While this newer USB modem from 3 carries itself with a sharp new look, it delivers nearly identical performance to its predecessor.
Design
3 Mobile's previous broadband USB modem shared its design with the competition's dongles; a largish elliptical pod dangling from your USB port by a short connecting cord. 3 has ditched the dongle — indicating that while it's still available it may soon be phased out of production — and replaced it with a smaller USB attachment with a sharper, sleeker design.
The new USB modem is shaped like a USB flash memory stick but twice as long. An extender cable is also bundled with the modem, which acts as an antenna for when the modem is used in areas of limited reception. If we have one tiny, niggling complaint to make about the design, it's that the cap which covers the USB connection on the front can't fit on the back of the modem when it's in use, making it somewhat easier to lose.
Features
While compacting the hardware of the original design into its sexier new body, this revised model has also received a speed boost and is now capable of receiving data at 7.2Mbps, rather than 3.6Mbps like the older model. That said, the 3 Mobile network is, at the time of writing this, only capable of transmitting data at 3.6Mbps, however, an upgrade is scheduled for the end of 2008, which this new modem will be compatible with when the time comes.
Similar to the previous model, the new 3 USB modem features auto-installation directly from the USB drive. There's also a CD in the box to install the necessary drivers and software to use the modem with a Mac.
Performance
As mentioned above, all software and drivers install directly off the USB drive after connecting it to the USB port on your PC. In our experience, the initial settings were correct so it was a plug'n'play affair.
3 Mobile has been kind enough to supply us with both an old and new model of the USB modems so we've had the opportunity to compare their performance side-by-side. To test the performance we ran a series of online speed tests including CNET's own broadband test.
The good news is that we saw comparable performance, with both the old and new models achieving an average download speed of around 1.5Mbps — 2.4Mbps at its fastest, and around 900Kbps at the slowest. While this is slower than the 3.6Mbps theoretical network maximum, it is in line with 3's advertised estimates.
The bad news is that we saw comparable performance. This new device, with or without its antenna attachment, performs almost identically to the older technology, and only time will tell the sort of enhanced performance we can expect beyond 3's network upgrade.
Overall
Our message to owners of the original 3 Mobile broadband USB modem: relax, your technology is yet to be superseded. The new modem has a sexier look, and is made more convenient without the attachment cable, but is ultimately mutton dressed as lamb. This isn't suggesting the old technology is bad — our connections have been pleasingly zippy — but until 3 upgrade its network to deliver data at 7.2Mbps then earlier adopters needn't rush out to replace the original devices.
10%
8%
I had the misfortune of deciding to purchase a 12Gb prepaid broadband key as advertised on http://store.three.com.au/prepaidbroadband/Internet-Key-Orange-plus-Data at $249. At the time, there was nothing on the website to say that this was a "web-only" deal so, rather than mess around with postage I elected to visit a 3 shop in Westfield Parramatta.
After a considerable wait I was finally served, and the "manager" - though who he was managing because he was the only one left in the store, I don't know - informed me that the key would cost $129 and the 12Gb credit would cost $149, thus giving me a total of $278. I told him about the deal on the website and he looked at the page. He admitted that there was no indication that this was a "web-only" deal but he was not going to sell it for that price.
Later that day I logged on to the internet and ordered online. The website asked for a billing address, for which I entered my home address and then a delivery address for which I entered my work address.
A few days later I arrived home from work to find an "Australian Air Express" card in my letterbox telling me that they had been unable to deliver and I have to pick up the item 30km away in Greenacre. I assumed that this was the Three item, but was not sure so I called AAE. The lady I spoke to did not know the origin of the item but informed me that she could reschedule delivery and asked me for my work address, which I gave to her. She told me that it would probably take two days.
I was unexpectedly off work 2 days later and there was a knock at my door and it was a courier with the broadband key, so again they had managed to deliver to the wrong place.
I plugged the key in, installed the software and expected to register my credit voucher and away you go. Unfortunately the broadband key had other ideas, and told me that it could not find a SIM card. I rang "Customer Service" and spent approximately 45 mins on the phone to India explaining my predicament, to somebody who kept asking me if I had ordered a SIM card and telling me how there should have been one in the box. He even went to the point of asking me if there was a "plastic card with some gold contacts on the back", in the box - as if I did not know what a SIM car looked like. I was asked for the IMEI number and was told that they had no record of selling me this unit, so he kept putting me on hold whilst he repeated thing I told him to some higher being.
Anyway, I was starting to get a touch annoyed by his inability to help me and he told me that he would get someone from Sales to call me later.
On Sunday night, after nobody had called, I called 3's subcontinental "Customer Service" centre again. This time, after reading out the IMEI number and was again told that they had no record of selling me this unit again, the lady told me that all I needed to do was go into a 3 shop and obtain a blank SIM card (which would be available for free), and give customer service a ring, and 20 mins into the call, I hung up believing that the plight was nearly over.
On monday, I again spent my lunchtime going to Westfield Parramatta (this time to a different 3 shop), where after discussing my predicament to the side of an assistant's head as she stared at her computer screen, she shouted over to another assistant to "do a SIM replacement". This assistant then handed me a SIM card whilst talking to someone else and I walked out of the shop thankful that, although treated with absolutely no customer service, I was in receipt of a SIM card.
I arrived back at work and plugged it all in, then rang Bangalore again, and spoke to yet another person who valued my call. I did the obligatory reading out the IMEI number and was yet again told that they had no record of selling me this unit. I told him that I was aware of that, but the fact is that they had sold me it, and I was now eager for it to work. After about 20 mins I was flick passed to another "Customer Service" representative. She asked me all the usual questions and asked for the phone number associated with the SIM card. I said that there was not one. She said it was printed on the SIM card holder. I said it were not. She told me again that it was and told me to look closer. If I had not grabbed a passing colleague I to corroborate my story, I think that she would still be telling me that there was a number on the card. She told me that, due to the fact that she had no record of the item being sold to me, that she would get Sales to contact me in about 48 hours. This kind of incited me a touch and I gave her a potted history of events to date and explained that I was not willing to let this debacle go on any longer. She reassessed her position and told me that I needed to go to a 3 shop and sign up for $20 prepaid card, and that the unit I had bought was intended for existing customers using their existing SIM cards and that this is why there was a price differential between the online store and the shop in Westfield. By this time, however, they had updated their website (I assume thanks to my call to the Telecom Ombudsman) to reflect that this was an online price. I explained that, having wedged the SIM card into the little sliding drawer of the unit, I can tell her that only a moron would take the card out of his phone every time he wanted to use the internet, and try and force the card into this badly proportioned drawer. Until I read out the entire contents of the 3 sections of the web page's "more details" on the item and explained how there was no mention of this, she maintained that this was true. She then told me that there was nothing that she could do and that Sales would contact me in 2 days. I told her in that case that I wished to return the unit for a refund. She told me I can't. I told her I could. She bizarrely asked me to "give them another chance". I relented and said that if 3 compensate me for the time, effort and stress that this is causing me, then I may keep the unit.
So now, it appears that I will wait until Wednesday, to be messed around further.
I assume though, as they have no record of selling me this unit, that they also have no record of sending me this unit. Maybe I should just ring up again and complain that it has not been delivered.
The good: I have no idea, it does not work
The bad: Three are a joke. They have messed me about way too much and I will never deal with them again.