Data roaming – the costs of overseas travel

December 16, 2011 2 Comments

There’s been a lot of recent press around the massive telco bills that some users are getting when travelling overseas with their smartphone.

A Google Australia search on “huge data roaming charges’ currently yields 143,000 results. So it is an issue.

How do you switch data roaming off?

Here’s some quick directions for a couple of the more common smartphones, if yours is not in the list, a quick internet search for “turn off data roaming” for your phone model will likely be helpful.

  • For iPhone – go into Settings / General / Network, and set “Data roaming” to Off.
  • For Samsung Galaxy S2 – go into Settings /Wireless and network / Mobile networks, and ensure “Data roaming” is not ticked (should be grey).
  • For Blackberry Bold 9900 – Go into Manage Connection (or via options) / Networks and Connections / Mobile Network, Data Services is normally selected as “On”, but change “While Roaming” to Off.

There is a chance, that even with Roaming off, that there will still be data downloads (or other call related charges) while overseas. You might consider contacting your telco prior to overseas travel, and restrict your account to disallow international usage. This includes voicemail and call diversions. Just picking up voicemail or a diverted call while overseas can be very costly.

But I still want to use my phone and access the internet!

One of the best solutions for this is to get your hands on a local sim card, with a pre-paid phone and data plan (normally a month at a time). This is by far the best solution cost-wise. These are normally available at mobile phone retailers and convenience stores. Compare prices and what you get in respect of call allowance, and the amount of data included. On a recent trip to South Africa, I picked up a sim card (I think it was Vodacom) with a fair call allowance, but more importantly 500MB of data included for less than $100 Australian dollars (this was my total spend – no extra for the few calls or data – largely because I used Viber as well as Skype on WiFi – see below).

Potential cons though:

  • If you keep your phone contacts on your sim card rather than on the phone, you won’t have easy access to your contacts after swapping the sim card (consider moving contacts to your phone – but make sure they are first backed up online or on your PC/MAC).
  • Since you will be on a local phone number, it’s not so easy for people to call you (maybe this is a pro!)

My suggestion to help overcome this is to use internet based apps (for calls, text, video).

A couple of applications you might consider are:

Skype – you can use this for instant chat, messaging, audio calls, or video calls

Viber – a great little app for text messaging or phone calls

For either of these two, each user must have the application installed – but this isn’t a bad idea even for usage within Australia, as you will be using data rather than call allowance (I’m assuming you have a reasonable amount of data included in your phone plan of course).

A big advantage with these apps though, is that your contacts are still available to you when you change phones/sim cards etc.

Important note – should you use these types of apps overseas (Skype/Viber or similar) – and you use them while global roaming – it will cost a small fortune. Use a local sim card with a reasonable amount of data, or hotel/cafe WiFi.

Don’t forget to also take advantage of WiFi where you’re staying, this will lighten the load for any data usage, even if you’ve obtained a local sim card.

So what will Data Roaming cost?

A lot!

You can estimate your download requirements and cost from the major telcos (as well as other general roaming information), so it would be wise to do so before travelling ..

What about tablet (iPads etc)?

The same issues around data download apply, but not so much the phone calls. You should go into the device settings and switch data roaming off. It may not be as simple to get the right sim card overseas – micro sims (used in iPads) are generally less common than standard sim cards, but a little more looking, or use of WiFi, is still the better solution than the costs of global roaming.

Please feel free to post comments on your own experiences, including any of your own tips!

Filed under apps, Broadband, Business, iPad, iPhone Tagged with , , , , , , ,

Mobile broadband with the new Telstra 4G

December 2, 2011 Leave a comment

Having read some reports on the high download speeds available on 4G, I was keen to do some of my own testing.

I got hold of one a couple of weeks back, and since have had a chance to try connection speeds in Brisbane, Sydney and Canberra.

So is it all it’s cracked up to be? Well in a word – Yes. And more.

I have regularly had download and upload speeds in excess of 20Mb/s in each (Metro) location. So far the best was Brisbane, which clocked well over 30Mb/s for both download and upload.

So what does this mean?

Well if you are away from your cosy home or office ADSL connection, you can still achieve fast data speeds for emails, file downloads, and importantly – Skype!

Mobile 3G speeds (despite what you may hear) are more commonly in the 1 to 3Mb/s range, topping out (rarely) at 4 to 5Mb/s, and at times may be as low as 0.5Mb/s.

I’ve tested 3G speeds in Sydney, Canberra, Brisbane, Melbourne, Adelaide, Perth and Hobart. So we are talking about speeds (at least in CBD areas I’ve tested so far) of 5 to 10 times faster than 3G.

Let’s talk the basics first of all

3G mobile WiFi versus 4G (LTE)

I’ve been using a Telstra 3G mobile WiFi for some time, which has been very good. It’s battery-powered, and can recharge from laptop or wall charger – and lasts for many hours. From this unit you can connect up to 5 devices, particularly useful if you also travel with an Apple TV (for when you want to stream movies/music or other content from your iPhone/iPad etc to a plasma – for work or play).

The new Telstra 4G (LTE) is a little different.

Firstly it must be plugged into your laptop/computer to operate. So it is ‘mobile’ but not ‘sit-in-your-pocket’ mobile.

Secondly it doesn’t provide mobile WiFi connections like my 3G one does (but see below for how to get around this).

Thirdly – it’s much, much faster in Metro areas. It will even give some ADSL connections small speed syndrome.

Setting it up

The unit itself uses the standard size sim. Note that it’s not the sim card that’s special, but the unit itself. Since it is fast though, you might want to review your download allowances in your mobile plan, else you might use it up before you know it!

If you don’t read the manual (and who really does read them), then you need to squint very hard to see which way the sim card goes in.

Here’s a pic to make it easier, the blunt corner of the sim is to the top left.

Once it’s plugged in, I found it a very simple process to get up and running.

It’s a lot more painful to get Telstra to get your account set up than to get this unit working. It’s lucky for Telstra that no-one comes close in broadband coverage and speed.

Once it’s working, then it’s plug and play thereafter. Just choose ‘connect automatically’ in the program settings (which present themselves to you once you plug the ‘dongle’ in), and that’s all that’s needed.

I find it connects within 15 or so seconds of being plugged in, without lifting a further finger.

Mine is plugged into a Mac Air, which allows me to share the connection and create your own wireless (WiFi) network, as noted above, this is useful when using an Apple TV and internet speed matters – if you are using YouTube for example.

What I’m really keen for is the release of future devices that use 4G. If the iPad3 comes out without 4G, I will be very disappointed. Same goes for the iPhone 5.

For these devices, particularly the iPad, the online experience, email downloads and even many applications that connect to the internet, will be greatly improved with 4G.

So for me, 4G gets 4 stars. If it worked unplugged, it would be an easy 5!

Post Script ..

Melbourne CBD test today (5/12/2011) 3G ~ 8Mb/s download, 1.5Mb/s upload and 4G ~ 29Mb/s download, 15Mb/s upload.

 

Filed under Broadband, Business, iPad, iPhone, Uncategorized Tagged with