Disqus
I’ve been trying out O2’s mobile broadband offering for the last few weeks, and I have to say it’s really rather good indeed! I particularly liked the fact that just because I was using a prepay device, I didn’t get stung for a ridiculous device cost – £29(ish) was all the modem cost!
Next thing that was good – the device has a MicroSD slot on-board – that’s forward thinking for you! It doesn’t take MicroSDHC unfortunately, but it can still handle up to 2GB cards.
Following on positively again, the modem installs itself as two devices – a USB drive, and also the modem itself. On the USB drive part are the application install files, and the instructions. Oh, speaking of application install, it works very well on both PC and Mac – something I can again vouch for!
Connection speeds were also good – I got a 3.6Mbps connection at home, and it ran consistently fast too – as heavy DSL users will know, just because you are connected at X Mbps, it doesn’t mean that whole bandwidth is continually available. Operators would probably say it “varies temporally” – which translated means “sometimes good, sometimes not so good!”. However, good speed and rock-solid connection I found.
The O2 management software for the modem wasn’t astonishing, but then it doesn’t need to be – it just needs to manage the connection and stay out of the way of the work/play you might be doing.
I’ve seen some pretty crappy implementations of Broadband Modems, but the O2 kit looks nice, works well, and is priced very well indeed – Tariffs are available here if you want to read more.
Well done O2!
About The Author
Ben Robinson
Ben is a 10+ year veteran of the Mobile industry – starting his career when SMS was a still a relatively new concept for most people (!), he has now consulted on everything from bleeding-edge Mobile content, to the next-gen accessories you might view it on. As a result he has a broad and deep knowledge in numerous areas of Mobile – from network operators to device vendors, to infrastructure and middleware vendors (not to mention content delivery) – and has worked for companies in all of these areas! He is based in the UK, a hotbed of activity for mobile, and recently became a father for the second time – as oppose to in his younger years when he was happy spend time tweaking all manner of mobile devices to 'nth' degree, he now looks for services and hardware that provide the most efficient, compact, and reliable improvements to his already manic life! It’s his opinion that Mobile solutions should be there to help to make your life better – if a particular solution (be it service or device) isn’t doing this, he believes you need to ask the very important question of why you continue to use it... His focus at IntoMobile is mainly on Mobile content, services, and infrastructure, particularly as regards the UK market – and with the occasional look at devices. Additionally, using his extensive experience in the industry, he will provide commentary on the industry at large, with regular (and hopefully thought-provoking) articles.
