I’m having a wicked time now that I’ve got myself a Best Buy Connect MiFi unit. If you’ve been following my Twitter feed, you’ll have seen the videos I’ve been publishing about how much I’m enjoying being free from the stupid mobile data roaming rates that my operators are trying to foist on me.
In New York, I didn’t have that much fun unless I was near a fixed WiFi hotspot. I refused to give in. I refused to reward my British operators with money for roaming. Indeed you can watch me going slowly nuts in this video discussing this very issue.
So when I got off the plane in San Francisco airport last night I did a double-take as I walked by one of those funky Best Buy vending machines. They’re a brilliant, brilliant addition to the world. They contain all manner of headphones, headsets, USB memory sticks, iPods, iPod Touches and so on. They usually also have a variety of phones, accessories and so on.
I spotted a MiFI unit though. That’s what turned my head.
It was $99.
I checked the label next to the MiFi that said “powered by Best Buy Connect” — that’s the name of the Best Buy MVNO. The sticker pointed out that service was provided by Sprint. Good. I do find Sprint highly reliable especially from a data standpoint.
I looked at the offer: Buy the MiFi unit for $99 and you’ll also get 3GB of prepaid data to use across 30-days. Plus the ability to prepay for more data if you need it.
I did some quick sums in my head and then got out my credit card.
Here’s the first video I made giving the overview:
Here’s another video demonstrating how I’ve been using the MiFi unit:
In terms of data costs, here’s the chart:
$50 gets you 3GB of data to use across 30-days — that will probably be the option for me.
The next time I’m back in the States (probably November) I can imagine topping up the MiFi unit when I arrive.
I’m seriously pleased with the experience. The purchase was ultra easy. I had the box in my hands about 10 seconds after deciding to buy — and I opted to have a receipt emailed to me.
Then when I got to the hotel room, I unboxed it, charged it up and went through the registration options in about 3 minutes and — boom — the connection was activated.
I didn’t have to speak to anyone, call anyone, panic about anything, it just worked. Brilliant.
And today I’ve been walking about San Francisco with my own personal hotspot. It’s just making my life that bit better because it’s nice to be able to check email, do map lookups, do search queries and so on when you’re out-and-about.
To know that I’m not being absolutely nailed for data is such a pleasure. I’ve had the device live for 10 hours and I’ve used 300mb already. Admittedly that’s been more than normal as I’ve uploaded three Socialcam videos with it too. But it’s working away brilliantly.
So there you have it — a top tip for US data roaming!
Note: I’ll need to check but historically, whenever I’ve been into a Verizon or a Sprint store, they’ve either *never* had MiFi units available or they’ve been strictly for 2-3 year contract customers only. They haven’t stocked prepaid units whenever I’ve been in. So I do recommend buying through an MVNO like Best Buy Connect. I’m no doubt paying a bit of a premium but I don’t mind ($50 for 3GB is quite a lot — but it’s nothing compared to what I’d be paying my UK operators).
That’s a result, all airports should have a vending machine dispensing Mifi units and pre-pay SIM cards for those of us who have our Android devices double up…
I’ve asked a few operators if they’ll be doing anything special in this vein for the 2012 Olympics / Paralympics when there will be a huge influx of data-hungry visitors to the UK.
Ewan, for those of us in constant need of a MiFi, as in want to keep it live for 12 months and need unlimited or somthing more than 3gb, let me know if you hear of any sweet deals in the states, or if any of your readers respond with like…
Giff
Giff – have you had a look at what the likes of Verizon and Sprint have to offer?
Seems both Verizon and Sprint offer a 4G MiFi for around 40-50 dollars a month. Is that any good to you?
I still think the data plans are really expensive…
Thanks, I’ll re-look into this. Best one I found a while back was Virgin, but will take a look again at these.
You *really* were happy with that purchase, weren’t you Ewan? I could tell…. 😉
I’m still utterly delighted!
Have you tried topping-up yet? I wonder if it requires a US-registered credit card / bank card to make the transaction?
I haven’t actually tried topping it up — good point… that might be an arse. I shall try that next time I’m in the States.
Thank for share!