Which SIM card for tablet use in uk?

[Erin]

Mrs Erin is going to be spending a bit of time in London in the coming weeks and whilst we have a 3G iPad we have not bothered with a installing a SIM card up until now as we can use one of our mobiles as a wifi hotspot. However, our data roaming charges are quite hefty, so my cunning plan was to buy a PAYG sim from Orange or Vodafone or whoever as their data rates look quite favourable.

I suppose, my question is, is there anything to choose between the different providers? We don't need free minutes or text allowances, purely data. Vodafone do a free sim specifically for tablets for a fiver which includes 250Mb data per month and can be topped up any time. I jut wonder whether there is any small print I haven't spotted yet on these free sims, as they seem to imply you have to 'sign up' to get one.

[martini]

Some opinions here:

http://www.ybw.com/forums/showthread...-data-only-SIM

Sent from my portable speaking device using Rib.net

[gtb]

You can order a SIM from GiffGaff (which is running on the O2 network) at no cost and with no contract.

If you use this link then I get a £5 referal and you get a free £5 added to your initial top-up too (IIRC the initial top-up is min. £10)

Once your SIM arrives you can login to their website and pick a data-only bundle from their PAYG data scheme, which will give you 500Mb to use within a month for £5, etc. Sorted.

[IanH]

Buy a 3GB Three mobile PAYG sim from Amazon at about £10.80 inc free p&p. Lasts 3 months or 3GB data. At end, throw it away and buy another.

Just need to trim it to fit iPad Microsim. I use a cutter that cost about £3 but pair scissors and bit of care will do.

Or walk into any Three store and buy a MicroSim one for £20.50. They also do a year/12GB one for about £70.

I'm a heavy iPad user and get through about 1.5GB in two week break. Never had one not time expire.

[Siochair]

This might be of interest: PAYG THREE MICRO SIM CARD 3GB DATA PRE LOADED FOR IPAD 4TH GEN RETINA DISPLAY | eBay

[Erin]

Thanks for the leads. Whilst the cost is important, we're not looking for the absolute cheapest £/Mb deal available, more the overall simplist to obtain and start using. I'm happy to walk into an Orange shop or Tesco's and pick up a card off the shelf if that is the right thing to do and will just plug straight in and start working.

[IanH]

As I said, walk into any high street Three shop and you will get what you are looking for. £20.49 (or £10.49 for 1month/1GB) will give your iPad what is effectively unlimited (unless you are a high use youtube user) mobile broadband for a month or more. Plug it in, no activation, registration or topup needed to get it working so you can use straight away.

Three PAYG mobile broadband options

I also found that Three gives much better coverage than my O2 service.

The only caveat with Three based services is make sure your outgoing email smtp server can use a port other than port 25 as Three and some other mobile data providers block this port.

[lump1066]

What about usage on the west coast of Scotland - thinking Easdale type area. Any views on which service provider actually provides any service in that kind of area?

[IanH]

Most of the main providers have pretty accurate coverage checkers.

ie
Coverage - Support - Three

[jambo]

Originally Posted by lump1066

What about usage on the west coast of Scotland - thinking Easdale type area. Any views on which service provider actually provides any service in that kind of area?

As one who is in that area Vodaphone is the one that has the best coverage some of the others are mon existing.

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[Erin]

Got this sorted today. Spoke to T-Mobile, Vodafone and three and ended up going with three as they offered a plain and simple data only card for £20 which lasts 3 months and up to 15Gb. Both Vodafone and T-Mobile had rather odd time restrictions on their sims, and T-Mobile in particular were actually selling time not data. After the first month you have to buy extra days of use at £2/day or £10/week which seemed a bit steep to me. There was also a strange data limit of 1Gb which once exceeded wouldn't stop you from browsing, just downloading. I thought that was more or less the same thing?