Orange's Data Card - Bad Software, Bad Coverage & Bad Download Speed

[3glive]

Mobile Connect 3G data card is an invaluable tool for anyone who needs to stay connected on the move. One of the things that make the Mobile Connect so great are reduced connection prices. The reason for the drop in tariffs was increased competition, in particular from Orange's Mobile Office Card, writes Riyad Emeran.

I didn't expect there to be a huge amount of difference between the Vodafone and Orange data card offerings, but this assumption was far from correct. Let's start with the way the cards look, although I'm well aware that this isn't going to be enough to sway anyone's buying decision. The Vodafone card is bright red, showing off the corporate colours, while the Orange card is black with a square orange badge on it. They both protrude about the same distance from the side of your notebook, but at first I thought that the Orange card didn't have a connector for a booster antenna. Flipping the card onto its back I spotted a small plastic bung which hides the antenna connector. Not only does this placement of the connector make it more difficult to plug in an antenna, but it also leaves you with a small plastic bung lying around that you're bound to lose.
Orange Mobile Office Card

Another slightly disappointing aspect about the Orange Mobile Office Card is that it doesn't come in a protective case like the Vodafone card. OK, perhaps this is a small point, but I like the fact that I can keep the Vodafone card in my bag protected by its figure hugging plastic case. If you want to keep the Orange card protected, you'll have to carry it around in its DVD packaging-style case. You could leave the card in your notebook, but then it does stick out and could cause damage to your PC Card slot.
Click Here

Loading up the software for the Mobile Office Card was pretty painless, leaving you to just insert the card and get going. The Orange application isn't as instantly intuitive as the Vodafone version. But then looks and ease of use are only a small part of the problem. With the Vodafone card, once you're connected you can do anything from browsing the Internet to sending text messages. The way that Orange has set its application up, however, you can only do one thing at a time. If I choose to connect to the Internet, that's all that the card will be able to do. So, if I decide that I need to send an SMS while I'm browsing, that message will just sit there in my outbox until I disconnect from the Internet. The minute that the Internet connection is dropped, your SMS will be sent.

I would say that the modular nature of the Mobile Office Card software is the most bizarre part of the package, but it isn't. Without a doubt, that honour goes to the signal strength indicator. Now, we're all used to signal strength indicators because every mobile phone has one - it's a little gauge with bars, that tells you how much signal strength you have at that moment, so you're probably wondering how Orange could have got this feature wrong. But the signal strength indicator on the Mobile Office Card doesn't show you how strong your signal is at that moment, oh no. To quote the manual: "The more bars showing, the stronger the signal. This will not alter while a connection is in progress; it will show the signal strength when you first launched the application." Yep, that's right, the signal strength indicator doesn't show you your current signal strength, but instead shows you how good your signal was an hour ago when you connected. This is made all the more ridiculous by the fact that you could be using your notebook on a train, so you're being told what the signal strength was like at another time and in another place. I just can't imagine what would have possessed Orange to implement things this way, but what you end up with is a signal strength indicator that's as good as useless.

Just like the Vodafone card, the Orange Mobile Office Card should give you a maximum transfer speed of 384Kbps with a 3G connection, but I didn't once manage to achieve a connection higher than 115Kbps. As a result, the Orange card does feel sluggish compared to the Vodafone Mobile Connect, and I did test both cards one after the other in an array of different locations. Also, the coverage seemed to be slightly better from Vodafone - both cards had no problem connecting all around London and in Bracknell. However, while I was in St Albans waiting for a new set of brake pads to be fitted to my car, I was unable to get any form of connection from the Orange card, while the Vodafone card provided me with access, albeit via GPRS rather than 3G. To be fair though, I'm sure there are places where the Orange card will have coverage and the Vodafone won't, but it's worth remembering that if you're planning on being outside a major city, either of these data cards could let you down.

The last part of the puzzle is cost and just as with the Vodafone Mobile Connect, the initial purchase price of the Orange Mobile Office Card varies depending on which tariff you choose. With a purchase cost of £149 and a monthly charge of £23.50, you get 65MB of download data per month, whereas using the Vodafone Mobile Connect you get 75MB for exactly the same cost structure. To be fair, as I already mentioned, Vodafone dropped its pricing in response to Orange's price plans, so I wouldn't be surprised to see Orange's costs drop sometime in the near future. I would also hope that Orange will look into its software and try to create a more usable environment that allows you to use all the services all of the time. However, as things stand Vodafone is offering a better package, with superior software, faster performance and more bundled data.
Verdict

Orange has been slow out of the gate with its 3G service, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. However, with a clumsy interface, slower connection speed and less competitive tariffs, Orange will find it tough to compete with the already established Vodafone Mobile Connect.
Orange Mobile Office Card

Rating 60%

Price £149


Doesn't sound too good to me...

[A1c]

Hey, who cares!. You live in Australia and wont actually be using this or any other UK based service. Your opinions are utterly worthless as all they ever amount to in terms of UK services is 2nd hand reports.

I suspect this report is genuine but would consider more useful reviews from others on here who have had the product for a longer period and who have taken more time to fully investigate its potential in various areas of the country.Another review from ZNet can be found here: http://reviews.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/networking/0,39023965,39163417,00.htm

[Gunner]

The Orange Datacard software sounds horriffic. Orange's 3G coverage outside of London is no doubt better, but I'd hate the SMS and Signal Strength issues. It's a very poor start as far as I'm concerned, and a mobile connect card should be something that's so easy to get right.

