New toy - wifi dongle

[Brian Kirby]

Mel B - 2010-01-10 8:34 PM

Brian Kirby - 2010-01-09 11:10 AM

Mel (via the mobile phone company 3) has networked her computers with a wireless router to a mobile phone broadband (i.e. high speed) modem (the so called dongle), which allows them all to access the internet via the mobile phone broadband network (3G) which transmits her communications back to a point at which it interfaces the wired internet.

If she so chooses, her network will also allow her computers to "see" each other and share files directly between each other, and to print from any one computer in her network to any other that has a direct (wired) printer connection, or even to print to a wirelessly networked printer, if she has one.

Nearly right Brian, except that with the new wifi router I have, the sim card goes in that and it is both a router and a dongle in one, so I don't now need a separate dongle (anyone want to buy one with a PAYG card???? :D ) It sounds like the same system that Keith is using.

So, yer dongle's up yer router then,  Situation normal?  :-)

[breakaleg]

Madmaggott - 2010-01-10 5:43 PMBreakaleg, I am very interested in the shield that you describe.  Can you provide a link to the site please?  How can you be sure that it is absolutely secure?

I intend to use my laptop for banking when abroad so am interested in any means of making it more secure.

 

Not very good with links,But type www.computeractive.co.uk into your browser bar at the top, when the home page opens select downloads then search forHotspot Sheild, read the bumff and you decide.There are adverts on the start up page, but when you hit home, these dissapear.mate of mine searched for my wi fi and couldn't see me on line.Hope this helpsPete

[Andy_C]

Madmaggott - 2010-01-10 5:43 PMBreakaleg, I am very interested in the shield that you describe.  Can you provide a link to the site please?  How can you be sure that it is absolutely secure?

I intend to use my laptop for banking when abroad so am interested in any means of making it more secure.

 

I find that Google usually works quite well ;) it found this: http://www.hotspotshield.comAndy

[Madmaggott]

Thanks for the help with laptop protection issue.  I use either lappy or PC when at home and both have their own password protection and Norton 360.  I like the idea of 'invisibility' for the lappy.  How do others deal with banking when away for long periods?

[Patricia]

Re security - my "3" router has its own inbuilt security code (27 digits) which I could change if I wanted to. It cost £34 from CPW last year Caljo. Mel I cannot remember (and I can't access the paperwork at the moment) whether my contract with "3" (£7.50 per mth like your's) was for 18 or 24 mths. Did your contract renew automatically or did they phone you? I had a fuss to cancel my T-Mobile one despite telling them a month in advance. I also fell for their "unlocking" (at £15) which is a complete waste of money as I cannot find another company who will supply sim card only internet access. To add insult to injury they now say that their own PAYG (which I did order when I cancelled the contract but it was not activated) sim will not work in this unlocked dongle as it is old technology.

 

Yet another fight to look forward to!!

[Mel B]

Keith T - 2010-01-10 9:16 PM

 

My understanding from the local '3' store is that no other connection/equipment is required, as my laptop already is equipped with whatever is necessary for the wifi, as I can already pick up such signals when in coffee shops etc?

 

Yes - as your laptop is already wifi enabled (ie able to connect to other wifi signals such as Mcdonalds etc) it already has the capability to connect to the 3 'mifi' wifi router dongle thingy! If you buy the 'mifi' router/dongle combined thingy, you will get a PAYG mobile broadband sim card and, as you won't need your dongle anymore, you can flog them on eBay.

[Mel B]

Patricia - my contract is for 18 months at £7.50 a month for 5gb download per month. It wasn't automatically renewed - I rang up about a month beforhand and sorted out a deal to get the broadband package.

 

I originally had the 18 month 7gb package at £12.50 a month (this was 50% of the normal cost because I took it out when we signed up for the mobile phones and it was a perk at the time). However, when I came to renew, the 7gb package didn't exist anymore and, whilst I could still continue on paying £12.50 a month for 7gb as an 'ongoing' customer, I didn't see the point when I could get 5gb for £7.50 a month (again after a 50% discount). It took some haggling but I got there in the end!

[Mel B]

Brian Kirby - 2010-01-11 12:37 AM

So, yer dongle's up yer router then,  Situation normal?  :-)

Now then Brian ... as I don't need the 'old' dongle anymore, I could soon try it out on you and see if you're able to receive the internet even without a laptop .... >:-)

[Patricia]

Thanks for your reply Mel. I'm on O2 for mobile phone services so here's hoping that 3 will let me continue on the same contract when it ends. I took it out in August 08 so if it was an 18mth contract I will soon find out!

[Keith T]

Patricia - 2010-01-13 11:04 AM

 

Thanks for your reply Mel. I'm on O2 for mobile phone services so here's hoping that 3 will let me continue on the same contract when it ends. I took it out in August 08 so if it was an 18mth contract I will soon find out!

