T-Mobile have announced price reductions in their SMS and data costs whilst roaming. SMSes will now cost 25p (instead of 40p), and data will now “only” cost £1.50 per MB (down from £7.50 per MB). Whilst we support these price reductions, we don’t think they go far enough to encourage people to use these services completely (when 3 will give you Mobile Broadband in the UK for £10 for 1GB, it puts into question these data roaming charges). For calls, we recommend you look at MaxRoam, but until they support data, you may still be better just leaving the phone switched off.

These price changes should take effect from next month, according to SMS Text News, but we would recommend you check with T-Mobile if you are going to rely upon the price to use the service abroad.

According to a short article over at SMS Text News, it appears the EC Commissioner, Viviane Reding, has given all European mobile phone network operators two weeks in which to reduce their roaming SMS and data charges, or face regulation. Of course, if history repeats itself, the operators will huff and puff, reduce their rates a little and regulation will still be introduced to ensure the rates fall further. As a consumer, the price drops can only be a good thing; as an occasional traveller, I normally leave my phone switched off whilst abroad to minimise the cost; if the operators get these price reductions down far enough, many people will be more inclined to use their phones abroad, which of course will increase revenue even further. 3 are already pioneers in this field by offering “3 like home” on their own foreign networks, but they don’t have networks everywhere people travel to.

Of course, whether or not the operators reduce their rates in time for this Summer is also up for debate, but at least we should see rates start to drop at some point.

Just a quick reminder, the £20 per month Mix & Match 1100 offer finishes this weekend for many phones, so if you’ve been thinking about getting this deal, now could be your last chance.  Head over to the 3 Store now to purchase it.

The offer will continue on a limited number of handsets for a little longer (remaining an online exclusive deal too), although we may see other offers in due course.  We’ve already heard about a likely drop in the additional monthly cost applied to the N95 8Gb, although if you are in the market for one of these phones, it will no longer be offered on the Mix & Match 1100 special offer after Sunday, so you may find buying it now results in a better value deal.

It appears at the last minute, 3 have decided to extend the half price Mobile Broadband offer for existing customers until the end of June, so you can still head off to the 3 Store for this offer.

If you’ve been to the 3 Store recently, you will have seen the Mix and Match 1100 tariff on special offer; £20 per month (a 25% saving). There’s been a few comments on the internet about the fact that this offer is about to end (in fact, we were notified by 3 it was due to finish on Saturday). 3 have now confirmed to us that this offer is still currently on, and will remain, but will only be offered online.

However, we understand that the half price mobile broadband for existing customers deal is due to end this Saturday, so if you fancy that, head off to the 3 Store quickly and sign up.

Update: The £20 M&M1100 offer will only continue for a few more days, finishing at the end of next week.  However, 3 are looking at creating some online special offers moving forward.

We first covered the LG Secret after it’s launch, and have been using one ever since. However, if you want your own Secret, it’s now available;

• on Vodafone, and if you spend more than £35 per month (for 18 months; or £40 per month for a 12 month contract), you should find the phone is free too.
• on O2, spending £35 per month for 18 months, £30 for 24 months, or £40 for 12 months will get the phone for free.
• on Orange, although you won’t get the phone for free on any tariff.

We’ve been generally impressed with the phone, although it’s not in the same league as an N95 or an iPhone. We understand it should be available on 3 and T-Mobile soon, although neither are listing the phone on their websites today.

It appears there have been a couple of surveys in the last few weeks where people have been asked about mobile phone calls on aeroplanes. Overall, both surveys showed most people are not keen on the idea of “I’M ON THE PHONE” calls taking place in the, air, but generally, those same people support the idea of instant messaging and data access. The Yahoo survey in the UK reported the following numbers:

• 87% of people would like voice calls banned
• 38% would like SMS support (of course, that means 62% don’t want that either)
• 28% would like data support (whether 72% want it banned, or just wouldn’t use it isn’t clear)

In other parts of the same survey, 49% said email would be useful (I’m not sure how the 21% who don’t want data are going to get their email!), and 14% said they would like to check the weather.

