Vodafone vs Vodafone Basics vs ASDA/TalkMobile

blizeH

Hi, I was with TalkMobile for a while and they were fantastic, but in the town we now live, at busy times my internet just didn’t work - I could have 3 or full bars of 4G and not be able to load even a simple website. My wife is still on ASDA mobile and has the exact same problem.

They’re both on the Vodafone network and I’ve been told that generally when you go with the cheaper subnetworks that they have less priority on the main network and that’s what could be causing this - I’ve since tried both iD Mobile & Virgin Mobile and both have been very problematic.

I don’t use that much data and don’t need 5G (our phones don’t even support it) so I’m considering Vodafone basics, but I’m wondering will I run into the same problems? Thanks

sully1311

I don't believe Vodafone do this to their MVNOs so you'll have the same issue with Vodafone. 

Neil_Jones

All the smaller providers do is buy bandwidth from the company they piggy back onto; it shouldn't affect the network speed.  If you can get decent signal/speed on Vodafone (for example) then anybody who piggybacks onto Vodafone should as a general rule get the same speeds.

Virgin is a hybrid of piggyback to Vodafone and EE with view to migrating everybody to o2, and iD Mobile piggybacks on Three, while Asda jumps on EE.

Its plausible you're in an area with only one decent signal or decent signal where you are, and you've only mentioned three of the four networks.  Get an o2 SIM and see how it goes.

Note that providers don't guarantee indoor coverage, so if you have problems indoors you'd do better to connect to Wi-Fi.

sully1311

Neil_Jones said:

All the smaller providers do is buy bandwidth from the company they piggy back onto; it shouldn't affect the network speed.  If you can get decent signal/speed on Vodafone (for example) then anybody who piggybacks onto Vodafone should as a general rule get the same speeds.

Virgin is a hybrid of piggyback to Vodafone and EE with view to migrating everybody to o2, and iD Mobile piggybacks on Three, while Asda jumps on EE.

Its plausible you're in an area with only one decent signal or decent signal where you are, and you've only mentioned three of the four networks.  Get an o2 SIM and see how it goes.

Note that providers don't guarantee indoor coverage, so if you have problems indoors you'd do better to connect to Wi-Fi.

Asda Mobile use Vodafone now and I believe the Virgin > O2 migration is complete. 

blizeH

Thanks guys, good to know that Vodafone itself likely won't be any better than TalkMobile - the latter has such good support!

And yup, I think you're right sully - the only one I haven't tried now is EE. I don't have BT Broadband and Wi-Fi calling is an absolute must so guess I'm looking at going with EE themselves sadly - just checked their website and it's £15p/m for 1GB

flaneurs_lobster

blizeH said:

Thanks guys, good to know that Vodafone itself likely won't be any better than TalkMobile - the latter has such good support!

And yup, I think you're right sully - the only one I haven't tried now is EE. I don't have BT Broadband and Wi-Fi calling is an absolute must so guess I'm looking at going with EE themselves sadly - just checked their website and it's £15p/m for 1GB

Wi-fi calling available on PAYG 1pMobile (uses EE). Might be OK pricewise if you are a low data user, needs minimum top-up of £10 every 120 days.

blizeH

flaneurs_lobster said:

blizeH said:

Thanks guys, good to know that Vodafone itself likely won't be any better than TalkMobile - the latter has such good support!

And yup, I think you're right sully - the only one I haven't tried now is EE. I don't have BT Broadband and Wi-Fi calling is an absolute must so guess I'm looking at going with EE themselves sadly - just checked their website and it's £15p/m for 1GB

Wi-fi calling available on PAYG 1pMobile (uses EE). Might be OK pricewise if you are a low data user, needs minimum top-up of £10 every 120 days.

Thanks! Might try their £10 per month for 10GB package