Mobile Data in Lieu of Broadband via BT – Open Reach

Have you looked out of the window recently? o_O The blooming thing would end up in Norway!

I usually put the little Huawei 5330 on the motorhome roof but I have bitten the bullet and ordered a Poynting XPOL-1 omni directional aerial to mount on an external wall.
 
Asterix said:
I got my first Motorola around the early 90s,I've had numerous since then,I've actually never owned any other brand of mobile,I've currently got the G7 which I think is superb for the money. For some reason it's a brand you don't hear about very much and although they've changed ownership over the years they've always produced quality and competitive prices phones imo.
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I've had a couple of Motorolas. Not bad, but completely outclassed by Huawei, Samsung and Redmi
 
Asterix said:
They are only outclassed if you've used a better phone,I haven't.😄
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I have changed from an iPhone5 to a Moto g6 and I am happy with it .. but I am a very light phone user. A £10 top up lasts me months. :) The only downside with an Android phone is that you cannot see the screen on a sunny day, the Apple phones are far better.
 
maingate said:
I have changed from an iPhone5 to a Moto g6 and I am happy with it .. but I am a very light phone user. A £10 top up lasts me months. :) The only downside with an Android phone is that you cannot see the screen on a sunny day, the Apple phones are far better.
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I think the newest phones have dark mode as an option,I wonder if that will make for easier reading in sunlight? Mind you there's little chance of sun...
 
Sharpie said:
You are on a sticky wicket I think with say a Huawei phone, which were (and still are I think) cut off from the Google infrastructure since Trump took against them.

I wouldn't touch anything that did not have access to the Google Play Store.

I've been using Motorola (well Lenovo) for many years, and found them very good, solid hardware, not expensive. Currently running a Moto G6. Buy a current model and they promise Android updates for at least 2 years, and regular security updates which they do push out regularly. Mine got Android 8 > 9 pretty much as soon as it was out.

Very clean version of Android, little bloatware added, never mind massively tailored "launchers". As I said pretty much pure.

Also running an Iphone 5s which is still supported and regularly updated. I don't particularly like it, but it has an essential feature for me which is WiFi calling, essential inside my house where there is no signal on any network, so dependent on my landline broadband for that. Only a few rather expensive Android phones have that natively, worth checking that if you think it might be important to you. E.g wan't to use it on London underground, or somewhere with WiFi but no mobile signal.

Three used to have an app for WiFi calling on Android, but stopped supporting that a while ago, which was a bummer, hence why I have the Iphone, gifted by a relative locked into the contract/upgrade/Apple ecosystem. Battery life terrible.
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Asterix said:
I think the newest phones have dark mode as an option,I wonder if that will make for easier reading in sunlight? Mind you there's little chance of sun...
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My 7 year old Nokia 1520 has dark mode as standard, as I think most windowsphones have, I think it's more screen quality that makes it easier to see in sunlight.
My 5 year old MS 950xl had wifi calling but it only works on EE.
 
Dowel said:
I am fed up with my broadband from Plusnet and thinking of replacing my BT landline with mobile data.
My line had gradually become noisier and slower over time despite Plusnet assuring me noise on the line did not affect broadband.
In the first week of December 2019 I started to suffer frequent dropouts. I bought a new router following advice from Plusnet and they adjusted their settings several times. Eventually, on 21st January, the second Open Reach engineer sent to fix the problem found water and a poor connection in one of their cabinets. The line is still slow but now much less noisy and does not drop the connection so frequently.

Open Reach can provide a fibre connection (FTC) on the edge of our village with my final connection via the existing copper overhead wire. Plusnet would charge a little less than I currently pay for my slower connection but significantly more than they would charge a new customer which puts me off.
I think that using a data SIM in a mobile would be cheaper, faster than my existing connection and could be used away from home. Coverage maps from the mobile network suppliers and OFCOM suggest that there is a good signal at my location from Three.

I could borrow long term a Samsung Galaxy Ace mobile but am not fond of Google and Android things.
I rather fancy a Nokia Lumia 640 XL Windows phone.

So question 1 is: Any comments and advice on Windows phones?

Question 2 is about using a mobile to download data to update my Garmin maps.

The Garmin Express System Requirements specify:
High speed Internet access (Not for use with dial-up, mobile or satellite connections)

I have asked Garmin to clarify whether this excludes tethering a mobile to my PC and await their reply.

