Optus

chris & phil · Member

Optus

dave06 · Guru

Hi christine and welcome to the forum

we have wireless broadband at home through optus, when we travel we sometimes take the dragons laptop with us and use it at some mcdonalds places, also some c/parks are introducing wireless as well now

we tried satellite broadband for a while (one trip around the great ocean road) found it (1) unreliable (2) a pain to set up and put down (3) too expensive

chris & phil · Member

Dave Thanks for that, I should have mentioned that we are very happy with Telstra we have the blue modem (toaster) We travelled around Australia last year, and even in the remotest of places we had the internet. Just wanted to compare with Optus, they are a bit cheaper than Telstra.

Thanks
Chris & Phil

ps thanks for the welcome to the forum

dave06 · Guru

well price is not always the best way to go, if it is not an enormous difference then I would not change from a system that is abviously tested tried and true

I am old fashioned and the saying is that "if it aint broke then dont fix it" is what I live by
but having said that it will be interesting to see if anyone has tried optus all over aus and just how it went with price and availability, I know their phones drop out in a hell of a lot of places but then I guess so does telstras "next G"

I would not go back to the sat system even if they give it to me, but I do not take the telly or computer with us any more, we dont get to watch it, too many walks to do or too many freinds to talk to, but every now and then I would like to "just stay in touch"

mike and Judy · Guru

Hi Chris,
I use the same as you, for the last 7 years, ( i think) been around the block plus taken a lot of sideshoots, down to Tassie , up the Cape, and as am very satisfied not bothered to check others,,
However had a small critism and that the swivel on the blue modem appears to be a little flimsey, have to be very careful when attaching the extension antenna

PeterH · Veteran Member

Chris,
I am in the process of looking at both Optus and Telstra for wireless broadband. Optus is cheaper at the moment at 2GB allowance at $29.99 bundle or $39.99 stand alone, with Telstra offering half price for the first 12 months of 1GB at $29.97. My current Broadband is 2GB allowance, so am leaning very much to Optus.
What sort of usage do you use per month?

PeterH · Veteran Member

mike and Judy wrote:

Hi Chris,
I use the same as you, for the last 7 years, ( i think) been around the block plus taken a lot of sideshoots, down to Tassie , up the Cape, and as am very satisfied not bothered to check others,,
However had a small critism and that the swivel on the blue modem appears to be a little flimsey, have to be very careful when attaching the extension antenna

Mike and Judy,
I currently use around 1.5GB a month. Can you advise about what level you used while travelling - would it be more or less than that.
I think our usage would be more than at home as we would use it more to communicate with the family - sending pics, use instead of phone calls etc.
I also wonder how good it is with things like Skype?
Optus does not appear to offer the extension antenna now, only a USB modem, or what they call the Roamer Data Card

-- Edited by PeterH on Saturday 21st of March 2009 12:27:26 PM

chris & phil · Member

Mike & Judy Yes the connection is a bit flimsy, at home I have to use the extsion arieal but found that I didnt need it when we were traveling.

Peter & Judy We use nearly the whole of the lGB when traveling. At home we are lucky if we use 50% of it. I guess it means when traveling we have more time to use it and as you say staying in contact with family and friends.

Dave yes I agree if it aint broke dont fix it, I was just curious and a little interested for half what I am paying now I can get double the GB with Optus if I bundle it with a mobile. The coverage has to be as good as Telstra before I would even think about changing over. Maybe Optus will give Telstra a bit of healthy competition. But I think not.

Chris & Phil

PeterH · Veteran Member

chris & phil wrote:

Peter & Judy We use nearly the whole of the lGB when traveling. At home we are lucky if we use 50% of it. I guess it means when traveling we have more time to use it and as you say staying in contact with family and friends.

Chris & Phil

Chris & Phil,
Last time we were away, I was fortunate to have a Telstra Turbo Modem supplied from work, as I needed to keep in touch there - for a number of reasons. Great isn't it ..on holidays, but not really....anyway.....
I used the Turbo modem, found it to be excellent as I was keeping an eye on both emails from work and the weather, as we were on the north coast of NSW during the last lot of floods there.
That's one reason we are starting to look for wireless - to be ready for our trips - and also Optus wireless is cheaper than my current broadband - by $10.00/month.

dave06 · Guru

fair enough, lot of good comments coming in to help you with your choice Chris, as I said I dont use it, but I'm glad there are people who do and can advise you, more than I can do,

mike and Judy · Guru

When I was a wanderer doing all my searching for space, I was very seldom in touch with anybody, it was the family in touch with me, and afraid I have no memory of the charges, just paid the bill as my kids told me ,
At the moment my usage is less then 1gb, if I go over I pay .30 mb, and couplled with mobile my monthly bill is about 150 bucks but I get $200 dollars worth of free calls, maybe it the females that cost the money, HE HE HE HE He
""""Stop yelling at me girl""

twobob · Guru

In my opinion, you are hard pressed to move away from Telstra Next G - I dislike that fact, but its true. They have the bigest setup, as they were originally designed to provide services to the masses.

Other carriers just focus on the populated area's, as thats were the money is.

For "normal use" 400mb should do it, but as the fine print says - upload and or download included, or it cost per Mb over.

