I have recently moved house and don't have a landline (and am not planning on getting one).

My best option to get internet seems to be a dongle but as I am in quite a rural location, we do sometimes struggle for reception on our mobiles. Would there be any way for a company to check that I would be able to get a connection before I signed up?

I've never used a dongle so any advice would be appreciated!!

Contact them and ask. I have to say,I use a dongle for my netbook when out and about and it's terrible. I can send and receive e-mails but hardly ever visit websites, it just will not connect. :(

Hi,

I have just moved from a rural area and also had the Dongle...3 was the so called best coverage for my area and it was a complete waste of time, got it from pc world who i gave my post code too and they checked it, said the coverage was the best so i got a 3 month one...thank goodness i didn't sign for a year as was terrible, certain rooms it would be slightly ok although the internet was very slow and kept crashing, i dare not move the laptop an inch whilt using it or would lose the signal, other rooms it just wouldn't work at all...i have tried vodaphone too and still rubbish, moved to Brighton and still had the same problems....i personally wouldn't waste your money or find out if a neighbour uses one and see if it works for them.

Good luck 

I just set up my mother in law's dongle she's on vodafone for it.  It is really slow and the guy in the shop advised her not to get it.  He said they are at their best in a 3G area.

To give you an idea, a google search on hers takes around 25-28 seconds, constantly times out as well.

HTH & Good Luck x

We use a Vodafone 'dongle'. There is no broadband here and it was quite a culture shock after we had Virgin cable broadband in our old house :) It is useable when you have no other option :) :) Yes - it can be slow and sometimes times out, however I manage to shop online, do my internet banking, come on here etc. The main downside is you can't use high demand things such as iPlayer etc and send good quality photos etc. Youtube is a definite no-no :)

My neighbour tried a BT dial-up connection and it was worse :)

Daisy

I got a dongle recently when we lost out broadband connection and the supplier wasn't interested in sorting it out, yes we moved to another ISP.
I went into Carphone Warehouse, they checked the coverage and I have T-mobile pay as you go, got the first month for £2 and have to say it is pretty good. I've used iplayer on it and Youtube with no problems once it had the over 18 lock removed, which was dead easy.
If I li ved on my own and only needed internet connection for myself it is definately the way I would go.

It's T-mobile I have and I can only get onto CD with it when not at home, but it takes 5 ot 6 attempts. Other sites with more graphics are impossible.

We only get the GPRS signal here - not the broadband. Vodafone is supposed to be the best mobile broadband connection :) :) :) Only cities/large towns have the broadband, I think :)

Daisy

strange that, I live out in the country !  No problem getting on here with it, get 4meg download which is almost as fast as the normal broadband max of 6meg

As i dont have a mobile phone and am only on dial up computer, i didnt know what a 'dongle' was ( still not sure though i did look it up), i thought it was a poo that gets caught up with the doggies fur.:)

> i thought it was a poo that gets caught up with the doggies fur.:-)

I thought only boys had them !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have a dongle use it all the time and it's really fast and have no problems at all with it. It is also 3.  When it does go off, which is rare, just have to take the card out and put it straight back in and it's fine.  Do have to wait just a few minutes after the computer has come on but after that it's fine.

i thought it was a poo that gets caught up with the doggies fur

LMAO - That is something that I would call a clinker!!!

I think I might try one - If I only sign up for one of those 3 month ones I suppose it doesn't really matter if it's not very good.

I looked on PC World website last night and there seems to be a new version of wireless broadband which works similar to a dongle although you don't actually have to plug it into the computer. They cost a bit more to by the actual box but then you can do pay as you go or pay montly.

I suppose I will have to go into PC World and ask their advise - although I find that people in electrical shops are most unhelpful. :(

>I suppose I will have to go into PC World and ask their advise - although I find that people in electrical shops are most unhelpful.

Try a small computer shop, by their very nature they are usually more 'expert' than staff in the big chains.  Although I found an amazing guy in Comet when I bought a netbook for my Mum - he was a perfect 'nerd', in the nicest way, and gave me great advice.  Mind you, he hadn't got that information from staff training - he was just a keen user!

We have a Vodafone dongle for occassional travel use and it's ok when you have nothing else.  We just have to reconcile ourselves to the fact that everything is a bit slower (a lot slower) than usual.

I bought mine from Tesco, was about £20 and had one months free usage.

We use them for out and about on sites no problems they cost approx £15 a month, seem fine to me or use a notebook computer with a sim card in it, that works as well but costs more.

My partner actually has 2 now! He works all over the UK including Wales and Scotland so when he first took the job he went and got himself one on a rolling monthly contract, he just has to give 30 days notice to stop it. That one is on 3 network because in the carphone warehouse when we looked on the map 3 had the best overall coverage over the UK. When he started the job they gave him a BT dongle which he also uses occasionally but he has kept the 3 one on because he has found in the majority of places that one works the best, I know there is the odd place the BT one works faster but these are very minimal. He uses them alot in hotel rooms and always manages to do anything he needs for work as well as Facebooking and emailing me and even manages chat on Facebook! I don't think it is as fast as the internet at home but he pays alot less a month than we do at home and we have the fastest speed we can at home, but it is perfectly adequate for both his work and surfing the net.