Broadband options for remote user in Kaiterteri

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BuffyNZ

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#59397 4-Apr-2010 21:47

Hi Folks,

I am asking this on behalf of my father in law.

He lives semi-remote area, in the hills around Kaiteriteri.

He does not have fixed phone line provisioned, although there has been one to his house in the past.

He has marginal mobile coverage, but is willing drive down to Kaiteriteri to get better coverage.

He is looking for a solution to get him online with his laptop that will not give him a monthly ongoing bill.

He has a pre-pay and is looking for something similar to that for data connectivity.

He does not expect to be online much. It could be weeks between connections.

He expects to be viewing the odd trademe auction, google search and email. No Photos, youtube or movies etc.

Any suggestions on which products to look at?

Can you get ADSL is you do not have a land line number provisioned?

Is there a prepay no monthly charge adsl broadband plan?

Would a Vodafone Vodem Stick with no monthly add-on bundle be the way for him to go? It looks like the vodem stick supports 3g extended and it looks like Kaiterteri has 3g extended coverage..

Any pointers, advice or comments would be welcome.

Cheers,
Stuart.

Recursion: See recursion.
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grant_k

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#314815 4-Apr-2010 21:59

BuffyNZ: I am asking this on behalf of my father in law.

He lives semi-remote area, in the hills around Kaiteriteri.

He does not have fixed phone line provisioned, although there has been one to his house in the past.

He has marginal mobile coverage, but is willing drive down to Kaiteriteri to get better coverage.

He is looking for a solution to get him online with his laptop that will not give him a monthly ongoing bill.

He has a pre-pay and is looking for something similar to that for data connectivity.

He does not expect to be online much. It could be weeks between connections.

He expects to be viewing the odd trademe auction, google search and email. No Photos, youtube or movies etc.

Any suggestions on which products to look at?

My father is in a very similar position to your FIL. I donated him my old laptop as a means of getting him online. Previous to this, he would only check his e-mail every 3 - 6 months, and of course it took hours on Xtra dialup to download all the spam as well as the occasional e-mails that he did want.

I chose Telecom Mobile Broadband and an MF626 Data Stick instead of Vodafone's Vodem because Telecom's charging regime is much more suitable for my Dad. Before Christmas, we loaded $40 of credit onto his account, thereby getting a $12 bonus topup, making $52 in all. He has until the middle of June to use all his credit, and so far, it looks like he will run out early. The big advantage of Telecom's 500MB Prepay Mobile Broadband plan compared to Vodafone, is that Telecom only charge 10c per MB when he actually uses the modem, and nothing when he doesn't. Whereas Vodafone sting you for $30 up front at the start of the month, and if you don't use all the 500MB you have already paid for -- you lose it!

So, assuming that my Dad uses all his credit up during April, it will have cost him just $10 per month for his broadband, which he is using more regularly than I expected. He even checks his e-mail about once every week or two, instead of 2 or 3 times per year! Encouraging progress, I'm sure you'll agree.

grant_k

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#314819 4-Apr-2010 22:06

Further to the above post, I should point out that both Telecom and Vodafone have casual $1 per day for up to 10MB prepay plans. However, that wouldn't work so well for my Dad, because he frequently uses more than 10MB in one day, and then nothing for a week or more. So the Prepay 500MB plan works perfectly for him.

sbiddle

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Biddle Corp

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#314822 4-Apr-2010 22:11

The Telecom 500MB plan is the best deal around for casual data use. The big question is just whether you'll get coverage there or not. There certainly are plenty of optons for a data card with an external arial but they are the sort of thing that you probably need somebody with a little knowledge to help set up.

nzbnw

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Spark NZ

#314829 4-Apr-2010 22:47

sbiddle: The big question is just whether you'll get coverage there or not.

http://www.telecom.co.nz/coverage

OP - do you have good, fair or limited coverage according to the map above? This should help you decide what equipment you may need to get going?

:-)

nzbnw