Three MiFi quandry?

[GrannyJen]

Abov.

Had my 3 huey hooray sim now for four years and has been brilliant. Costs me 10'quid a month for 15 gig and always reliable.

 

[Bramco]

You got me! How do I add another APN?

Use the tplink app which you can download from the app store. This allows you to see the status of the tplink device. MB transferred, users connected etc.

There's also a menu choice for 'Network'. Click on this and then select 'APN Management's. You can then add an APN using the + symbol. I gave it a name and the only field other than that that I changed was the APN field. Put three.co.uk in there and hey presto it worked.

I wonder if three have somehow changed their provisioning. When I put the SIM in my phone I received some provisioning info. On the tplink device I didn't get any of that.

Anyway - we're well pleased now it's finally working. Faster than the campsite WiFi here in Ljubljana!

 

[Jabberwocky]

Use the tplink app which you can download from the app store. This allows you to see the status of the tplink device. MB transferred, users connected etc.

There's also a menu choice for 'Network'. Click on this and then select 'APN Management's. You can then add an APN using the + symbol. I gave it a name and the only field other than that that I changed was the APN field. Put three.co.uk in there and hey presto it worked.

I wonder if three have somehow changed their provisioning. When I put the SIM in my phone I received some provisioning info. On the tplink device I didn't get any of that.

Anyway - we're well pleased now it's finally working. Faster than the campsite WiFi here in Ljubljana!

Thanks for good clear advice. Have made the changes you have suggested and have crossed fingers that all is good in the Netherlands in just over a month. Thanks again.

 

[Jabberwocky]

Sorry, I should have replied - excellent all worked very well after APN setting changes. Thanks to all.

 

[T6 CFO]

On the ferry from St Malo - Portsmouth so just a quick heads up on the dangers of wasting your data allowance.
I have an iPhone and iPad and was occasionally connected to my mifi which had a 12GB data SIM. The SIM I had in the mifi was at the end of its 12 months and the data was almost used and fortunately I had a replacement with me. What I do is stick the data SIM in an old phone I have so that I can register it and monitor the usage on-line. I was a bit surprised a few days into our trip that it was out of data. A bit of head scratching identified why. I had downloaded some video clips from my Blackvue Dashcam to my iPad and it had by default set these to be backed up when the iPad was connected to wifi. That soon gobbled up the data that was left. So you can either remove any app like that from your backup list or cancel backups while your away.
You could get the same issue if you use your iPhone or iPad to take pictures/videos.

Mike


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

 

[MrNick]

Indeed, background data usage on iOS is a bit of a nightmare. When you're connected to cellular you can disable things like iCloud Photo Library, iCloud backups, auto app updates etc - but when you're using wifi to a mifi it just gobbles up whatever data you have. We found this out too when both our iPhones decided to update all their apps overnight and our 10gb data was gone in one night

Got a 30gb/month SIM contract now to give us a bit more breathing room (and turned off auto app updates)

 

[s2bear]

As I found out and unless his has changed Three 4g in UK is fine but they only had 3G roaming agreements - not 4g. Consequently I was never able to get 4g in Switzerland & France etc. This is kind of irrelevant now as with the abolition of roaming charges you can just hotspot your phone wherever you are or use another provider (one of your choice as opposed to Three) in your MiFi. Not sure how it is on other networks but on Vodafone, data drops onto 3G if you’re using it for voice at the same time.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Jonathan Duke]

I have a Three SIM card in my iPhone, and a separate Three 4G MIFI device with it's own SIM card also.....

I've a monthly 30GB, on my pay-monthly SIM in the iPhone, whereas the MIFI has a pre-loaded SIM with 24GB, which is valid for 24 months.

I cannot create a hotspot, with my iPhone whilst roaming, this "data use type" is not allowed, and restricted by the carrier (Three.) Video streaming, is also restricted whilst roaming.... However, I can, and do, use the personal hotspot feature daily whilst on home-network, in the UK. To use this feature whilst roaming, you need to purchased a "data passport" from Three, which is £5 per 24-hours. I've purchased this previously, only to find it doesn't work.... After several calls to Three Customer Services, they refunded the £5, and advised they were aware of a current issue - I haven't tried it again since.

Due to the above issues, I've now reverted back to using the MIFI device whilst roaming.... I had intended to decommission the MIFI device, after getting a 30GB per month allowance on my iPhone, but it turns out it'll survive to live another few trips....

 

[T6 CFO]

I have a Three SIM card in my iPhone, and a separate Three 4G MIFI device with it's own SIM card also.....

I've a monthly 30GB, on my pay-monthly SIM in the iPhone, whereas the MIFI has a pre-loaded SIM with 24GB, which is valid for 24 months.

I cannot create a hotspot, with my iPhone whilst roaming, this "data use type" is not allowed, and restricted by the carrier (Three.) Video streaming, is also restricted whilst roaming.... However, I can, and do, use the personal hotspot feature daily whilst on home-network, in the UK. To use this feature whilst roaming, you need to purchased a "data passport" from Three, which is £5 per 24-hours. I've purchased this previously, only to find it doesn't work.... After several calls to Three Customer Services, they refunded the £5, and advised they were aware of a current issue - I haven't tried it again since.

Due to the above issues, I've now reverted back to using the MIFI device whilst roaming.... I had intended to decommission the MIFI device, after getting a 30GB per month allowance on my iPhone, but it turns out it'll survive to live another few trips....

I would agree with keeping the Mifi as it’s good to have options. One thing I did find is that for us moving around frequently, staying in Aires and wild camping WiFi is a waste of time and 3/4G kept us connected throughout our trip. Hardly ever without a signal good enough to fire up the apps we were using for finding somewhere to bed down for the night.

NB: App that surprised to the positive was park4night

Mike

 

[Jonathan Duke]

NB: App that surprised to the positive was park4night

park4night, worked really well for us also. This sort of "regular" access to 3G/4G is fine thru the iPhone, and uses the basic roaming data bundle fine.... However, it was a surprise, that roaming no longer includes personal hotspot and/or streaming video etc.... for this the MIFI is needed, to avoid Three's £5 data passport charge. I wonder if other carriers, are restricting access along the same lines??

 

[El Greco]

On our recent trip to France we just used my phone as a hotspot to used by the wife on her phone and for tablet use. I have a Virgin SIM only deal and it worked on 4G as it does in the UK. However our data requirements are low in the region of 4GB though a heftier deal is available that can be altered by the month. Check it out on the Virgin mobile site.

 

[El Greco]

This is the link.

http://store.virginmedia.com/virgin-media-mobile/sim-only/pay-monthly-sim.html

 

[MattBW]

Did I not read on here that 3 had introduced some policy on mifi that the main use of the data had to be in the UK and it was no more than 30 days in europe? Did the roaming change also come in for data?

Or did I dream it?

 

[Jonathan Duke]

Did I not read on here that 3 had introduced some policy on mifi that the main use of the data had to be in the UK and it was no more than 30 days in europe? Did the roaming change also come in for data?

Or did I dream it?

I read that on here somewhere too also.... I haven't had any issues to-date with mine however, I do use my MIFI on-occassion in the UK also, so I don't keep it solely for roaming usage - Which I think causes the issue with Three's T&Cs.

It's all still a bit of a mine-field.... Even with the new EU rules, from June this year.

It looks like the carriers, aren't too happy with the new rules.... And are being a bit more "inventive" with their T&Cs since they were implemented.

quelle surprise!