Sports 'Togs 3G Dongle recommendations

Seba

Seba

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Seba
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Hello You lot,

After some advice for 3G Dongles for pitch-side image transfer.

PAYG vs contract (do they do contract ones?) Which ones work best in stadiums etc.

I'm currently with 3 network, so maybe they have a deal!?

Any help would be awesome.

Seba
 
I have a 3 dongle which uses a micro sim card which 3 allow me to switch between my dongle (with an adaptor) and my iPad and my iPhone, its all unlimited data usage/internet when using the dongle in my laptop, ipad or internet on the iphone plus 600 minutes and unlimited texts when using in the phone for £15.90 per month

I have been with 3 for as long as they have been going and i flatly refused to take out 3 seperate contracts for the 3 seperate devices i use, it has taken a bit of haggling but ive had this deal for the last 2 years

3 know that 1 sim card can be used in multiple devices but dont advertise the fact that they let some people get away with it,l you need to badger them and complain if they put up any new offers that are for new customers only
 
i use a t-mobile wifi that when it works is super fast, but i find that since they teamed up with orange connection is not the best, they claim that when 4g comes in it will be back to its best] contract wise i have mine on a 10 pound a month and its enough for me [i do at least 3 games a week plus uploading to web site and ftp to papers etc with stock during the week]
i know that gary coyle and others swear by the 3 myfi.
if you have a look at tobers site he has some stuff on dongle / myfi
regards which groungs do they work at i think that depends on how many people are on there phones dongles etc as it effects the band width
tobers web site has some info
hope that helps
 
Should add that 3 would also allow me to use "tethering" from the phone to the laptop but want an extra £5 a month, just as eays to take the sim out, im a tight sod as well.

I used to have the MiFi but thought it was poor, signal strength dropped terribly even when it was only in my pocket, battery life was terrible as well.

Only place anywhere in the country ive had trouble with signal is the far end of the Huddersfield ground so i logon to their wife and in the press room at the new St Helens ground which they know they have an almighty cock up with, the grounds own wifi is terrible in the media room but good at pitchside, the walls have something to do with it.

Ive been up Mountains in Wales/Scotland/Lake district and on Dartmoor/Peak District/Exmoor and loads of other remote places and always got a signal with it on the iPad, always a good enough signal to run it as a sat nav or use it on google maps as a walking/hiking aid
 
Wow, didn't know there were so many options out there. I was just going to run a long cable from my landline....

Thanks for the replies though. I'll check out Tobers site.
 
when you say your on 3 do u mean for mobile? if so it may be cheaper to add a tethering bolt on to your phone and use it as a mobile hotspot?

I've got a 3 mifi 1Gb for £7.50 month which is plenty enough for me, no speed issues either
 
The newer Three MiFi that supports HSDPA has the fastest available upload speed until 4G comes onto the market.

Great bit of kit.
 
Seba said:
Yeah, my mobile contract is with 3.

Is this what you have? http://store.three.co.uk/Mobile_Broadband/MiFi

1GB, 18months, £10.87.
Click to expand...
If youre happy with your 3 mobile reception then as Landy says a simple tethering option would work, its £5 a month with 3 on a monthly rolling basis and you just use your current phones adta allowance, i think most 3 data allowances are the "all you can eat" variety now so no worries there.
 
Yeah, I have an iPhone 4s. I think the bolt on may be the best shout at the moment. Not sure how much pitch side image transferring I'll be doing yet.
 
Hi Seb,
I use a 3 dongle but also have the newer MIFI described by Mark!. I find the MIFI a lot faster when it works but it's hit & miss with the grounds I cover so I sometimes put the sim in the dongle.
I hit lucky with my 1st contract & got a wopping 15g a month so i now keep it rolling over even though I use nowhere near the data I can have!.
 
I used to be able to create a hotspot on my galaxy S2 on three and it was real quick. about 2/3 mb/s then they stopped you being able to do it and you have to pay the bolt on price now to be able to do it.
con artists!
cant comment on the up speed as i never really used it / checked what it was.
 
I have three (3, ie more than one, rather than "3") dongles, Vodafone, O2 and "3", all on prepay. I also have a wifi hotspot internet tethering feature on my phone (O2).

My default is to use the "3" dongle as it works best at most grounds I go to when they are full of fans. The other ones tend to drop down from 3G/HSDPA to 2G/GPRS as the volume of people in the ground increases.

There are a few exceptions. Unsurprisingly, O2's coverage at Twickenham is pretty awesome.

The important thing is to have some alternatives should your main channel fail. With prepay, I'm not paying anything to not use the O2 and Voda dongles, and know that if I need them I can top up £10 and be sorted. On the "3" dongle I usually use their £10/month data topup which has plenty of capacity for a few pics.

Also note that if using FTP, the settings you use on your FTP client can vastly affect the reliability of your upload. I'll write a blog post about this at some point in the near future.
 
At the Keepmoat, I'm permanently connected to their internet, but I've got a 3 Contract Dongle that I use for the away games.
 
Thanks for the reply chaps.

I think for the time being I will purchase a simple PAYG dongle, posibly Vodafone or O2, to act as back up for my iPhone. Then, if the work looks to become more regular, I'll get the 3 dongle as above.
 
rmt1982 said:
At the Keepmoat, I'm permanently connected to their internet, but I've got a 3 Contract Dongle that I use for the away games.
Click to expand...

Ahh the Keepmoat, Doncaster 2-0 Crystal Palace FC, 2009 (I think...!). Great away day out, from what I remember....! The Tut and Shive was a nice little place!
 
rmt1982 said:
At the Keepmoat, I'm permanently connected to their internet, but I've got a 3 Contract Dongle that I use for the away games.
Click to expand...
The wi-fi uplink at your place is wicked fast Rob, i sent 10 1mb files at half time and they went in less than 2 seconds
 
Gary Coyle said:
The wi-fi uplink at your place is wicked fast Rob, i sent 10 1mb files at half time and they went in less than 2 seconds
Click to expand...

It does help when one of the local internet companies provide free wireless for the entire stadium as well.
 
I have used the 3 Network Mifi 3G/HSDPA with no problems at all premiere league grounds

Cheers Rob
 
Ended up just hot-spotting my phone today and it was fine. But still going to look into getting a dongle(s) of sort.
 
Used to use vodaphone but could never get a signal at the end of the game at big stadiums. Mostly used the stadiums wifi but switched to Three when I dont and found it good at most grounds I've used it at.
 
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