Internet away from home

Hi all Merry Christmas and hopefully a better year to come..

I’m already looking to next year, and hoping that I can continue to spend many months abroad....to that end I’m considering cancelling my TalkTalk internet, phone and other services that I don’t get good value from!!

I have a friend who uses an iPhone on their canal boat..they don’t have to pay TalkTalk for internet and it appears to work for them!

My question is: what’s the best way to receive internet at home and when I’m not at home?

I do use a Mifi and internet with legs whilst I’m abroad or on holiday in the Motorhome but would a Phone with contract work well at home!!

Ray

I stopped using Mifi when I realised that my Moto G phone has reception that's every bit as good as the Hauwei Mifi device. All I use now is a dual-SIM phone, a PAYG SIM from Three for phone and emergency internet data access, and an EE monthly contract SIM (actually from Plusnet) for internet access.

With an Android phone it's very easy to set it up as a wifi hotspot, so that any laptops/tablets in the area can connect through it to access the Internet, without needing any wired connections.

I find 4G adequate, but a lot depends on what you want to do. I suspect if you had several users watching video at the same time it would not be enough, but I don't tend to watch a lot of high def video, so that's not important to me.

The only fly in the ointment for me is that my Linux-based laptop wouldn't let me use its wifi interface, so for a year I had to use a long USB cable! Fortunately they fixed the Linux Kernel a short while ago and it all works Ok again.

[I should add that the above is for "away from home" use - I still have "fibre to the cabinet" and landline phone - almost never used - at home.]

Thanks for the reply Roopert...

I can’t see an issue with the laptops...it’s the desktop we use at Home....we’re not big data users anywhere really...it’s just that I’ve begun to believe that I don’t need internet at home....or the landline for that matter..

Ray

Its certainly a conundrum, I could pay much less for our connectivity but keep coming to the conclusion that I just want to be able to do what I want with it whether at home or away without any constraints.

We don't use the landline at home for outgoing calls and very few people have it to use to call us but I still have a telephone instrument hardwired to BT that will work during a sustained power outage.  The unlimited data on fibre has been a boon over the last months as virtually everything we watched has been streamed, often two HD devices at once.

However if you don't use much data and think that I haven't used the hard wired phone for 15 years then (whether mifi or phone date) just connect the home devices to the kit you use in the van when your at home.  There are of course still large tracts of the UK with no or limited mobile coverage but the majority of that does not have a permanent population.  You don't have to be right off the beaten track to experience that as all networks have black spots.  I lived in a Vodafone blackspot till 18 months ago when they installed a new base station and I live in a town.

I expected to use the mobile wifi in the van much more that I actually did this year so am on a contract and have lost a lot, on the other side, when we could get away I've not had to worry about running out of data at an inconvenient time.  All my Vodafone sims will be out of contract mid January so I will be having a think then but expect to just carry on.  We've saved a fortune on eating out this year so are not out of pocket in the scheme of things.

Yes Peter, it’s complicated..and I understand your point of view...I just don’t see why I should pay for a service I’m not using...I’m away from home for six months £180:00 + for nothing isn’t a great deal in the scheme of thing but still a waste I’d rather not spend.

There has to be a cost effective way of getting rid of a home network service and just living of a mobile phone....

The point about prolonged outages and always having a phone available is valid...but I’ve not had an outage like that for many a year.

Ray

This is a topic that has been talked about a lot here over the last 12 months. 
Without going into great detail we could save a lot of cash by dispensing with the landline.
We are on a good competitive pack age at the moment which I dont think we could better.  However SWMBO overruled me.
The options I was considering were a 3 Home Wifi router for the house connection and broadband (need a permanent connection for heating etc) and all calls through our mobile phones which also would provide internet in the van, which they do now very well on the 3 network.  
I have in the past run the home broadband from my mobile phone which quite happily run 2 laptops, 1 PC, and a couple of iPads.

In the van travelling over the years I have found 3 to be the most stable having tried Vodafone (not a good experience), O2 (not bad but cust service poor),3(best of the lot) and EE (very poor at home and cust service poor)

Regarding the iPhone "powering" and internet our iP6's did sterling work but had to be replaced, unfortunately as phones they couldnt run a couple of programs I use a lot so we had to move to Android

Yes I agree....in one of my posts it appears to read that I don’t use internet at home ....of course I do...I just don’t want to pay for the landline or the internet when I’m away!

