Orange has retained its position as the top mobile broadband provider in the UK, according to a survey by independent research company YouGov. Orange was ranked top for customer services and reliability, while customers also rated Orange’s mobile broadband service top in a further seven out of 15 categories, including ‘ease of use’ and ‘upload speeds’.
Orange offers a selection of mobile broadband and connected laptops in the UK, and in November 2009, made it even easier for customers to access content online by offering two new dongles, the Orange e1752 and the Option 515M, as well as two new laptops; the Asus 1005HGO and the embedded Compaq CQ61, both featuring the operating system Windows 7.
Asif Aziz, Director of Broadband and Home, Orange UK said: “Retaining our position as the top mobile broadband provider in the UK is a great accomplishment which we’re really proud of. This win is recognition of our strong focus on network quality and brilliant customer service and its our aim to build on these, as well as the products and services we offer, to ensure our customers continue to benefit from a high quality user experience.
Orange’s mobile broadband was also ranked number one in YouGov’s Dongle Tracker survey in October 2009.
If after reading that you feel like you need some mobile broadband fun, you can visit the Orange site here.
Some footage and pictures has bubbled up of an upcoming Android handset from Alcatel called the OT-980, a smartphone running OS 1.6, packing Wi-Fi, A-GPS, 3G, 600 MHz processor, 192 MB of RAM, and a 2 megapixel camera. A compass, accelerometer, microUSB plug, microSD memory card slot, and a 1150 mAh battery flesh out the rest of the device. The OT-980 will be aiming for the entry-level, with a price point below even the HTC Tattoo – impressive, considering all of the specs crammed in there. The resistive QVGA touchscreen is apparently very responsive, and has an on-screen keyboard for when you can’t be bothered to slide out the real one. Those in France eager to pick one up, the OT-980 will be released on Orange sometime within the next four or five months, but we’ll for sure be seeing this (and perhaps another Android phone) at MWC in a few weeks.
Our buddies over at Fonehome.co.uk weren’t content with testing the iPhone 3GS for YouTube search speed on Vodafone (NYSE: VOD), O2 (NYSE: TEF), and Orange – oh no, they’ve done a bunch more tests too! We’ve got the ‘411′ (or ‘info’ for UK readers) on what went down, but we’re not going to totally spill the beans – for that you’ll have to hit up the links and take a look as to who is the winner in each case!
Personally, I think the best test they did might be the straight surfing test, since most of us smartphone-owning peeps will have given that a go at some point – so here’s the video embedded – links for the others follow below:
So, our buddies over at fonehome.co.uk have conducted a download speed test using the iPhone 3GS on three different networks (O2 (NYSE: TEF), Orange, and Vodafone (NYSE: VOD)), side-by-side, to see which is the quickest. And the result – well, let’s just say Vodafone didn’t lose!
Now of course there is some criticism you could level at the test, because it could have been in an area of poor coverage for O2 and Orange, and great coverage for Vodafone. But that’s part of Vodafone’s statement about their network anyway – they say it’s the fastest, and has the best coverage too! Certainly on the evidence of this video, you wouldn’t disagree.
I’ve long been going on about iPhone and/or network issues with respect to some of the applications taking forever and a day to get connected (the email app is one great example) – but this speed test shows that it’s more likely to be a network issue – since all the devices were kicked off with their search at the same point in the same app, but the Vodafone iPhone appears to connect and pull the search results much more quickly.
Whatever the explanation, it’s “Steeee-rike One!’ to Vodafone – we’ll keep you updated as more tests are performed
Well it’s been a tortuous week in the UK for weather – we’ve had snow – and lots of it! Unfortunately the poor ol’ UK is none too well-equipped to take on sub-zero temperatures, and there have actually been a number of serious incidents resulting from it. That’s a real shame. However, it’s not all doom and gloom – some people have been making (mobile) hay whilst the cold stuff has been on the ground. check out this PR from Orange:
“This week, Orange saw one of its biggest spikes for MMS. Yesterday, customers sent an unprecedented 984,000 messages with pictures of them playing in the snow – almost double the normal daily volume. Throughout the day, the Orange network witnessed a considerable increase in customers using MMS to share their experiences in the snow with friends and family, as well as using their phones to upload their images to social networking sites like Facebook.”
Nice. Well at least some people are enjoying themselves!
Orange UK teamed up with Barclaycard back in March of 2009, announcing that they’d be working together to roll out NFC to British consumers. “Today you pay for things by cash or on your credit card” said Tom Alexander, CEO of Orange UK. “Tomorrow, you’ll use your mobile to buy the things you want, whether that’s on the high street or the internet.” Here we are, 10 months later, and Orange UK has announced an NFC enabled credit card. I know what you’re thinking, isn’t the sole purpose of NFC enabled mobile payments to eliminate credit cards? Then I got to thinking, there are no worthwhile NFC enabled devices on the market today. You try selling NFC to someone used to owning something like an iPhone or Nokia (NYSE: NOK) N97 Mini and then asking them to downgrade to some four digit model number Nokia. This credit card makes sense. It’s also got some nifty features:
NFC payments only work on purchases £10 ($16) or under. It sucks, but then again I’m sure this limit will change once more NFC readers are deployed.
Receive an SMS when a payment is made. Useful for parents keeping track of their children, but also useful for adults keeping an eye on their finances.
