What is a VODAFONE PAY AS YOU GO 3G BROADBAND SIM CARD ?

ianonline

I've been looking at this item on Ebay but I'm not sure what it does over and above any other PAYG simcard:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=250507091365

THESE VODAFONE PAY AS YOU 3G BROADBAND SIM CARDS ARE HARD TO FIND. PEOPLE ON EBAY ARE SELLING 3G VODAFONE SIM CARD BUT THEY ARE NOT VODAFONE PAY AS YOU TALK HSDPA/3G BROADBAND SIM CARDS.
THE CARPHONE WARHOUSE ARE SELLING 3G BROADBAND SIM CARDS FOR £19.99 AND VODAFONE SHOPS FOR £29.95 WITH NO CREDIT, ON VODAFONE WEBSITE YOU CAN ONLY GET NORMAL SIM CARDS 2G FOR £2 BUT THEY ARE NOT 3G OR 3G BROADBAND

However, according to Vodafone:

any Vodafone SIM card can be used in a 3G phone and streaming should work with them all

http://help.vodafone.co.uk/system/selfservice.controller?CMD=VIEW_ARTICLE&ARTICLE_ID=2764&PARTITION_ID=1&CONFIGURATION=1000&CURRENT_CMD=SEARCH&PAGE_TITLE=&SIDE_LINK_TOPIC_ID=&SIDE_LINK_SUB_TOPIC_ID=&SIDE_LINK_TOPIC_INDEX=null&SIDE_LINK_SUB_TOPIC_INDEX=null#t=2
by which I take to mean so long as you have a 3G phone and 3G coverage, then you can connect to the 3G network for video calling and web browsing at 3G speeds using any Vodafone sim.

Looking at the ebay listing above, the info they've quoted looks to be somewhat outdated:

DURING OCTOBER 2007, VODAFONE WILL BE UPGRADING OUR MOBILE BROADBAND NETWORK TO SUPPORT DOWNLOAD SPEEDS UP TO 7.2MBPS.....

so maybe things have changed since then, but can anyone "in the know" confirm, are there two different types of simcards for 2G (2.5G?) and 3G .... or are all Vodafone simcards capable of supporting 3G? - I suspect it may be a case of "yes and no" - ie there USED to be two different types, but all "recent" simcards (issued within the past couple of years?) are 3G capable - can anyone confirm this to be the case?

CLLC

Hi ianonline ,

the sim card on ebay you linked to is a sim card for Vodafone's Mobile broadband via a Dongle

For example , people with Netbooks sometimes have a slot to put a sim card in for mobile broadband. So they have to buy a sim right? Well Vodafone don;t sell these PAYG Broadband sims seperately , you have to buy a modem with it for like £30. What a waste , you have to buy the modem simply for the sim card.

So this seller is basically selling the Sim card only. So........ to sum it up this is a PAYG mobile Broadband SIM card which is specific to data / Mobile Broadband compared to your average sim specific to call's etc.

Does this answer your question?

CLLC

ianonline

Yeah, thanks CLLC.
I must admit I do struggle to keep up with developments in mobile data methods. I remember the first time I bought a phone with GPRS and thinking how that was a massive step up over the old dial-up wap access (which it was!). Nowadays, it's EDGE, HSDPA, 3G+, 3.5G ........

The only thing that got me thinking is that I've just bought my first 3G phone (PAYG) but I've put my old sim in it. Then it occurred to me that my old sim might not be 3G capable which is why I checked the Vodafone site (which confirmed that "any Vodafone SIM card can be used in a 3G phone and streaming should work with them all").

As it turns out, it's fairly irrelevant as far I'm concerned as the 3G signal is pretty much non-existent where I live. When the 3G signal is present it's just 1 bar, then it just constantly drops out all together - so now I've just switched off the 3G !!!!!