 

Patricia

If you are on a 3 contract, they normally let you review/change that up to three months prior to expiry. Mine runs out the end of this month, but they have been willing to change/upgrade since about October, htough as yet I haven't taken anything. Once it has expired it seems that it just carries on as before, but just on a month by month basis.

 

Hope this is of some assistance.

 

 

[terry1956]

Please take note that not all dongles will work outside of the UK, THEY NEED TO BE UNLOCKED to work, and if they do there will be a charges for use outside of UK so please check this.

I use a handset from the BT go anywhere package, as I did not want laptops remaining in the motorhome.I make good use of Mac donalds for their wi-fi connections. as using the phone handset outside the uk eats into the free time allowed, if I use mac donalds or a few other hot spots it works out the same as using within the UK.

michael

[Mel B]

Patricia - make sure you get the 50% discount as an ongoing customer ... it is standard practice that you should get this.

 

Wifi - using wifi hotspots, either in the UK or abroad, from such likes as McDonalds etc, should be completely free and shouldn't eat into any 'allowance' at all, after all you are using their internet connection, not your own. You may, however, have to pay for a cup of coffee to get the password to access it!

[Patricia]

Thanks Mel. Is 50% discount a standard practice with all mobile broadband suppliers or only 3?

[Mel B]

Not sure Patricia, I'm with 3 and haven't used anyone else, once you get the 50% though you keep it ... forever! :-D

[Patricia]

Mel I have found out that my contract with 3 will finish in February and that I am entitled to an upgrade so I phoned today and have ordered the new wireless router like yours. This was after a long conversation during which he wanted to sell me a new laptop! Refused that and settled for just the router/dongle thing. He said that he had given me my 50% discount but has put the monthly payment up to £9.50 instead of £7.50 and I am wondering whether I should stick out for the same price per month. I am only tempted to change to this model (E5830) because he said that the signal is stronger and speed is better too. As I rely on this method at home (no landline) and the signal near me is very weak I thought I would try it. If I like it I can then sell my present dongle (E160G) and my 3 router on Ebay. Are you still happy with yours? Things should get better when T-Mobile and Orange combine as 3 will share their masts.

[Keith T]

Patricia - 2010-01-28 1:00 AM

 

Mel I have found out that my contract with 3 will finish in February and that I am entitled to an upgrade so I phoned today and have ordered the new wireless router like yours. This was after a long conversation during which he wanted to sell me a new laptop! Refused that and settled for just the router/dongle thing. He said that he had given me my 50% discount but has put the monthly payment up to £9.50 instead of £7.50 and I am wondering whether I should stick out for the same price per month. I am only tempted to change to this model (E5830) because he said that the signal is stronger and speed is better too. As I rely on this method at home (no landline) and the signal near me is very weak I thought I would try it. If I like it I can then sell my present dongle (E160G) and my 3 router on Ebay. Are you still happy with yours? Things should get better when T-Mobile and Orange combine as 3 will share their masts.

 

Am in process of looking to change as my 3 contract also expiring. Is the quote at £9.50 definately the wifi version, and what is the download limit?

 

The best they quoted me (previous contract/customer for 2 yrs) was £17.50 wifi with 5Gb monthly download. Shall b e interested to hear what you have actuaully obtained from them......

[Patricia]

Hi Keith

Just managed to get a signal (few and far between here!) so will give details as given to me yesterday.

 

As Mel said you are definitely entitled to 50% discount anyway and that will always be the case - I was assured of this yesterday. My earlier contract was for £7.50 month for 5GB with E160G dongle which I used with the 3 router (this improved the signal and allowed several computers to be connected at the same time but need to connected to electric). I have never become close to using the 5GB.

 

Yesterday's offer: new MIFI wireless (you can keep in pocket) dongle/router E5830 which allows speeds up to 7.2 mbps on 18mth contract. 5GB again plus 20 txt across all networks (I don't need this), picks up signal more easily with 30m range (100m if plugged into a computer). There is a 14-day return policy if I don't like it but I think I will challenge the price because on the internet the price is £17 so I should pay £8.50 max. I have to pay £1.99 postage (special dongle so presume this is for ins) and told it would be delivered by 1st class post no signature. Just found a DPD unable to deliver card from this morning so if it is the dongle they have surpassed themselves with delivery.

 

Will let you know what I think of it.

[Mel B]

I would say if the offer is for the new Mifi wireless dongle (which also acts as a router) then that is very good - it cost us £49.99 for our Mifi dongle as the offer wasn't on at the time - in effect if you've got an 18 month contract, the Mifi dongle is only going to cost you a most an extra £36 over the term (assuming you end up paying £9.50 a month), that's less that our monthly cost of £7.50 for 5gb (18 months) plus the dongle which equates to £184.99, or £10.27a month.

