what about 3G internet ?

[Auri]

I need to get an internet connection. At the moment I have Clearwire unfortunately. In my area no other can provide good internet connection. What about 3G data cards / Vodafone or 3G?

[Grimly]

Originally Posted by Auri

I need to get an internet connection. At the moment I have Clearwire unfortunately. In my area no other can provide good internet connection. What about 3G data cards / Vodafone or 3G?

Depends how far you are from a 3G-enabled cell mast and what the terrain is like in that line.
Have a look at the coverage map on Vodafone's site and see if you're close to one.
I'm 4 miles from a Vody 3G mast and am currently getting 1Mbs with a Sirio 9dbi flat plate antenna up on a 10m pole at ridge height. I expect this to get more reliable when I put up a 24dbi mesh dish.
Only thing I find is the link is terribly weather-dependent. When it's overcast, it's fine, but clear calm skies are not conducive to good m/wave links at treetop height - I think there's a bit of ducting going on when the speed's good.

All you can do is give it a go - I took a chance and it paid off quite well.

[tincan]

Have a look at these threads...show me where to complain about 3
and Hi, just asking about 3

[cenfinlay]

Anybody having an luck with Three???? Called into shop and was told it would pick up and even be up 2 7mbs by xmas. Yeah rite!! and upto 10mbs by next summer. YEAH RITE!!!!

[Xpro]

my friend is currently using vodafone 3g,and the speed is brutal.hes most of the time in 3g zone with good signal and speed is getting is around half meg,and upload is worst then dial-up.

[foggy_lad]

three is the pits lol am out at Eire og and service is DIRE speed ranges between 25-200kbps for their highly advertised 3.6mbps crap. today their whole service crashed leaving their customers without broadband and all mobile services!

[oldinnertube]

I've been using 3 mobile 3G broadband in Trim since last July. To be honest, it's not the worst service in the world and at €19.99 it is the cheapest alternative to phone-line broadband around here.
Service is highly assymetrical: typically 200-700kbps downstream (1.2Mbps this morning) and 50-60kbps upstream. This is fine for normal downloading, but sending a 10MB email attachment is a pain.
When the service came out it was terrible, intermittent and seemed to randomly block access to certain IP ranges. But in fairness to 3, the put their hands up in the media and admitted that they had underestimated uptake and were having trouble with bandwidth. Since then service has improved every month. I have not had any downtime since July 07. The speed here is approximately the same regardless of indicated signal strength or weather. Even when my mobile phone can't get 3G the broadband works fine. It has not gone to GPRS since July 07, but when it did it was dire.
The 'normal' internet experience is fine - no problems with general surfing, ebay, online banking, etc.
I find that 1 out of 3 large downloads (>10MB) 'hangs', so I use a download manager for everything. Not sure if this has improved. Bittorrent was extremely slow and practically useless due to the slow upload speed, but I revisited it recently with a different client and it seems to work ok.
It is handy to be able to go online anywhere in the house with a laptop without having to have a wireless network (unlike one of my neighbours who unwittingly supplies free , slow, internet access).
Set-up is simple, as the installation application and drivers are stored on the adapter. It can be switched between any PC, and I don't need to remember passwords as its all SIM-based.
Overall, I'm happy with the service and I consider it value for money.

[foggy_lad]

Do three not have any customer service ethic at all? i was without any broadband modem or phone service from Tuesday morning until early today and their customer care while polite have NO valid or useful information to impart to customers! I went to the store where I was more or less told to complain elsewhere rather than in-store or to three customer care!

also three seem to have reverted to treating pre-pay phone customers as pay-later customers allowing us to use mobile broadband without informing that broadband add-ons have expired then charging for the excess hours/days later - my add-on expired and they kept this to themselves alllowing me to use 76mb which i assumed was covered by the add-on then they sent message saying add-on was expired and hours later did a Dick Turpin on my credit!