What provider for pay and go broadband in UK

Hi,

I don't want to sign up to the t mobile package I got with my vaio z as I will only infrequently need to use mobile broadband.

the people at T mobile don't seem to understand what I am talking about and sent me a regulatr pay as you go simcard. they also said that they can't change the sim that came with the laptop to be pay as you go.

I just called 02 and their mobile broadband PAYG "has the software on the USB modem" and "will not work by putting a sim into an slot in a laptop".

Does anyone have any su

 

I can tell you about T-mobile and Vodafone only. I don't know about the others.

T-Mobile - £1 per day used (regardless of data used). No contract. Good value. No FTP available. Can't remember the download limit, but it's not a problem for me. Currently use this in my Z

Vodafone - Buy a £39 pay as you go data pack. You need to buy this from a store or online. It comes as a USB modem with a vodafone sim. The sim works in notebooks. You get £15 of credit included, which equates to 1gb. You have as long as you want to use it - no expiry. Top up in £15 chunks, for 1GB each time. Again, pretty good value.
You can't buy the sim alone or convert an existing sim. T-mobile will convert an existing data sim to pay as you go. You just need to call the right department. Don't call the number that came with the Z, it's the business number and they deny such a product even exists! Muppets! Try general sales or something like that.
Hope this helps. I have used both and they both seem similar coverage and speed. I'm in Manchester.

 

I bought a 3 and T-Mobile 3G data sim card of ebay for my SZ. I just top up every month with 3 and i pay £10 a month for 1GB. The signal is good and i am pleased.
I am on PAYG and i prefer it that way.

 

Well they told me they couldn't convert a data sim to PAYG so have sent me a PAYG sim and apparently they can convert that to PAYG data. I am not looking forward to the conversation thought!! They also told me that it was £4 per day for PAYG data, are youeaper than some of the regular non PAYG tarrifs sure it is only £1? Even if you used that every day it would be cheaper than some of the regular non PAYG tarrifs!!

do you top up in the in the same way into the normal pay as you go Sim is topped up?

Yep, all they want to sell me is "mobile broadband" and I am 100% sure that PAYG is the way forward!

 

I can't say I'm surprised with your reply. I got different answers every time I called them. When they converted what had been a contract web n walk sim to the PAYG system at £1 per day, I explicitly asked them if this was something anyone could get or was it some special discount. They told me it was a normal product and I had no special discount. They said it was open to everyone. This was early October '08.
I top up via the t-mobile website, in the normal way.
If you PM me your email address I'll send you screen shots of my account stuff. It may help, it may not!

 

According to what i have read on this 3G sim cards run at 64kbps-384kbps and 3G data/broadband sim cards run up to 1.4Mbps currently . Converting one over the other does not seem really possible to me. It seems like you might be able to use the service but it seems to me that your speeds will that of a standard sim card.

I started a similar thread in the networking forum.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=305258

 

The one I had converted was already a 3G data sim card. It was converted from a monthly 'web n walk' sim to a pay as you go data rate.
The sim that comes with the Z in the UK is a T-mobile 3G data sim, so there is no reason why they shouldn't do that same as I understand.

 

The sim card that came in the box with the z was "canceled in october 2007"!!!

I tried to explain that I don't think the laptop or the sim card existed back in 2007 but they have no idea.

I can't find any thing on the T mobile site about pay as you go mobile broadband

The guy also said that if I want a PAYG broadband sim I have to go to a t mobile shop as they aren't available over the phone and teh sim costs £10

This is like pulling teeth!!!

Can I ask did you have to activate the 30 day web and waldk jobbie first?

 

In a word yes. But you'll need the details as it's was not quite your scenario.
Before I go into that, I've logged on to my T-mobile portal and it tells me the name of my rate is:

Mates Rates pay as you go

I've attached a jpg of a part of my usage history. You can see it costs £1 per day of use.

About 18 months ago I did sign up to one of the t-mobile webnwalk packages which was £15 a month. The 18 month contact had ended when I bought my Z. I called them and asked what was currently available as I did not want a recurring payment. That's when I found out about the £1/day option. So I still use the same webnwalk sim from before. That, however, will be no different from the webnwalk sim that come with the Z..I assume.

A friend recently bought a Z and I told her about the same. She also had difficulty getting it, but I believe she eventually got it sorted by calling sales I think she said.

Hope this helps.

By the way,
I just connected and went to http://www.broadbandspeedchecker.co.uk/
It says my download speed is 312Kbps and upload 53Kbps
This equates to a download speed of about 40KBs. I don't know what my signal strength is though (the one disadvantage of using the integrated Win7/Vista networking).

 

I had a look into this the other day, as I already have a T-Mobile phone with Web'n'Walk Max (so the WWAN built into my SZ and Z are pretty much useless to me, as T-Mobile say I'd have to pay again for a whole seperate Web'n'Walk plan to get a SIM card for it)... but a couple of weeks ago I was somewhere where I could barely even get a GPRS signal on T-Mobile, through the phone or with my SIM card in the laptop...

So I looked into getting a SIM card on another network that I could just keep as a backup with some prepaid data usage on it and use when needed, which wouldn't be often, but it looks like the only network that can really be done with is Vodafone... I was almost going to go for a Three mobile broadband SIM card, as they actually had coverage in the area where T-Mobile didn't, but then discovered that their data topups apparently expire after 30 days :-\

 

I have signed up for their web and walk thing and then before the 30 day trial is up I have to call and change to pay as you go. Thanks for teh information on the tarif you are on, that will give me something to bash them over the head with if they say they can't do it!

Alex

 

I use a Data only package from Vodafone.
That's a twelve month contract for £15/month with 3gb/month allowance for combined GPRS and 3G downloads.
Very happy with it as I commute from Surrey to London it's useful to get coverage to not so densely populated areas.

 

Well I rang back at the end of the 30 days to convert to PAYG data and they said they couldn't do it and reeverted to the answer that they had to cancel and I had to go in to a store!

I was about to jump on a flight to the US so I let them cancel it so I didn't go into a contract!!

Lame

 

I have a t-mobile sim card in my SZ, and I am on a standard pay as you go 'mates rates' tariff. As I understand it this is not supposed to be used in a laptop. Any pay as you sim card in a phone can surf the web for £1 per day maximum charge, and this is what I use - they refer to it as 'Interent on your phone' on their website ( http://www.t-mobile.co.uk/services/mobile-internet/on-your-phone/). As long as you don't use windows update, I don't think they can tell you are using a laptop rather than a phone.

T-mobile now offer a laptop pay as you go sim, for £2 per day maximum charge, but you have to buy a USB modem for £39 ( http://www.t-mobile.co.uk/shop/mobile-broadband/). I presume you can just use the sim card from this. You could then sell the modem on ebay to re-coup some costs.

Yeti

 

How interesting. That explains why others have had problems getting the £1/day thing. The person that sold it me at T-mobile must not have been aware of this.
I have been using that mates rates sim in my Z for months and I've not compe across any problem.
I haven't specifically avoided windows update, but probably haven't run it either.