wireless broadband

If you are going away from major city areas i have found that the only signal you will get is with Telstra even that Telstra has poor coverage but i found it the best.

I agree - AND the only Telstra service that is any good is the NextG broadband, NOT the Telstra 3G which is just as bad as the Optus network for coverage. DO NOT go for the cheapest deal if you want coverage. Telstra has spent a lot of money on their NextG network and is getting a return on their investment by charging more than the other carriers that have not spent as much.

Look at the relevant coverage maps for each service, decide where you want to go and who has the coverage where you want to go. In general, NextG will work in a lot of places outside cities, Optus, Vodafone, Telstra 3G, etc will only work in or close to the cities.

Telstra have also bought their NextG pricing down again last week so it is now getting to the sort of affordable range.

Also make sure that you get at least 1GB of data/month because if you go with the lower priced plan (400MB) and you go over your data cap, you will pay dearly for the excess data.

There are plenty of other posts on this forum on the subject as it seems to come up every 2 or 3 weeks so do a search and see what others have said.

Stevesub

I use my Next G mobile phone as a modem connected to my laptop. I only had an 80meg download form Telsta but found that was quite sufficient for email and banking. The way to save on download is to set up a Gmail email account, this way you are not downloading your email, but viewing it as a web page and Gmail removes all the spam for you. I used a ZTE F165 mobile phone supplied by Telstra which works the best in the fringe areas. I also used an external aerial. The hardest bit of the aerial is to find was pig tail that connects the phone to the aerial. If you have a LG tu500/tu550 or the ZTE F165 I have as spare pig tail still in the box.
The best part of using your mobile phone as a modem is that you can cancel the browsing pack at anytime at no extra cost.
The software that came with the ZTE F165 is excellent with information on how much of your download limit you have used.

I agree with the others, Telstra NextG is the only way to go, my Daughter came to visit us at Dongara WA she is with Optus and coulden't use her phone no signal.............I have the Telstra PC Card that fits in the side of my Laptop, I also purchased an Aerial which I put up on the outside of the Caravan and a connector to the PC Card, I could get the internet at Yardie Creek (Carnarvon) when others couldent use their Telstra mobile.

Hi, you will find a much better deal if you get the Bigpond data ( all info on telstra website under mobiles) pack instead of the Telstra one , no plan or sign up ), my mate has just come back from a trip up thru Longreach, over to the Cairns and down to Sydney and home . he got a 80 meg pack for $89.50,( using his Nokia 6120 Next G as a modem) and he was sending me his GPS tracks each day, he never found a place ( C/v park) that did not have service ( even at Undara Lava tubes), we talked quite often on Skype and he sent some photo,s etc, and when he got home he had only used 78% of the package , and he just rang them and they turn it off untill he goes away again. If he used it all you just ring and they will put a new pack on for you , they have packs from $5.00 I think from memory.
Cheers Des.

Like Arthur when travelling I use my Telstra F165 NextG phone as a modem and connect to the internet via the software that comes with the phone. It costs roughly $1 per meg of data transmitted and received. This may sound expensive but it was a lot cheaper than signing up for 2 years for the Telstra NextG Broadband system. I already have iiNet Broadband at home and did not need a second connection. I could download my emails via the iiNet system and if I composed all my emails in Word before opening the email programme it saved time and money on the connection. The only problem I had was I stuffed my laptop hard drive on the rough roads up north and had to have it replaced. Now here is a plug for Dell. I got home to Braidwood (100kms out of Canberra) on Friday and Dell had the hard drive replaced by the following Thursday. The serviceman gave me a time he would be at my home and he was. The laptop was 5 years old and 2 months out of warranty. Dell extended the warranty for $350 for another year and replaced the HD as part of that warranty. I will now look for a SSD laptop before I travel with a laptop again.

Phil
I use Bigpond Next G, it's the only broadband you will get in the small towns like Adelaide Rive, El Arish etc , I do believe there is a major upgrade of Wireless Broadband services from other providers like Optus,and Vodafone, not sure about DoDo but this is suppose to happen in December , keeping my fingers crossed because I'm sick of being ripped of by Telstra / Bigpond As soon as I can get with Optus or Vodafone I will be changing,
So as others have said Bigpond is it at the moment ,

Phil, All a bit confusing isn't it. And although everybody is trying to be very helpful, there is (IMO) some incorrect info above.

The onle PHONE network that will give you mobile broadband in most country and remote areas is Telstra Next G.

For broadband, you can access this network via either Telstra or Bigpond. Both give the same coverage as they both use the same network. In remote areas you will need an external antenna, so make sure your phone or modem can accept one.

When I extensively researched this about 8 months ago, for Bigpond, you need to get a plug in modem for your laptop. This is included for 'free' by Bigpond if you sign up for a 2 year contract. 1G per month costs about $89.

On Telstra, you can use your phone as the modem. Also, you do not need a contract. Instead you can simply order a casual data pack. 1G is about $89 (same as Bigpond). The advantage is no contract. We recently travelled in NT for 5 months. We ordered a 1G data pack before leaving. On return we cancelled it. We will order again when we leave for next trip. We used Samsung A412 phones with RFI 2195 high gain antenna. Worked perfectly in very remote areas.

In my view, if travelling or needing mobile broadband long term, the modem with a plan is the way to go (Bigpond or Telstra). If travelling shorter term, or needing broadband for less than 2 years at a time, casual data packs from Telstra are the way to go.

The other advantage of the casual data packs is that you can change at any time. If you find you are not using as much as you expected, move down to a 200MB plan for example. With a contract you cannot do this.

All the info is available on the Telstra and Bigpond web sites, but they (particularly Telstra) are not easy sites to navigate.

Norm C

Hi Phil S

If you match a bigpond Next G with a 5db magnetic mount antenna ($176) you will have, IMHO, the best available mobile broadband Telstra offer.

Cheers.

As Norm says, there is a variety of correct, incorrect, and maybe correct, information here. The sad truth is that this is not the fault of the posters. Telstra staff themselves do not know their product and give out incorrect information at our expense.

I used a data pack to and from the Gathering at Innamincka. On the way home while in SA I wanted to top up my Pack as I had used it up. I rang Telstra and was told that I could NOT buy another pack until my "billing date" came around (about 10 days away). In the meantime I HAD TO pay casual rates of $2 perMb.

Daylight robbery I thought.

Until I got home and rang Telstra, spoke to a Corporate representative who told me I actually paid the excess at $10 per Mb, not $2. She wished me a good day and hung up on me.

Telstra sux badly.

I wrote to Sol Trujillo but the ignoramus has decided not to respond.

As Doug TNT has said, roll on some decent competition.

Telstra DOES NOT DESERVE OUR BUSINESS.

Research EVERYTHING because the deceitful prix will screw you at every opportunity.

We were with westnet but planning to move around a bit we decided to go mobile. While researching we had no choice but to go with Telstra. Their coverage is great considering the age of the technology. That aside we have become a nation relied on technology and I love it so had to pay for the privilege. We have the Air card. Noticed Telstra are offering 12 months half price. bugger we only got 6 months.

Phil,

A couple of months ago we completed a lap around Oz & used the BigPond next G wireless broadband modem aka 'Blue Toaster' to have internet access practically everywhere. Also have a marine band external antenna (same frequency as the Next G) fitted tot he o/s of the van. As long as I can get one bar on my phone the o/s antenna will drag in at least 3 bars consistently.

Simply remove the left hand screw on mini antenna & connect the o/s antenna & your in business.

Paying $49.95 p/m for 1GB & found that ample.

Hope this helps.