Mobile Phone Coverage in the Kimberley

You will be waiting a long time to get a better overall coverage that what Telstra has.

Have you ever had to deal with Optus customer service - is far worse than Telstra's already atrocious customer service.

If you're ever going up to that country just buy a Optus chip for your phone

Get a mobile that takes 2 sims, but be aware that they may only have one as 4G and the other as 3G and the extra sim may be taking the place of the SD card.

Just buy a $100 prepaid optus card and cheapy phone, if you already have telstra. Simple and cheap.

The problem with prepaid is most, if not all, of them don't allow tethering. So much so in fact, most of the benefit of buying a prepaid SIM, say for Optus which seems to be getting the jump over Telstra in remote communities, is lost on us.

Remember that you usually pay more for an unlocked phone.

If your phone is lock to to particular service provider, eg Telstra, putting in another service providers sim, the phone will not work.

My navigator's phone and mine are both unlocked. Neither will tether on an Optus pre-paid. Also, in Canada, same thing on Petro-Canada's mobile service with pre-paid. And wth Rogers. I haven't tried Telstra because that's my regular post-paid service.

It's a service provider policy for some reason. I can't figure why. The user pays for the data, why can't the user use it the way he/she wants? I cannot see the difference between using it on the phone which has the SIM or on a tethered tablet.

If someone can enlighten me my curiosity would be satisfied, but not my frustration. LOL

Frank, the SIM-changing problems in a mobile handset can be many and varied.

1. Check the frequencies your phone can receive on, and the frequencies each provider is using.
Optus and Telstra are starting to diverge more and more on the frequencies they use.

GSM Arena will give you the precise frequencies your phone model can receive on, if you know the exact model.

I have a Galaxy Note 4, model 910G. This is the phone compatible with Australian, Singaporean and Indian networks.

The link below shows the Galaxy Note 4 specs (you can find your phone model specs with the search function).
In the first line of the Note 4 specs, you will see "GSM / HSPA / LTE". These are the network types supported by the Note 4.

On the right is a menu button "expand". Clicking on "expand" shows the full list of Note 4 frequency capabilities, followed by the exact model number.

GSM Arena

Phone manufacturers produce up to 20 or more models of each phone, that are designed specifically for individual countries or regions, according to the frequencies and the networks available there.

If you've bought a phone off eBay, or when overseas, that phone may not be compatible with the Australian phone network, due to being set up for a different network system, or different frequencies - or both.

If you've bought a phone off a local Network provider, that phone is usually tailored in its construction and programming, to only support that particular network provider - even if you have unlocked it.

The local network providers install software on their new phones, tying the subscriber ID number on the SIM card, to the phone's serial number.
If these numbers don't match, the phone won't work.

The Whirlpool page below gives Australian carrier frequencies. Note that there have been a lot of changes since the analogue TV network was closed down in 2014.

Whirlpool - Australian network provider frequencies

The Govt auctioned off the old analogue TV frequencies, divvied up into many smaller chunks of bandwidths, to the Telcos - and both Telstra and Vodaphone spent billions (yes, billions!) on purchasing these frequencies for future mobile phone use.

The Telco engineers have discovered that the lower frequencies penetrate large concrete buildings more easily, so the lower frequencies such as 700MHz are now being used more often.

Some phones have the ability to use, say 900 or 1800MHz in the open areas and can then switch to 700MHz inside buildings if the 900 or 1800MHz reception starts to drop out.

2. If you change your SIM card, you may need to manually change settings such as APN, user name, password, authentication type, etc, to accommodate the new carriers connection requirements.

3. OzTowers provides details of every mobile repeater tower in Australia.

The Optus Small Cell network repeater at Kalumburu is now provisioned with a 3G service (900MHz, Band 8), and this had been planned for installation since August 2017, but has only come into service in recent weeks.

The 3G, 900MHz frequency can be received by many mobile phones, even older ones.

OzTowers - Kalumburu

Here's the link to the ABC article that is not working in Robert1660's original post.

ABC - Kalumburu gets mobile network

I fear the new mobile Optus service may have a few unseen social problem downsides, for the relatively isolated, and still quite tribal group, that inhabit Kalumburu.

Cheers, Ron.

Some good advice here.
I'd like to add a few comments that may help people.

1)Telstra generally don't lock phones on contract any more. So you can temporarily put in an optus pre-paid card. Also most newish phone will connect to any frequency.

2)You can get any phone unlocked on one of many unlock websites. You generally pay about $25 and send your phone IMEI details and they email a code to put in the phone. I have done this several times. It works well.