Receive an SMS every week or every month with your balance. Useful for people like me who use their cards 20+ times a day and don’t want a text every time they buy a can of Red Bull.
Points you can redeem at Orange Shops, Marks & Spencer, HMV, various donations, or for trips and special events.
The Nokia (NYSE: NOK) N97 Mini will no longer be offered by UK operator Orange after sources told Mobile Magazine that the return rates of the device were “quite high”. In other operator related news Vodafone (NYSE: VOD) said it is no longer going to launch the Sony Ericsson (NYSE: SNE) XPERIA X2 since it was significantly delayed and no it no longer fits in their portfolio.
The N97 Mini news I’m actually surprised to hear since everyone I know with an N97 Mini, or who has reviewed the N97 Mini, have said that it’s brilliant and what the N97 should have been at launch. The Sony Ericsson news I’m not really shocked to hear at all. Sony Ericsson’s track record with high end smartphones is quite poor. They either ship late or they ship on time, but with terribly buggy software like we’re seen in the Symbian powered Satio.
At the end of the day though there will always be another operator which you can your favorite device from, and hell, if you don’t mind paying for your device all at once you can pick it up straight from the handset maker and use it with whatever operator you want.
Didier Lombard, CEO of France Telecom, otherwise known as Orange, just told Les Echos that 77% of the mobile devices sold with a contract during 2009’s holiday season were iPhones. When asked about the problems AT&T and O2 (NYSE: TEF) UK are having with the added network traffic that iPhone users create, he simply replied that Orange knew increased data usage was going to eventually happen and they’ve been heavily investing in their network since 2005. Data usage in France alone increased by 260% during 2009 and he expects traffic to increase at least another 200% in 2010. How refreshing is it to hear an operator not complain about iPhone users? In fact, Didier himself admits that his personal device is an iPhone and that no other device comes close.
Orange has revealed it will be launching HD Voice nationwide for customers on its mobile network in 2010.
In case you are wondering what HD Voice is, it’s the use of WB-AMR (Wideband Adaptive Multi-Rate) as a codec. This provides excellent audio quality due to a wider speech bandwidth of 50–7000 Hz compared to the current narrowband speech codec of 300–3400 Hz. The WB-AMR (Wideband Adaptive Multi-Rate) delivers significantly enhanced sound quality whilst utilising the same network resources. Orange is already working with leading handset manufacturers on the development of devices to be rolled out next year. The 2010 launch follows two years of investment in the Orange mobile network with expansion and technology upgrades across large areas of the UK.
Tom Alexander, CEO of Orange UK, said: “Orange is proud to be leading the industry into the next decade by announcing a new standard in voice innovation that will transform the mobile experience for customers in the UK. HD Voice really does inject a level of innovation into mobile phone calls, making it sound as if callers are actually in the same room. Once people have tried it, they won’t want to go back.”
Interesting one, isn’t it – personally I think the terminology is wrong, and should actually be ‘Hi-Fi voice’, since we usually refer to the ‘fidelity of audio. However, they’ve gone for the buzzword gold and used the current term ‘HD’ (relating to video) to represent something to do with audio. On top of that, handsets are going to either have to be replaced (or at least software-upgraded) with devices that can support WB-AMR – so it’s not instantly going to be ’switched on’ for everyone. BUT there is real innovation leadership here, and that should be praised – good one Orange!
This Christmas and New Year will see a bumper crop of text and picture messages as friends and family share their season’s greetings according to UK Mobile Network Operator Orange.
Last festive season was a record year for Orange with more than 100 million text messages and more than 1 million picture messages being sent by customers on Christmas Day.This year, the numbers are expected to be even higher.Christmas Day is expected to be the busiest for picture messages with around 1.1 million photos of gifts, trees and turkeys!
New Year’s Eve is also expected to break all records with more than 120million text messages likely to be sent.Last year saw 106million texts and almost 1 million picture messages celebrating the start of 2009.
This Christmas and New Year will see a bumper crop of text and picture messages as friends and family share their season’s greetings according to communications company Orange.
Last festive season was a record year for Orange with more than 100 million text messages and more than 1 million picture messages being sent by customers on Christmas Day. This year, the numbers are expected to be even higher. Christmas Day is expected to be the busiest for picture messages with around 1.1 million photos of gifts, trees and turkeys!
New Year’s Eve is also expected to break all records with more than 120million text messages likely to be sent. Last year saw 106million texts and almost 1 million picture messages celebrating the start of 2009
Orange has retained its position as the top mobile broadband provider in the UK, according to a survey by independent research company YouGov. Orange was ranked top for customer services and reliability, while customers also rated Orange’s mobile broadband service top in a further seven out of 15 categories, including ‘ease of use’ and ‘upload speeds’.
Well it’s been a tortuous week in the UK for weather – we’ve had snow – and lots of it! Unfortunately the poor ol’ UK is none too well-equipped to take on sub-zero temperatures, and there have actually been a number of serious incidents resulting from it. That’s a real shame. However, it’s not all doom and gloom – some people have been making (mobile) hay whilst the cold stuff has been on the ground. check out this PR from Orange:
Orange has revealed it will be launching HD Voice nationwide for customers on its mobile network in 2010.
This Christmas and New Year will see a bumper crop of text and picture messages as friends and family share their season’s greetings according to UK Mobile Network Operator Orange.
