Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Working on water :)

Hi All,

I've no idea how many people actually read this blog, maybe it's just my mum.. infact, maybe she doesn't read it?! Anyway, for those of you who have read it, thank you, and do leave some comments so I know your out there :)

As you will have seen from my previous post Sirius was broken into, since then I have tried to spend more time on Sirius, the problem is, as I work in IT I have a constant requirement to be online, so I needed a solution!

I have previously used various GSM and GRPS data cards and to be honest, none of them were really very usable compared to sitting at home connected to a broadband connection. This time around, my house mate Nick offered to lend me his Vodafone 3G data card, wow! What a difference! It was almost as good as being connected to a broadband connection and perfectly acceptable for working on Sirius, finally technology has caught up and floating working could become a reality :)

I was so impressed that the following week I signed up and bought one of the Vodafone 3G data cards. For those of your interested, I bought a Express Card version as they are Quad Band ( i.e. work pretty much in every country including USA ) and they support the full 7.2mb current maximum speed, where as some of the USB modem versions do not support the full speed.

If you are interested in getting one, go onto the Vodafone business site as they are not available in the consumer area. The costs FREE card and £15 / month for 24 months gets you 3GB of data per month. So far I have used about 100MB in 1.5 weeks, so it doesn't look like the 3GB limit will ever be a problem!

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

We're using USB dongles from Vodafone and MobileOne here for various things. They're brilliant.

Anonymous said...

Hi Chris,
You mentioned about not being sure how many folks read your blog, well I do via RSS feed - so hello!I think I must've seen a link to it on someone else's. I'm not too sure how many folks read mine either, but I know my mum does!
I'm in IT too, & I opted for the T-Mobile 2 year deal - £15 per month, uses HSDPA too. No download limit either - V impressed.

Anonymous said...

Hi Chris
I was just wondering if you could help me out with some information about moving my life to a narrow boat? I am looking to move my business to the boat and was wondering if you knew the way rates etc are worked out and if there were any particular difficulties I may come across doing this?
Thanks for the vodafone broadband tip, that was one of the big issues I have been pondering over

Unknown said...

Hi Will, I'm glad you found the blog post useful. I am still very happy with my Vodafone card.

As I don't live full time on Sirius, I have no idea about the legalities of running a business from your boat.

I do know however that the Gold licenses are getting very expensive! Sirius is a 70' boat and this year the license was over £1k, and, unfortunately they are going up 15% every year for 5 years in a row. ( If I remember correctly.. )

Unknown said...

hi chris, nice blog :-)

I am, like one of the other commenters and you, into IT (well... Web consulting ...(!)) and am hopefully moving onto my first boat "bryter layter" at the weekend. I look forward to tracking down a mate with a vofaphone card, but don't hold out much luck of being able to connect at any great speed due to being moored in some of the most remote, east Anglian fen waterways!

I look forward to reading your blog (and telling my mum about it.... And dad... Do possibly 3 new readers for you...!) so keep posting... And maybe speak to u again soon (connection willing!) :-)

Would u mind tell me what the best and worst things are about your boat?! I'm trying to be prepared!

More Than My Genes said...

Now I know how you found my blog - Liz is my buddy! Howdy Liz..hows life on the Norfolk broads?? :P

Unknown said...

Ohh.. I was confused then :) I thought that was Liz's blog! So Cornwall? That sounds like a nice place to live. I went to Uni down in Plymouth and love going down to the Scilly Isles :)