3)If you have a recent 4G phone with wifi calling, and there is no Telstra coverage, you can make or receive phone calls or texts as normal on any decent wifi hot spot. Most phones under about 2 years old will do this if set up properly. I've just spent the last week using my phone this way.

Thanks Ron and Boobook,

My phones connect perfectly with the networks I mentioned. I chose them (frequencies, etc) to suit where we travel and I have full functionality with the phones on a pre-paid SIM.

But none of the telcos we have used will allow tethering of a tablet to the phone if using one of their pre-paid SIMs. I'm trying to learn why that is so.

In regard to use within Australia, Optus doesn't want to answer the question. I'm just wondering if anyone here knows the reason for the restriction.

As far as I can tell, it is a policy matter, not a technical one.

I used to be with telstra and now with boost (they use telstra ) pre paid, and have never had a problem tethering a tablet off the phone.....used to be a samsung s5.....now a htc one......soon to be the samsung s5 again because a forgotton point here is reception.....the htc is crap compared to the samsung.....so much so, loading a web page becomes almost impossible sometimes.

Let me take a guess Frank.

You have an iPhone or IPad. It's a "feature".

No, Boobook, Androids all. Samsung S2 in days gone by, S5 more recently, S7 now. And the tablets are all Samsung Android as well.

Hmm, strange. I used a Telstra Note 7 on Optus prepaid just last week with tethering. 5 devices most of the time.
Maybe Optus cripple the phones. I seriously doubt it though.

Frank - Ahh, now you're talking about tethering between Tablets and phones, that's a whole lot different ball game.

The plan that was purchased plays a part in this. Prepaid with an unlocked phone from another Telco or eBay? - SIM-only, to use in multiple devices? - or post-paid coupled with a new Telco phone purchase?

Apparently, there are restrictions as regards tethering by Telstra, and this is due to Telstra stopping data-sharing between devices in the event of a change of the type of plan.
There are also restrictions on tethering if you have more than one Telstra account.

Telstra are particularly devious at hiding the "small print" and keeping plan restrictions hidden, or finding ways to charge you extra.
They haven't changed in 30 years, as far as these techniques go.

Telstra simply want you to pay all the way, and particularly when it comes to data useage.
The other Telcos are starting to challenge Telstra on their basic network access cost of around $1 a day - but they are targeting the highly populated areas, and if you go with one of them (or one of their resellers, such as Kogan), you soon find the limitations on their coverage.

Cheers, Ron.

"The plan that was purchased plays a part in this. Prepaid with an unlocked phone from another Telco or eBay? - SIM-only, to use in multiple devices? - or post-paid coupled with a new Telco phone purchase? "

Unlocked phone from an on-line seller. Up to date firmware and up to date Android. My provider is Telstra with a post-paid plan. Tethering with Telstra works perfectly.

We bought an Optus pre-paid SIM with lots of data for use when Optus is there but not Telstra. Put the Optus SIM in the phone, everything is fine. Calls and text work, data works (email, internet, skype, wife's FB etc). But Optus won't let it tether to a tablet.

Similar story overseas with Canadian providers and pre-paid SIMS.

My question is, I've paid for the data, it's mine. Why am I not allowed to tether a tablet and use the data there to get the benefit of the larger screen and keyboard? Surely that is no different to using the data on the phone.

Frank, I can't see any reason why Optus is not allowing tethering to your tablet.

I suspect the problem has to be with the connection settings on your Telstra phone, when you insert an Optus SIM.

The Optus webpage below offers advice as regards setting up tethering.

The "Advanced user" link provides the technical details as regards connections.

Optus - Tethering

Cheers, Ron.

Telstra WAS the national carrier. but sadly no more. Previously the Government was the regulator and major Share holder of Telstra. That was deemed a bad thing so they sold down. Now Telstra is no longer responsible for nation-wide coverage. Infact it is illegal for the board to put the nation's interests ahead of the share holders interest.

Go Figure.

So the fix is the black spot program where the government puts black spot areas out to the lowest bidder. Some times that's Vodafone, sometime Optus, sometimes Telstra.

Another government screw up.

You can't blame Telstra for this one, though you can blame them for a lot of other things.

Thanks Tony (Boobook)......certainly a very sad state of affair.

You get what you vote for, look at America. Any time you think that things are going down hill into the toilet, just remember that the majority of people either thought it was a good idea, or couldn't be bothered thinking it through.

Tony (Boobook), not quite sure WHAT the Telstra board are doing as priority one, but shareholder interest it can't be (or they should all be sacked) as anyone with a holding would well know.

Can't disagree with that Zippo. More very bad news to come I hear too.