 

Reception for us has been absolutely abysmal for the last month or so but that's been down to the 3 network who have been having some major problems in our area, it wasn't the new Mifi dongle (it was the same with my original dongle), that seems to have got a bit better so they must've sorted something out as it's nearly back to what it was, which was pretty much okay. The only thing I have trouble with occasionally is trying to watch video clips, such as Youtube etc, as it can be 'juddery' (not caused by Fiat for once! :D ), as it stops to load more data before it plays.

 

This is what the Mifi dongle looks like for anyone who's interested.

 

[Patricia]

Thanx for info Mel and hope that your reception improves soon. I know that they are doing a lot of work in the London area but my reception has been "iffy" for quite a time now.

 

Anyway just checked the website and there are some anomalies - most info for this dongle gives speeds of up to 7.2 as I was told but website says up to 3.6. He told me charger included (so does one place on internet) but elsewhere there is no mention of it. Also extra card for a friend - he did not mention this. Says free post by DPD - he said charge and delivery by Royal Mail. Finally price is £17 (so £8.50 to me) so basically I will have to wait and see!

 

Hope you log on tonight Keith as this offer finishes 31 Jan.

[Patricia]

Update on the new Mifi dongle as pictured above:

Well the new dongle was delivered ok the next day at the second attempt and the box does contain the mains charger and extra pin card for a friend which I can put into an old phone and they can phone me for nothing (not sure that I will bother with this though).

Anyway transfered my card and the computer found it but I could not get a signal at all with it here but I can with the old router! So it does not seem to be any better at picking up the signal. However, I have since noticed that my old dongle often flashes as it there is no signal but when I try to connect it usually settles down and provides one - weird!

To continue: I sent a polite email to 3 querying the monthly price and they phoned me after 3 or 4 days and confirmed that the postage charge was correct (although it does not say this one the website) but much more importantly that I am being kept on the £7.50 month tariff. So that is excellent and worth keeping this other wireless dongle anyway as it may well work in some locations.

Ialso received all my disputed charges back from T-Mobile so pretty impressed with both companies.

[davenewellhome]

We are currently on Virgin for telephone and broadband internet service but as we rarely use the landline from home and have no need for the 50Mb feed we currently have (we went for it originally when our son lived with us as he plays a lot of high bandwidth games online and he payed half of the cost) so we thought we'd look into the MiFi from 3. Went to their local branch this afternoon and signed up for it on contract after they checked for coverage and said it should be good. Guess what, the blasted thing can't find the network. I've just walked the dog and took the Mifi with me to see if it could get a signal outside. It did............for all of fifty yards in a neighbouring street. guess where I'm going tomorrow?

 

D.

[Mel B]

Dave - it can vary greatly from room to room, or just from one end of a room to another, or even just a foot away, that's the problem with mobile broadband generally. However, the Mifi dongle does let you move it around to a place where you can find the best signal - it doesn't even have to be in the same room as your PC/Laptop - try it in other rooms and see how you get on first.

[davenewellhome]

Yeah I'd figured that out Mel but it doesn't receive any signal in any position in any part of our property including the garden, greenhouse and garden shed so its going back!

 

In defence of 3, we did try a T mobile dongle last year (both our mobiles are on T mobile contract) but it actually gave worse performance in our house than using our mobile phones as modems and they don't even get GPRS here.

 

D.

[kontiki]

Just to clarify a dongle is something you plug into your computer, we used to have dongles for some software programs which could plug into the serial, parallel or the USB port (when that came along). It seems people are getting confused & assume the 'dongle' is the one that uses the mobile phone network.

 

I have a couple of wifi dongles & a blue-tooth one but never bothered with a GSM one as I can usually find an Internet connection when I want one when we are traveling. :-D :-D

[GJH]

kontiki - 2010-02-07 12:53 AM

 

Just to clarify a dongle is something you plug into your computer, we used to have dongles for some software programs which could plug into the serial, parallel or the USB port (when that came along). It seems people are getting confused & assume the 'dongle' is the one that uses the mobile phone network.

 

I have a couple of wifi dongles & a blue-tooth one but never bothered with a GSM one as I can usually find an Internet connection when I want one when we are traveling. :-D :-D

Yes, the original dongles were security devices which were used to prevent unlicensed copies of programs from working. As is often the case, though, suppliers started using the term for other pieces of small plug-in hardware.

 

However, there does seem to be a tendency these days for the term to be mainly applied to Internet connection devices which use the mobile phone networks rather than other small plug-in devices. For instance, USB WiFi and Bluetooth devices I have bought are termed "adapter" rather than dongle by the manufacturers.

 

Graham