and sling a cable (or Bluetooth) between the handset and the laptop - rather than buying a dedicated SIM and PMCIA card for the laptop?
These public Wifi spots - I think I have seen them at Starbucks - how are they charged for? Expensive? |
I'm very pleased with the 3G Web n Walk Professional from TMobile (normally advertised with a 3G card but you can use a 3G handset instead). When connected by cable at home though a 3G handset I get 30-40K/sec, which is about the same as 300kbit broadband. It degrades a lot in non 3G areas but still works.
The thing about the handset is it doesn't use my one precious PC card slot, as you can use a USB cable or bluetooth, and you can also use the handset browser etc. for simply tasks where you don't want to get your laptop out.
This is £20.00 a month on its own or £10.00 on top of a voice tariff, for 2Gb a month transfer.
If you don't have the voice tariff the only way I think to rack up bills is to buy things on the TMobile mobile web site from the phone. If you go over the 2Gb limit in any two months of six they simply slow down your data transfer. The other restrictions are no VOIP (understandable) and no IM (
).
For the stand-alone option it is sometimes advertised with a free 12month T-Mobile (incl Starbucks) Wifi pass (costs £23.00 a month if bought on its own), though I haven't got hold of it that yet.
One advantage of the PC-Card is that I understand it actually has the ability to run much faster than existing 3G once TMobile have upgraded their network, which you don't get with a handset.