In the meantime has anyone tested this requirement? I will need to be able to update my Garmin periodically.
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I told plusnet their fibre was cheaper to new customers than my steam driven service. But that wasn’t good enough, others were doing fibre for less than Plusnet, so I’m off said I. So they matched the competition!
 
in h said:
They're still outclassed, even if you're oblivious of it.
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Not everyone requires, nor can afford, something that they believe, to be best in class.

There are other things around that are solid, well made, work well, and not embargoed from say the GMS, by the US trade disputes.

And possibly US protectionism of it's own industry. And Apple.

Some recent analysis:

www.pocket-lint.com

What does Huawei's trade ban mean for your present or future Huawei phone?

The latest on the Huawei saga.
www.pocket-lint.com www.pocket-lint.com

www.techradar.com

Huawei ban: the global fallout explained

Update: Mate 30 series won't have Google services
www.techradar.com www.techradar.com

It's not just the Google bit, but also the supply of key components such as the RF sections, the ARM (or ARM licensed) processors, lots of other things.

As I said, at the moment, buying a new Huawei phone might not be a smart move, until some rapprochement is reached. It is in flux at the moment.
 
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Sharpie said:
Not everyone requires, nor can afford, something that they believe, to be best in class.
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That'd be a good point, but for the comparative prices of Huawei, Redmi and Motorola phones. All three brands have models at different price points, but for each given price band, the Motorola one is least good.
 
my smartphone is an alcatel running some version of android, it allows me to make phonecalls, send a text and use whatsap to send a piccy. which is all i need a phone to do. i can even get maps on it should my paper ones self destruct. anything more expensive would be just a waste of money.
 
My smartphone is not often used as a phone. Literally dozens of things it does, from switching lights on and off, through finding places in strange towns, tuning instruments, timing boiled eggs, commenting here, getting up-to-date weather forecasts, monitoring servers, reading emails, to gently waking me up in the morning.
It is a superb camera with a 48 megapixel sensor, which can film in 4K. 256GB of storage, 4GB of ram. All for much less than £200
 
What made you chose that aerial Jim? I sometimes think I will get one for the van for times I have poor signal but wouldn’t want it permanently fixed
 
Must admit I don’t like phone calls much and use my phone for just about everything else. If I am in the van I use iPad for larger screen
 
ricc said:
my smartphone is an alcatel running some version of android, it allows me to make phonecalls, send a text and use whatsap to send a piccy. which is all i need a phone to do. i can even get maps on it should my paper ones self destruct. anything more expensive would be just a waste of money.
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What's a text? :confused:
 
Nabsim said:
What made you chose that aerial Jim? I sometimes think I will get one for the van for times I have poor signal but wouldn’t want it permanently fixed
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That one is an omni-directional aerial. I thought it better than the Poynting XPOL2 which is a directional aerial.
 
maingate said:
That one is an omni-directional aerial. I thought it better than the Poynting XPOL2 which is a directional aerial.
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Ah okay, wasn’t sure if you had been in touch with3 and found that’s what they use. Please update with how it works when you have it. It may be directional could be better using in a house but omni is less messing in a van.
 
in h said:
There have been issues since the weekend, and on Sunday, in the storms, it was very iffy indeed. But that may be due to network reconfiguration. Instead of ping times aroung 38ms, I was seeing 200ms times, starting at the third step of the tracert. In my area, Three said they were dealing with a "complex network issue" (whatever that means). Since that notice disappeared at the weekend, speeds have been more variable. I suspect that the storms have affected some of their microwave backhaul links.
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I'm now revising this thought. The storms may have affected their network for a while, but the weather had improved (until this evening) with no matching improvement in the network.
It looks like Three has done a fairly major reconfiguration of their data network in the last ten days, and it needs a lot of optimising to even match what it was like a fortnight ago.
I'll give them another month or so, but if Three hasn't improved dramatically, I'll switch to EE, even if it £12 a month more.
 
Ditched BT Landline. and Plusnet. Got a sim card from "Smarty" unlimited, yes unlimited, calls texts and data. I push big photo files around with no problems its £20 a month, on a months contract.

I Bought a Huawei Modem its battery powered or runs of the mains. Absolutely brilliant. Much faster than BT internet and Plusnet, I run smart TV Mac, iPad and Phone, with no problems. But, you must have a decent mobile phone signal, to get 4g. Take the modem with me when I go away. I will probably get a more sophisticated modem, when ever :)
 
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