Vodafone Vs O2 (GPRS)

str8_away

Does anyone know which is better on providing GPRS?
Which prvides better GPRS coverage over WHOLE Ireland?

Can anyone got GPRS reply, if their network provide GPRS everywhere their go?

Thanks

Ro-76

I'm on O2 GPRS, which seems to work well. I can get GPRS everywhere I can get a signal, and when roaming on an O2 network also.

I have noticed that in remote areas the speed seems to be faster. I wonder if it is because of extra "slack" on the network outside of the larger urban centres.

I did have a couple of problems setting it up, but It works well now.

Ro

sirlinux

GPRS works just fine for me on vodafone, anywhere, however i find HSCSD much faster and better (not to mention cheaper) get on a plan with plenty of minutes and i think it's better, i find VPN'ing much better with it, GPRS seems to slow down a lot on busy cells.

Ro-76

Originally posted by sirlinux
GPRS works just fine for me on vodafone, anywhere, however i find HSCSD much faster and better (not to mention cheaper) get on a plan with plenty of minutes and i think it's better, i find VPN'ing much better with it, GPRS seems to slow down a lot on busy cells.

I would like the option of HSCSD also, but unfortunately O2 do not offer it. It would be a major benefit.

I do, however, find that I rarely exceed my 1MB limit on my GPRS per month. This is mainly because I really only use it for email/wap/internet on a PDA, or the phone itself, and I download the email headers first. If I do use it with my laptop for internet access, I use Opera and have images disabled.

I have also noticed it quite slow in busy cells.

Ro

flywheel

main difference is PRICE on post-pay bill accounts with Vodafone being a multiple of the cost of O2 charges

first questions i'd ask are:what device(s) you would be using, if you are on a contract or pre-pay and what you wanted to use a data connection for...

reception has been fine for both around Dublin City - (was taken back at the coverage on the DART though with both dropping in and out in places (more Voda than O2)) - i don't travel much around the country so can't give any regional forcasts - where would you be planning on using it?

HSCSD always seems to pop into any threads on GPRS - only applicable to Voda customers, it really depends what you want to use the connection for, if a per second or per kilobyte charge is better for the applications you will use - this thread may be of some interest....

Note: Vodafone have since updated their GPRS tariffs for post-pay consumer GPRS more info in this thread...

so for consumer GPRS currently O2 win hands down on contract accounts as they offer a range of inclusive packages from 1 up to 50 MB - for Voda on a contract currently only offer 1MB package (or 5MB for Sharetime) for GPRS so you'd need to stick to WAP and extremely light Smartphone/PDA use for email and browsing Moble Friendly sites - Voda also charge a minimum 10KB per connection - there was a sentence in a recent ENN article about Vodafone coming out with new GPRS tariffs (about time!!) but nothing since...

on pre-pay GPRS there isn't much in it on cost - apart from O2 offering full WEB access (although some peole here have had trouble getting it set-up when they call ) - last time I checked Voda still only offerd WAP access for pre-pay

HTH,
BrianG

updated for info on new Vodafone GPRS tariffs

Ro-76

Originally posted by DubWireless
Voda also charge a minimum 10KB per connection

That's interesting. I've got my phone setup to check my email every 2 hours. This shows up on my bill as hundreds of 1kb connections, whereas on VodaFone, it would use 10 times as much of my data allocation.

Ro

.

flywheel

yeah - bit of a nasty one alright - especially when the 1MB package is the main one they have for consumers at the moment - it can sure eat into that quickly enough

when there are no new mails and the number of emails on the server is low - it is usually only only a low no. of KB for each headers check - grad if you can keep a connection going - but I can't configure that for mail (header) check on the T68i - also different devices / locations have a vairying degree of success maintining a long-term connection

i only do mail and web GPRS on O2, and limit Voda GPRS for WAP or a rare e-mail check

although, the worst kind of GPRS tariff I've seen, not from the operators here (yet!), is an additional per hour charge while connected to GPRS :rolleyes:

BrianG

tribble

Voda - 2c per k
O2 - 3c per k
on prepay - or am i missing somthing?

tribble

flywheel

tribble wrote:
Voda - 2c per k, O2 - 3c per k, on prepay - or am i missing somthing?

nope - for pre-pay that's spot on for price (noting the min 10KB charge per connection for Voda

iwb

I talked to a guy at the Vodafone stand at the ICT Expo yesterday and they have just introduced their mobile data package or whatever its called. It is priced at E2 per MB of data for the first 20 or so and E1.50 for the next 10 and so on. You buy a PC Card modem and slot it into your iPaq or Laptop. The card costs about E200. I cursed them for not having an unlimited usage package and they understood but said it is early days yet and they might come out with one depending on how this is taken up.
I don't understand the way this mobile crap works at all but the tarriffs mentioned above are on the data package only. You can get this pricing on a voice SIM.

The Corinthian

I've personally found GSM to be cheaper than GPRS for data transfer in many cases.

Prices will remain high in Ireland. Ultimately, it's happy days on the ARPU stakes here (ref. this months BisPlus magazine).

It's what we call a duopoly.

flywheel

Originally posted by iwb
I talked to a guy at the Vodafone stand at the ICT Expo yesterday and they have just introduced their mobile data package or whatever its called. It is priced at E2 per MB of data for the first 20 or so and E1.50 for the next 10 and so on. You buy a PC Card modem and slot it into your iPaq or Laptop. The card costs about E200. I cursed them for not having an unlimited usage package and they understood but said it is early days yet and they might come out with one depending on how this is taken up.
I don't understand the way this mobile crap works at all but the tarriffs mentioned above are on the data package only. You can get this pricing on a voice SIM.

thanks for the info - is that for all customers (including personal) or business only?

did you see / they mention who manufactured the card (heard someone who was at the ITC say it was the Option Globetrotter)?

they did have a GPRS 5 and GPRS 20 offering for business customers when they launched GPRS last year, but left personal customers with the "choice" of pay as you use or a 1MB package (they just updated that to 3MB on their site)

BrianG

iwb

Brian,
Sorry but I can't answer either question. I didn't see the card as it was in a laptop there. I was talking to them as a personal rather than business user so they should have mentioned that it wasn't for personal if that was the case, but I can't be sure they would've done that.
I will be talking to them again soon and will ask.