Orange 500mb Data and HTC Desire

mwille14

I have just got this phone on Dolphin £25 p/m which includes 500mb data.

Please can someone give me a definitive answer as to if 500mb is not enough. The small print says that anything over will be charged at £1 per MB. That is extremely worrying to me especially as I am on a 24 month contract. I still have a week cooling off period so could send it back.

Obviously getting the Desire would mean that i would frequently like to be online and i am not always going to have access to WiFi. I have read a few threads and i understand i can also limit data use by using Opera, not having the phone contantly syncing, and not download apps through 3G.

I just want to know if this plan is feasible with the Desire without having its potential held back by the data bundle.

Jon_01

Depends on what you intend doing with the phone?

If you're streaming video, you'll blow it in a day.

If you're doing the odd bit of surfing and checking your emails 2 or 3 times a day, it's loads.

You might want to get a good app killer from the market place. Some of the built in app's are running all the time (like the weather on the home screen) and using data when you don't realise. Killing them not only lowers your data usage but gives you longer battery life as well.

mwille14

I intend for light internet (1-2 hrs a day) on the move. I don't intend to stream videos or listen to radio through 3G (stick to WiFi for that).

Occasionally i may want to look at a map. I don't want widgets for weather updating every 5 mins but am happy to update manually when i need them.

Jon_01

Sounds like you shouldn't have any problems.

Get a data monitor from the market place and check your usage for a few days to put your mind at rest. . .

ruggedtoast

mwille14 wrote: »

I have just got this phone on Dolphin £25 p/m which includes 500mb data.

Please can someone give me a definitive answer as to if 500mb is not enough. The small print says that anything over will be charged at £1 per MB. That is extremely worrying to me especially as I am on a 24 month contract. I still have a week cooling off period so could send it back.

Obviously getting the Desire would mean that i would frequently like to be online and i am not always going to have access to WiFi. I have read a few threads and i understand i can also limit data use by using Opera, not having the phone contantly syncing, and not download apps through 3G.

I just want to know if this plan is feasible with the Desire without having its potential held back by the data bundle.

Contact Orange immediately and insist they move you up to the Panther bundle which has 500mb with a fair use policy.

If they refuse then send the phone back.

500mb is not a lot of data for the Desire. Unless you disable syncing entirely it will be polling data from a range of apps and updates itself, regardless of your web usage, which can be 2 mb or more for a webpage.

The Desire can easily use 2 megs an hour or more just sitting in your bag. In addition some apps grab your connection and start bleeding data without you knowing. 3G watchdog will alert you to high usage but it wont be able to shut your data connection off, or immediately locate the offending app.

£1 a meg is outrageous on such a small limit, and the main reason I didnt want to upgrade with Orange.

Think about it. Someone could pick your phone up, decide to spend an hour mucking about on Youtube (3 megabytes a minute) and thats cost you £180.

Edit - You can forget about Googe maps as well. Firing it up uses 500k, and the same again for each shift in the map. i.e. if you're using maps in a car you can burn through data in no time.

Seriously, dont even think about staying on that tariff.

A pound a meg... Jesus wept...

Notsram

I agree with ruggedtoast. 500MB is not enough. I've not got a Desire, I've got an Xperia and I use mine for a heck of a lot less than 2 hours a day. I've tried to limit my usage this month (due to Vodafone being a bunch of ripoff merchants, but that's another story), but I've still used just over 800MB. And that's with general surfing, App updates etc. no visits to youtube or listening to streaming music and the like.

If they're going to charge you £1 per MB over 500, you're looking at quite a hefty bill unless you use the phone to a bare mimimum, disable updates/polling etc. Which kind of defeats the point of having a phone that's capable of proper internet use, really...

lozzaman

You could get away with 500MB but it means not using the phone to the potential. Web browsing on it is truly delightful. I would therefore be looking for a 1GB minimum unless you are planning to spend most your time in a WiFi area (in the office and at home for example)

T-Mobile (and Giffgaff) seems to be the only data friendly network these days.

Dreamnine

I could use that much data in an afternoon/evening really.

marcowil

I've had the Desire for two months now and havent gone over 500mb yet. I have 3 email accounts syncing every 2 hours though check it manually myself more often than that. Weather syncing every 3 hours (can look outside after all) and i surf the net on my favourite websites throughout the day, including Facebook and Flickr.
Once at home its connected to wi-fi so doesnt use the data connection at all.
I used the maps recently to find 2 locations and found it used hardly any data.
Admittedly I dont use youtube very often (even at home) but I think for most peoples daily usage 500mb is fine.

maxtweenie

Dreamnine wrote: »

I could use that much data in an afternoon/evening really.

Doing what? I'm 20 days into my monthly 3gb allowance, and I've used 337mb. I'm always surfing the net on mine, but if I download apps or watch youtube, I tend to use my wifi.

mwille14

I am a bit worried now. I bought it through e2save so am not sure if can change the deal. I can send back for cancellation without any charge as have not used anything yet.

The Orange says this:

Anytime Monthly Browsing taken at point of contract £5 per Month 500MB anytime Out of bundle cost £1 per MB



Anyone have any experience of getting e2save to change the deal?