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- 12-05-2008, 04:31 AM #1dransfieldGuest
I was thinking of getting a 3G laptop dongle for occasional mobile
surfing/email (using laptop on train, airport, etc.), and see things
for £10 / £15 pcm, plus initial purchase. But I need to get a new
phone (as my current model features in a lot of cave paintings), and
I'd like to get one that has some web / email capability (not
necessarily looking for full blackberry capability). So I was
thinking, why not get a phone that will work on 3G and can be used as
a laptop dongle?
I've had a bit of a browse and it does appear that there's a huge cost
saving to be made doing this. Eg. a Virgin dongle is something like
£15pcm for 3GB (and then £15 for each GB extra - Yikes!), whereas if
you're on Virgin direct debit then 'accessing the web' is only £2 per
GB and you don't have to buy. Am I not comparing like for like, or is
this a massive disparity? (And you don't have to carry an extra
dongle.)
I'm with Virgin, who I like, and who give me 300mins/300 texts for
£10pcm, so I'd like to stay with them, and as its just for occasional
business use I don't mind paying as I go for the data (in fact I'd
prefer it as this usually works out cheaper).
So what do I need to do? I read some discussion on here about using a
Nokia N95 for this, but can I use anything 3G? Does it have to have
Wifi or is bluetooth fast enough for the laptop-phone connection? Does
the phone have to have a modem? N96?
Thanks in advance,
Dz
› See More: Phone to use as a 3G laptop dongle?
- 12-05-2008, 05:25 AM #2tony sayerGuest
Re: Phone to use as a 3G laptop dongle?
In article <[email protected]
..com>, dransfield <[email protected]> scribeth thus
>I was thinking of getting a 3G laptop dongle for occasional mobile
>surfing/email (using laptop on train, airport, etc.), and see things
>for £10 / £15 pcm, plus initial purchase. But I need to get a new
>phone (as my current model features in a lot of cave paintings), and
>I'd like to get one that has some web / email capability (not
>necessarily looking for full blackberry capability). So I was
>thinking, why not get a phone that will work on 3G and can be used as
>a laptop dongle?
>
>I've had a bit of a browse and it does appear that there's a huge cost
>saving to be made doing this. Eg. a Virgin dongle is something like
>£15pcm for 3GB (and then £15 for each GB extra - Yikes!), whereas if
>you're on Virgin direct debit then 'accessing the web' is only £2 per
>GB and you don't have to buy. Am I not comparing like for like, or is
>this a massive disparity? (And you don't have to carry an extra
>dongle.)
>
>I'm with Virgin, who I like, and who give me 300mins/300 texts for
>£10pcm, so I'd like to stay with them, and as its just for occasional
>business use I don't mind paying as I go for the data (in fact I'd
>prefer it as this usually works out cheaper).
>
>So what do I need to do? I read some discussion on here about using a
>Nokia N95 for this, but can I use anything 3G? Does it have to have
>Wifi or is bluetooth fast enough for the laptop-phone connection? Does
>the phone have to have a modem? N96?
>Thanks in advance,
>Dz
I've got one from Voodofone and quite frankly for the use it gets and
the places where it still doesn't work, mainly rural east Anglia
reverting to GPRS, Its not a lot of cop;(...
--
Tony Sayer
- 12-05-2008, 06:34 AM #3Guest
Re: Phone to use as a 3G laptop dongle?
On Fri, 5 Dec 2008 02:31:41 -0800 (PST), dransfield
<[email protected]> wrote:
<snip>
I'd only consider mobile broadband if it was absolute last resort to
get internet access.
Well three anyway!
--
A useless life is an early death. Goethe
- 12-05-2008, 06:52 AM #4Nick Le LievreGuest
Re: Phone to use as a 3G laptop dongle?
"dransfield" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>>
>> The MWG Zinc II allows you to tether to a laptop so you can access
>> Internet and it supports 3G... only £ 199 inc VAT + £ 7.41 del at
>> expansys.com
- 12-06-2008, 01:34 AM #5JonGuest
Re: Phone to use as a 3G laptop dongle?
In article <3c67e357-572b-4097-acf4-16331e38c9d4
@t3g2000yqa.googlegroups.com>, [email protected] says...