In opposite to Sir Dave, I use satellite, and am comfident on it for the road, but agree with him, it is difficult to setup, compared with the "dongle" for Next G.

i have found that we do rely on the internet, and access to it, more and more. It becomes part of your life, so, a reliable service is worth more than the money saved on a "better" option. So Next G 4 me, till the others lift their game, and sat, if I can get it simple to use

Mike47 · Senior Member

I hate to admit that Telstra is superior at anything, but while moving through the mid-north and upper-north of South Australia, I found several times that while I was in an area covered by Telstra, I couldn't get any signal on my optus phone or Internet.

If you are going to be moving through remote areas and MUST have your broadband, then you will need to go with Telstra. I prefer optus, because I think that their wireless broadband is more cost-effective than Telstra, but I have to ut up with no coverage at times.

Roostertales · Senior Member

I'm with Telstra/Next G wireless also hooked up to a laptop.

Although I haven't been in any really remote area's with it , I went with Telstra for reliability and coverage. Not the cheapest I agree but htere you go /you get what you pay for perhaps ?

Good to also hear people are very happy with the performance in remote places.

dave06 · Guru

just as a side note with telstra phones and internet, we travel all over the joint as you know and the phone service is absolutely appalling, we have the "next G" "R" model R = Rural or remote

the coverage is O.K. up and down the east coast but cross the blue mountains heading west and forget it, there will be spots that you may snag a signal but 90% of the time it's not there, others will tell you different but it aint

if you rely on your phone for internet then you are not going to get it reliably , the only way to go is satellite internet, I found it a pain but I was only stopping a night here and a night there (thats how we travel) pain in the bum to set up, pain in the bum to pull down and a pain in the bum to store, and damned expensive

however if one was to "sit" for a couple of nights and if one was not in a Hi-ace camper where space is at a premium then the service is very good with the added benefit of crystal clear tv anywhere in australia

if you want truly reliable internet and you are dinkum about travelling then sat is the "only" way that you will get a reliable service,

wireless is great, but draw a line of say 800 - 1000 kms from any coast line all around aust. and thats about where your phone service ends, sure there are spots here and there but I'm talking reliable phone coverage

Popeye · Senior Member

I have been using schools & libraries all over this great land.

PeterH · Veteran Member

Just signed up for the Optus plan and have set up OK. Seems to be as quick or a little quicker than my cable broadband. Time will tell on coverage as we start to travel.

Roostertales · Senior Member

dave06 wrote:

just as a side note with telstra phones and internet, we travel all over the joint as you know and the phone service is absolutely appalling, we have the "next G" "R" model R = Rural or remote

the coverage is O.K. up and down the east coast but cross the blue mountains heading west and forget it, there will be spots that you may snag a signal but 90% of the time it's not there, others will tell you different but it aint

if you rely on your phone for internet then you are not going to get it reliably , the only way to go is satellite internet, I found it a pain but I was only stopping a night here and a night there (thats how we travel) pain in the bum to set up, pain in the bum to pull down and a pain in the bum to store, and damned expensive

however if one was to "sit" for a couple of nights and if one was not in a Hi-ace camper where space is at a premium then the service is very good with the added benefit of crystal clear tv anywhere in australia

if you want truly reliable internet and you are dinkum about travelling then sat is the "only" way that you will get a reliable service,

wireless is great, but draw a line of say 800 - 1000 kms from any coast line all around aust. and thats about where your phone service ends, sure there are spots here and there but I'm talking reliable phone coverage

Thats an interesting comment Dave.

Since my Next g works off mobile phone coverage my presumption was that any town that has mobile coverage or a telstra tower will be net friendly.

I hadn't considered areas where I would be out of mobile coverage as such.

I would agree in these areas only a sat phone or sat net would do the trick.

I wouldn't be relying on these from a safety perspective and probably unlikely to spend much time completely out of range.Unless I take up the swag permanently of course.

Once a jolly swagman ........

Mike

chris & phil · Member

Thanks for all the interesting comments. We traveled Australia for 6 months, with the wireless attached to the lap top the blue modem and we had coverage in pretty remote areas. The road house at 3 Ways in the Northern Territory we had full signal on the wirelass broadband. Moount Isa and Cloncurry and places like that we had good coverage. Once again thanks for all the comments. We will wait and see what happens with Optus before we make the final decision. We will definatley be changing providers with the mobile phone at presant we are with Vodafone, the coverage is not great with them so it will probably be Telstra at this stage.

Chris & Phil

Basil Faulty · Guru

I have had some rather unpleasant experiences with Optus so I could not reccomend them, yet Telstra is overpriced.

PeterH · Veteran Member

PeterH wrote:

Just signed up for the Optus plan and have set up OK. Seems to be as quick or a little quicker than my cable broadband. Time will tell on coverage as we start to travel.

Well here we are 24 hours later...and now not so happy.
Found the thing slowed to a pace I could only describe as 'less than snails pace'
This applied to most of the night, so tried it again at 11:30 last night and it 'flew'
Tried again tonight and..you guessed it... as slow as.....
Phoned Customer Service and was advised that a $25.00 external may help, but not guaranteed. Also advised to try in different areas of the house and especially try near windows.
Have tried a number, have yet to get on the roof of the house, but little better performance.
There is a 7 day return thingy, so will perserve over the next few days....
More to follow..........

-- Edited by PeterH on Monday 23rd of March 2009 06:37:32 PM