I also use three, in fact the 3 with legs sim has just been reduced to £36 pounds...I paid £43:00 earlier this year...so currently a good buy.

Im hoping that a good data sim router will work at home...I’m not sure my hawaui mifi that I Use in the Motorhome will be strong enough for the house!

All this said....non of us know the effect on data and calls now that we are leaving Europe....roaming just might make it a complete waste.

Ray

I guess the home broadband is not the only thing we pay for when we are away.

Poll tax, standing charge on our gas and electric, water fresh and waste, the list goes on. 

But I must agree the telephone issue raised does cause some looking into.

I did wonder why our heating bills had shot up recently, then the penny dropped when my wife said, hang on calm down, we have actually spent a lot more time at home this past year.

Roll on the jab and back to France ultra fast .
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Richard

I would watch the January sales and get a SIM free phone with hotspot facility. Last year EE were offering 100gb of data and unlimited calls and messages for £20pm. Most parts of the country get 4g unless you're out in the wilds. Find a website to check for coverage. 
Rich..

Ray,    if its the Hawaui that 3 push out you will have no problem at home. If its one of the older ones then you are limited to three devices if a later model then I think its 11 plus devices it can cope with

My suggestion would be an unlimited data contract from one of the majors. Use the phone as a hotspot and all devices will connect. The only thing to watch out for us Apple won't allow photo uploads ( or syncing to photos cloud) via a hotspot on an iPhone as it doesn't consider that to be Wi-Fi. I've yet to find a way of overriding this on any apple device. It's fine via an android hotspot though.

Thanks for your input orac, perhaps you'd like to give a brief introduction.....

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Thanks for the suggestion Orac.....I have researched that option and it has potential, there are however some constraints.I.e. Tethering can be data hungry and is probably the major hurdle!

In the current Brexit climate, I suspect other people interested in this way forward might wait to see what happens with Roaming charges as well....it’s certainly not an easy choice.....everything is changing too quickly!!

That's why for my money, an unlimited data package is the way to go. As to roaming, yes. The Jury's out.

You can get a 3 Home Broadband 4G package for less than £30 pm, with unlimited data. When you go away you just take the router with you - it just requires mains power, but even that might be OK on direct 12V. We tried it, but sadly the 4G reception at home was too variable.

I’ve got 100gb on my Vodafone plan. We use it abroad to get British TV. I’ve got a Three data sim and mifi for surfing, emails etc. You do need to watch for prices on Amazon as they tend to vary from about £28 for 24gb to about £45. I just buy when they’re cheap, they don’t start counting down until you connect and activate them, then valid for 24 months.

In case anyone hasn't noticed, Three has announced a massive price hike on their PAYG phone contracts, so if you  have a second SIM from Three as a backup to your main data SIM (I do that in case I'm somewhere with no EE coverage for more than a day or so) the costs will go up a lot. And in this case "massive" is not an exaggeration! Their 3p, 2p and 1p tariff goes up to 10p, 10p and 5p, and some of the increase outside the UK are truly colossal - e.g. an SMS text outside Europe will go from 2p to 35p!

I don't think any of the increases apply to their "Internet with legs" or whatever it's now called, or at least, not yet...

I would urge caution on any of their other brands too, if that's the way they are going.

It's hard to know, but it may be that they have simply decided to drop PAYG as a major part of their product line. I think it's a well-established fact that contract-based services are much more profitable for the mobile operators, not least because people have a tendency to buy contracts that are way bigger than they are ever likely to use!

I think my average monthly spend with Three is less than £1 so I doubt I'm contributing much to their profits - and I'll be transferring my number out as soon as the price increase hits!

I've been refreshing my Vodafone contracts today.

I had a mobile broadband for the van at £21 per month for 30 Gb. Absolute max we've used when streaming is 28GB and usually less but of course last year I've mostly been paying for nothing.

I'm now on a rolling 30 day contract. In any month I get 250MB free so ok for a little surfing when the mobile cant get a signal but the van roof mounted aerial can, then if we want to stream its £1 per Gb.

I'm sure there are cheaper PAYG deals to be had but this contract really suits my needs/desires.