Just how good is Everything Everywhere’s 4G service? Very good.
With just two bars of service and well inside my office in Richmond I was able to download 1.62gb in just 21 minutes.
Very smart indeed.
I wondered how EE’s MiFi device would handle two iPhones each trying to download TV/movies from iTunes and set them to the task earlier this afternoon.
I have to say it is rather impressive watching the MiFi chomp through the megabytes.
(You will want to make sure you have a good allowance of data in your monthly bundle before doing the same on a regular basis!)
Which by my reckoning means you will have consumed the largest bundle of data that EE sell in around 1hr 45m.
Well done EE.
I was thinking similar!
Is that a problem?
Is it a problem that you can only use the incredible video streaming and high-speed internet services that EE advertise for 1hr 45mins a month? Yes. I’d say so.
If I’m going to need to space that 8GB out across a month why not pay a lower price for a slower connection. Or is there really a market of people who need high speed mobile data, but only for minutes a day?
See my reply to MacLeod and stop drinking the kool aid 🙂
Yeah I don’t use the MiFi for hours on end every day. Perhaps 10-30 minutes some days, maybe 2-3 days a week. But when I switch it on I want it to be the fastest possible connection.
There’s no cool aid being drunk!
Your logic would have prevented us all from looking at iPhones when they launched (“why pay more for a phone that doesn’t even do MMS and its only 2G”)!
But at 20 mins a day, 3 days a week you could run out in about 2 weeks (at the speeds you reported0 if you use the data intensive stuff EE advertise.
You really are fixated with running out of data aren’t you?
My average sessions are maybe 60-80mb of data. What’s brilliant is I can get stuff done faster thanks to the better speed and then get on with other tasks.
I’m not scoffing at the speed – I think that’s great. I’m laughing at the stupid tariffs which haven’t been increased to reflect how much more data someone on a 4G connection can consume.
Apple built something less than cutting edge, but really considered the full user experience so what was there was (generally excellent). EE have upgraded the tech but appear not to have considered anything else.
Not on running out of data (although I have been bitten by overage charges… big ones) but by not having a consistent experience throughout the month.
I don’t want to change my behaviour in week 3 of the month because I’ve been cut off or the cost for the next 100mb is hugely more.
Ok, what then, would it take for you to be satisfied with EE’s offering? A 20GB plan?
Here’s another angle on this debate.
Firstly Ewan’s use of the MiFi to hammer out that volume of data in such a short period of time arguably isn’t a representative case of how consumers will use the device in a real world setting.
However it is very valid to discuss what the right size of the data allowance should be for these types of devices on 4G. Clearly a 500MB option is not sensible and I would expect it to disappear from EE’s tariff portfolio next year.
Moving through 2013 I expect to see operators gravitating to a “small, medium, large” menu of data bundle allowances, and the debate will be around what is the right amount of data allowance to put into these three bundles.
The operators will then start increasing the bundle allowances each year, which will seem a good deal consumers, but if they’re smart the operators will increase the size of the bundle at the right lower than the underlying increase in average usage by their customer base.
So you will have small bundle customers progressively cascading into the medium bracket and the medium bracket uses progressively cascading into the large bracket.
Very similar to how bracket creep with income tax works in favour of governments to get more revenue income tax system.
EE have no idea what usage to expect from 4G, so they will use the period of their 4G exclusivity to throw out some random tariffs then monitor take up and usage against this “finger in the air” portfolio so they are in a position to present a more informed tariff portfolio mid 2013.
I got a Lumia 920 last Monday. It used up 800MB of my 1GB allowance, without me knowing why. Only then did I realise it may have been the Free Speed Test app eating all those megabytes!
It sure is overpriced, and, I miss my unlimited data with Three – too bad they have no signal in my new area.
I can do similiar on there 3g network.infact i did a test some time ago i managed to download 5GB in less than 1 hour on dc-hspa
2;30 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmJCGjfgGHY
Excellent!