Internet while on holiday?

[AnnPaul]

:-D :-D :-D :-D

 

Have just bought a new laptop, which can be used "wireless", how should I use it while travelling we will only need to send a few e-mails. We try to camp wild as much as possible. so will be using our two batteries topped up by our solar panel.

 

1 I have an inverter should I keep the laptop charged as I travelling?

2 How do I send e-mails while in Europe?

3 Any other hints on how to get the best out of our new toy.

 

Regards Paul

 

"happiness is no white bits"

 

 

:$ :$ :$

[Klyne]

Paul

 

If you used campsites your task would be a little easier because a lot of them have WiFi connections some are free and others charge. There is always the McDonald's trick! Use one of their carparks to pick up their free internet connection, I think they allow 30 minutes. If you are in a town or city there will be many WiFi connection some are free and other chargeable. If you are sure that its only e-mails you want to pick up a connection via your mobile phone might be the best option. I use a Nokia 6300 on a Virgin account and they charge £5 MB in Europe. So typically cost less than a £ to download via POP3. It would be more if you used webmail. Unfortunately the cost of data roaming in Europe is still prohibitive but it looks as if the EU Telecoms Commissioner is about to force mobile phone networks to seriously reduce the cost as they did with voice calls last year.

 

David

[Basil]

I would suggest you look at the 3G offer that is the subject of an earlier thread on here, cheaper than the previous suggestion.

I have used WiFi abroad for a few years and whilst it was fairly freely available earlier on I noticed last year a lot of 'open' connections have now been 'closed' and need security access. Whilst the McD. et al connections are available they are rarely convenient for use, so you cannot beat having your own independant connection available.

As you will see from the offer it still costs £3 per Mb for roaming with 3G (though free within your package in Italy and other places) but that is not time based so you can use it as you wish over any period of time. There is nothing better than being able to download when you wish even on an Aire with no WiFi connections for miles, in fact anywhere that your mobile phone works. You can set your laptop to only download what you want so reducing the amount you download e.g. by switching off picture download and other usless information. I have set my e-mails to only download the headers (typically 2kb or less) and you can then select which ones you wish to download for full viewing after checking out the headers. Clearly you can download a lot of headers for £3.

As I said check out my previous thread '3G Dongle for £7.50 per month'

 

Bas

 

P.S. I will bump it to the top for your convenience as it is now on the second page.

[cronkle]

So, to give me some idea how much 1G would last could you say roughly how long I could look at this forum for before I use one up?

[Keith T]

cronkle - 2008-07-26 4:27 PM

 

So, to give me some idea how much 1G would last could you say roughly how long I could look at this forum for before I use one up?

 

When I took my 3G DOngle earlier in the year, I asked the sales staff this question........the inidcation was an hour a day for 30 days!

However, whilst I use the internet quite a lot, and also usuallya few e-mails each day, I 've never exceeded this, and usually run to about 80% of it.

With regard to use aborad, it's VERY expensive, although so is much of the wi-fi or even use of terminals at camp sites!

The DOngle is very convenient when in the Uk, though and as stated on the previous thread on this subject, so afr - apart from and area near Leek in Staffordshire, I have found excelennet receptionon the whole.In fairness,the signal on none of the mobile networks seemed to very good up there!!!

[Klyne]

cronkle - 2008-07-26 4:27 PM

 

So, to give me some idea how much 1G would last could you say roughly how long I could look at this forum for before I use one up?

 

I can only go by my use of a PC Fusion card in my laptop and using GPRS. I would say that typically I would use 3/4 MB a day and that would allow me to check e-mail several times, check internet banking and credit cards online. Check my website and perhaps visit a few forums like this. 1GB is 1000 MB so from that type of used you would be hard pressed to use your allowance within the month. However I do think a type of 'Parkinsons Law' applies to internet access the bigger the allowance the more we use!

I now have a Vodafone 3GB allowance mobile broadband, but I have only used it once on a 4 day trip away and even with quite heavy use I don't think I got to 100MB, so I can't see me running out of allowance. The downside is that it is still very expensive to use abroad, £10 a day for a 50MB allowance. Hopefully that will come down in time.

 

David

[Basil]

cronkle - 2008-07-26 4:27 PM

 

So, to give me some idea how much 1G would last could you say roughly how long I could look at this forum for before I use one up?

 

I think the other posters have given useful information, for my own use an e-mail header is around 2kb then a full download around 14kb, a page of this forum comes in to me at around 5kb (text only). So you need to decide how much you are going to use it to determine whether it is for you. I have not yet exceeded my allowance for the month and I believe I use it quite a lot.

 

Bas

[cronkle]

Thanks Keith, Klyne and Basil.

 

That's given me a good idea of the quant*ties involved and therefore potential cost.

 

Again, many thanks.

[zulurita]

I have the 3 USB dongle and currently I am touring here in Yorkshire for 6 weeks and have so far used just over 1 GB since I set out on 8 th July. Mind you I have done a Zone alarm update etc.

 

Normally 1 GB would be enough for me but as I am away for quite a time on this trip I am glad of the 3 Gb allowance.

 

You do of course have to be in a 3G signal area. It has worked on GPRS when 5 bars are showing but you also have to untick the show pictures in the internet options section. This does help if the signal is not so good.

 

I have also used it in Italy. France is a shame that did cost me an extra £15 + ontop of my £15 monthly contract, I used it twice in France. So I for one will be glad if they bring down the cost of using the internet abroad.

[SAS]

I have just downloaded the Opera browser onto my mobile phone and it`s really quite brilliant. I can access everthing on it that I can on my pc and it loads all the pages. I have a bolt-on on my contract of free internet browsing and can send emails etc etc just like the facillity on my pc and it`s suprisingly quick. (I have a Nokia 6131) The good thing is you charge your mobile in the 12volt, it`s automatically `wireless`and there`s no extra equipment to cart around with you. If you do a lot of downloading you`ll get charged extra and it`s no good if you want to print off documents but for emails and general browsing on the move it I think it beats the pc. You can put in your favourite bookmarks, save pages and can even access this forum and reply. You do need the 4.1 version or above though, for it to be able to load the feeds.