> I was thinking of getting a 3G laptop dongle for occasional mobile
> surfing/email (using laptop on train, airport, etc.), and see things
> for £10 / £15 pcm, plus initial purchase. But I need to get a new
> phone (as my current model features in a lot of cave paintings), and
> I'd like to get one that has some web / email capability (not
> necessarily looking for full blackberry capability). So I was
> thinking, why not get a phone that will work on 3G and can be used as
> a laptop dongle?
>
> I've had a bit of a browse and it does appear that there's a huge cost
> saving to be made doing this. Eg. a Virgin dongle is something like
> £15pcm for 3GB (and then £15 for each GB extra - Yikes!), whereas if
> you're on Virgin direct debit then 'accessing the web' is only £2 per
> GB and you don't have to buy. Am I not comparing like for like, or is
> this a massive disparity? (And you don't have to carry an extra
> dongle.)
Are you sure it's not £2 per Mb?
Hooking the phone up and using it as a modem is easilyt distiguishable
from using a donlge in your laptop, this is how and why companies have
differential pricing for laptop/modem use and browsing the "mobile web".
> So what do I need to do? I read some discussion on here about using a
> Nokia N95 for this, but can I use anything 3G? Does it have to have
> Wifi or is bluetooth fast enough for the laptop-phone connection? Does
> the phone have to have a modem? N96?
> Thanks in advance,
Any phone which can use a USB cable or bluetooth connection will do. All
phones which can do this will also have the necessary built-in modems.
USB cable is better as it's doesn't cane your battery and if you find
yourself in a HSDPA area then bluetooth could become the bottleneck (up
to 3.6 or 7.2mbps dowlink).
--
Regards
Jon
- 12-06-2008, 09:24 AM #6Adrian CGuest
Re: Phone to use as a 3G laptop dongle?
dransfield wrote:
> I've had a bit of a browse and it does appear that there's a huge cost
> saving to be made doing this. Eg. a Virgin dongle is something like
> £15pcm for 3GB (and then £15 for each GB extra - Yikes!), whereas if
> you're on Virgin direct debit then 'accessing the web' is only £2 per
> GB and you don't have to buy. Am I not comparing like for like, or is
> this a massive disparity? (And you don't have to carry an extra
> dongle.)
Some service providers prohibit tethering use for some of their data
contracts, but not all. Read the small print.
--
Adrian C
- 12-06-2008, 05:29 PM #7TonyGuest
Re: Phone to use as a 3G laptop dongle?
<[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> On Fri, 5 Dec 2008 02:31:41 -0800 (PST), dransfield
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> <snip>
> I'd only consider mobile broadband if it was absolute last resort to
> get internet access.
> Well three anyway!
>
>
It's my first choice, £5 a month using a Nokia 6120 on 3 PAYG
with an Acer Laptop, cheaper than dial up.
Using it to send this
Tony
- 12-08-2008, 09:18 AM #8D MacGuest
Re: Phone to use as a 3G laptop dongle?
> Some service providers prohibit tethering use for some of their data
> contracts, but not all. Read the small print.
So who doesn't ban it other than the £44 T-mob w+w plus polease?
- 12-19-2008, 05:38 AM #9dransfieldGuest
Re: Phone to use as a 3G laptop dongle?
On 8 Dec, 15:18, "D Mac" <[email protected]> wrote:
> > Some service providers prohibit tethering use for some of their data
> > contracts, but not all. Read the small print.
>
> So who doesn't ban it other than the £44 T-mob w+w plus polease?
I'm the original poster. This is what I've found:-
(I'm sure this will be old news to many of you).
I bought a simple £100 3G phone from Virgin Mobile (SonyEric K770i).
It comes with a USB cable and a CD ROM. If you install the software
from the CD and use the cable to join laptop to phone then I can
connect to the internet at 112Kbps in my house (in SE London). I don't
know if this constitues tethering, but this speed is fine for
occasional use. (googling a phone number or collecting emails on the
train / in the car.) .
Presumably if I get one of those micro bluetooth USB dongles for my
laptop I won't need the cable or the phone out of my pocket.
I'm probably getting charged quite a bit for the data, but I don't
mind as its for occasional use and I'm a PAYG kind of guy (he says,
not having seen the bill yet!).
I hope people who pay for dongles and subscriptions for 'mobile
broadband' get bettwe than 112Kbps though!
HTH somebody.
Dz
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