Vodafone

Posted on 15 Jul 2008 at 14:24

Modem tested:

Huawei E172

Maximum speed achieved:

1.9Mb/sec

Average speed achieved in London:

1.3Mb/sec

Average speed achieved out of London:

890Kb/sec

While it came nowhere near hitting the advertised heights of 7.2Mb/sec, Vodafone's mobile broadband is the paragon of reliability. Actual download speeds were regularly between 1 and 2Mb/sec, which is more than fast enough for web applications and streaming video with the BBC iPlayer - and it provided a decent connection on our London to Sussex commute.

Vodafone was also the top performer when it came to upload speeds. It's the only UK network currently offering HSUPA - and it shows, with upload speeds hitting 400Kb/sec in the limited central London locations where HSUPA is available. We uploaded a 3.5MB JPEG to Microsoft's SkyDrive in only 31 seconds, which makes Vodafone a superb choice for designers or people looking to update their website on the move.

Vodafone irritatingly compresses images on websites by default, and the Mobile Connect Lite 3.2 software that ships with the device doesn't allow you to turn this off. For that, you have to download Mobile Connect 9.2.5 on your PC, and witness the newcomer pull rank over the old version every time the stick's plugged in - an unseemly way to prevent an avoidable problem. Nevertheless, Vodafone's solid performance makes it our pick of the networks for business users.

Rating: 5/6

Author: Barry Collins