Equally, a US survey by Harris Interactive (but still commissioned by Yahoo it would seem) came up with similar results:

• three quarters said cellphone support should be limited to “non-talking” features
• 69% said if calls were allowed, there should be a “talking area” on the phone, ie you only disturb other people on the phone, and not the person in the seat next to you

Of course, it’s only in the last year that the network operators have realised they can make real money from data services priced at sensible levels, so whether the airlines listen to surveys like these, or just plough ahead with voice only services at very high roaming rates remain to be seen. Another point to note; we don’t think the survey included price within the question; consider these two questions:

• Would you like to check the weather and receive your email on your phone whilst in the air, for a flat fee of £1 for the whole journey?
• Would you like to check the weather and receive your email on your phone whilst in the air, paying a ridiculous £10 per Mb? (which isn’t far off Orange’s old UK rate of course)

We suspect people will want the first scenario, and the airlines will want the second scenario…

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SMS Text News have reported that Orange is dropping it’s data rates, from around £8 per Mb to £3 per Mb (£4 per Mb for PAYG).  So, if you download 3Mb of data, you will have spent £9, whereas for another £1 you could have download 1Gb from 3.  Hmm.

It appears Vodafone have taken 3’s concerns (and complaint to the Advertising Standards Agency) seriously, and are revising their claims for the Mobile Broadband service. Having claimed users could get 7.2mbps, 3 have pointed out that the real maximum is more like 6.69mbps, and even that figure is not always obtainable. Vodafone will now, instead, concentrate on tasks like “Downloading music videos” as they shift the advertising more towards a consumer bias.  To compare, 3 state you are likely to get 2.8mbps on their network, although they plan to increase this in June.

It appears a recent Vista security update is causing problems with USB Mobile Broadband devices, including the 3 Modem Stick.  It appears that the update causes Vista PCs to power down the dongle, even though it’s connected and data is flowing.  Shane from SOS has come up with an interesting solution, which he has released on his blog.  Basically it’s a batch file which runs a directory listing of the disk section of the USB device every 5 minutes to ensure it’s kept active.  Hopefully, a proper fix will be released by Microsoft soon; given O2, Vodafone and 3 are all in talks with Vodafone, it hopefully won’t be too long.

Story courtesy of 3mobilebuzz.

Vodafone are rolling out HSDPA to more cities. After covering London last year, they are in the process of extending this to also cover Birmingham, Bristol, Glasgow, Liverpool, Manchester, and Reading. In these areas, the theoretical maximum speeds are 7.2mbps download and 1.8mbps upload. Although, of course, 3 recently challenged mobile network operators to concentrate of actual performance, and not headline rates.

Whether it’s the phone itself, the innovative pricing, or the promotion of the device and the abilities it has, but according to an mobile device survey by Admob, the 3 SkypePhone is now the number 5 mobile internet device in the UK, based on the number of adverts served to mobile devices. The top 10 are:

• Sony Ericsson K800i
• Nokia N95
• Sony Ericsson W810i
• Sony Ericsson K610i
• 3 SkypePhone
• Nokia N73
• Sony Ericsson W850i
• ZTE F866
• Nokia 6120c
• Nokia 6300

It’s also interesting to note the ZTE (a USB modem) is in there too, and mainly only on 3 UK in the survey too. The 3 SkypePhone came straight into this survey in 5th place, with 2.7% of the market (by ads served). No wonder 3’s data usage has increased by so much.

Although nothing is firm, 3 mentioned today at a briefing, that they are looking at providing a home router with a 3G modem built in, to allow people to connect their whole network via 3G, instead of just a single laptop or desktop via a USB dongle. 3 also said they will expect sales of dongles to drop as more laptops come with HSDPA built in over the next few months. Of course, they’ll still make their money from the contract, and won’t need to provide hardware, so it will be interesting to see whether they offer a SIM-only data deal, and what pricing they offer.

Finally, they also talked about speed of 3G connections, and whether companies are over-selling their services. Mainly aimed at Vodafone, 3 are claiming customers should be more worried about signal strength and the impact of other traffic, and not just the headline connection rate. To help counter this, 3 are planning to increase the number of mast sites from 7,500 to 9,000 by 2009 as part of their mast sharing deal with T-Mobile. This will also help increase population coverage from 90% to 98%, which will also help.

Scrolling around the 3 intranet the other day, we noticed that 3 offer a 7 day unlimited trial to Spinvox. Spinvox offer a voice to text service, so your voicemails are provided as SMS. You simply divert your phone to Spinvox, instead of the more usual 3 voicemail option. Once the trial is over, you move onto their chargeable, but low rate, service; although there is a limit to the number of messages you get before incurring more charges. What 3 fail to mention is whether the cost of the call diversion is chargeable or not, and we believe it is, which we feel 3 should state.

To signup, simply use Planet 3; if you can’t find it, head to Services, A-Z, and then select Spinvox.

Spinvox should work with any UK mobile, although for other networks you’ll need to sign up at Spinvox.

T-Mobile now offers it’s USB Modem on PAYG for £99.99 with a £4 per day offering. It’s advertised as unlimited, but it’s Web’n'Walk Plus, which doesn’t offer all services (VOIP is not allowed on this tariff, for example), and compared to 3’s £10 for the whole month doesn’t sound such good value if you would use it more than twice a month. Also, we could not find out whether T-Mobile actually meant unlimited, or had a fair usage policy on this service.

So, O2, T-Mobile, 3, and Vodafone all openly promote good data deals (although some of them could do with keeping their web sites up to dates with their latest deals and T&Cs), Orange stand out as only promoting their pay monthly service, and not a PAYG service.

According to an article by Fresh Plastic, the 3 SkypePhone is now available at both Woolworths and Sainsburys at just £39.99 on PAYG. Even better value, this includes a £10 TopUp credit, reducing the real cost. We’ve been a fan of the 3 SkypePhone since launch, and since then 3 have made a small, but significant change to Internet Access. For 50p a day, £2.50 a week, or £5 a month you have always been able to access the Internet direct from the phone, but for the last few months, 3 have opened up a new option for customers; Mobile Broadband.

Mobile Broadband costs £10 per month, but importantly allows you (under the T&Cs) to connect your PC through the 3 SkypePhone to access the internet. Technically, the cheaper Internet Access is limited to direct access from the mobile itself, and this limitation is removed for the Mobile Broadband option. Now, some people question whether this is worth the extra £5, given the fact that the same £10 also buys you 30 days credit for a PAYG USB Modem too. Well, remember that it also gives you free Skype access on the 3 SkypePhone, and with the ability to configure the phone to provide the PC access via Bluetooth, then you can have the same access without anything attached to a Bluetooth capable laptop. For many, this Skype access makes the 3 SkypePhone better value. Even if you only topup with £10 per month, and use this all for mobile data (ie you don’t use it for phone calls) the device will feel useful because of the Skype access. Of course, looking at the other point of view, the 3 USB Modem will get higher data speeds, so that may be a deciding factor for that option instead.

Price drop story courtesy Fresh Plastic [Via 3mobilebuzz]

Although we first announced it a couple of weeks ago, today 3 finally reduce the price of the ZTE and Huawei E220 USB Modems to £49.99. The new USB Modem Stick (E169) remains at a higher price though. Go and buy your PAYG USB Modem here.

If you want to use your 3 USB Dongle on an Asus Eee PC, then head over to Dale Lane’s blog where he has written up exactly the steps required to get it working on the little device. It all revolves around the dongle being a composite device, presenting both a CD-ROM image (to load the Windows / Mac drivers) and also being the modem itself. The main extra utility you need for the Eee is a USB Switcher application, which allows you to choose which part of the device is available to the OS.

[Via 3mobilebuzz]

After the launch of the Skype Mobile Beta last week, Darla Mack has given the software a thorough review, which can be read here. As Darla is in the US, the prices are all US prices, but you’ll still get a good feel for the application. Of course, you may decide a 3 SkypePhone is a better option, and certainly offers a cheaper way of bringing Skype to a mobile phone.

After a long wait, Skype have released a beta version of their mobile client. This is a Java app, which gives them a good range of compatibility across many handsets, but does not provide an integrated solution for Symbian or Windows Mobile users that many would like. Also, although it uses the internet data connection for presence and IM messaging, it makes a traditional phone call to connect into the Skype infrastructure to get VOIP connectivity, so there is still a real cost to these calls (if only that they will come out of your inclusive minutes). Skype even advertise it as “no WiFi needed”, but fail to mention that it really can’t take true advantage of a WiFi connection, even if you have one. Overall, Skype themselves hint that the 3 SkypePhone might be a better solution for many, and right now, I think I agree.

More details direct from Skype.