They'll get there eventually, but I don't think this first incarnation of their product is anything to applaud. We can thank Orange, however, for the resulting price drop from Vodafone. The margins must be high if Voda is dropping it's prices! ;)

Luckily using my Orange 3G mobile as a modem over Bluetooth is a breeze. Poor datacard peoples.

GRR PLEASE Admin, PLEASE up the smiley limit from one per post. It's MADNESS.

[A1c]

What some of the 'down-under' folks dont actually appreciate is that their beloved '3' , does'nt do data in the UK! Fine for them to sit 12000 miles away and carp about UK services but what they have from the multi-nationals and what we get are two entirely different products and to use their experience and relate it to UK services reveals total ignorance.

[new2three]

Well thats one way to counter an argument.

[Gunner]

Yeah, you do make a good point. Looks like border control are on lunch again! :P Nice of you to provide 3glive with an alternative review. ZDNet are good for that kinda thing.

I know people who have the Orange card and they think it's fine. Personally it's not for me (reasons already expressed), and I have my mob anyway. The Voda card does sound superior though (if it works for you... some people have reported compatibility problems), regardless of who posts the reviews.

[new2three]

Did not see much counter argument about Vodafone.

[A1c]

I'm going for neither, if it comes to it it'll be wi-fi (a bit more limited) for my laptop. At £10 Unlimed/day and faster it looks like a better bet but I can see why corporate users would choose 3G for better coverage etc.

Anyway I have a 7600 now - factory reset it might eventually become a modem for Internet access - on any network I choose.

[3glive]

Now Now 3GSU don't get ya knickers in a knot..

I am just posting the news as you do it..

twisting the title again..

never said I used the product did I...

Although we do have a data card on 3 in australia and it rocks. irrelevant of course to the your situation in the UK...

I am sorry they turned you down for a job at 3 early on 3GSU no hard feelings of course.

[nigel_kelly]

Must say that this product/service is one of the worst I have experienced. Flaky software, very poor connectivity, unreliable, usually very slow, that’s if I manage to get connected. Overall far worse than a normal analogue dial-up. Very surprising how bad the connectivity is considering I work very, very close to an Orange Mast/Office.

[A1c]

Take it back and get a refund! It should do exactly as it states and if it does'nt then you are entitled to a full refund.

Let us know how things develop.

[nigel_kelly]

Trying to stick with it because when it works it works well, unfortunately that’s less than 10% of the time. It’s been made worse recently due to being informed by Orange that they have a serious GPRS service issue that has been on-going for nearly 3 days. During this time I’ve not been able to connect, am I subscribing to a GPRS service packaged as a 3G?

[Gunner]

I had the GPRS issue - they deleted my access points off the network and it started working again fine. Call and suggest that perhaps?

[nigel_kelly]

Basic GPRS problem appears fixed now; hence service is back to poor from non-existent

[Gunner]

Oh good. Lol, I do feel for you. I don't have to put up with any of that datacard nonsense, I just dial up over bluetooth and *ding* 3G with no hassle!

[nigel_kelly]

Although not impressed with the 3G card software I think the route cause is the 3G core network. I'd be interested to know how much you use 3G data services via Btooth. I use remote VPN back to my office most of the day and can say that I used to get better throughput via analogue dial-up. Typically I get no connection, if I get a connection I cannot pass data, if I can pass data it's very slow and regularly drops down to GPRS at below 20Kbps or fails completely. I can see the Orange mast out of the window in front of me.

I have no axe to grind with Orange, if fact I have normally praise them for their good service have been a Business user for over 10 years but this service is dreadful.

[Gunner]

That has to be a hardware issue, unless you're either too close to the mast or the mast is down - not all their masts are active all of the time. I take it your signal must be pretty poor?

I use it to connect to servers over SSH and it's nice and quick (not laggy like GPRS) with medium signal. If signal drops down to one bar the connection becomes unreliable - but then I guess you'd expect that with one bar of signal!

What you're experiencing is in no way what you should be. I'd go down the route of:
a) requesting a replacement USIM and/or datacard
b) requesting a 3G handset like the Z1010 to use as a modem... long shot
c) a refund ;) longer shot still?

[nigel_kelly]

I’ve done all the standard problem management scenarios

Re-installed software
Upgraded software/drivers
Used alternate laptop
Used alternate data card/Sim

The signal can fluctuate but is usually at maximum. During the week I rent a property that is less than ½ mile from the Building housing the Orange 3G/data support engineers, so I would hope the very large mast next to this building is enabled.

While at this property during the evening I very rarely get 3G, it usually downgrades to GPRS. It’s while at work, less than a mile from here, I have the greatest concerns.

Don’t particularly want a 2nd phone just as a modem, primary phone is a smartphone which I don’t think the Z1010 could not compete with.

Interested to know how you’ve acquired the 3G service on Orange.

[Gunner]

An error at upgrades. Orange's 3G phones are on the system, and it would appear they are fully dispatchable and operable - the staff just aren't allowed to order them yet. Oh, and the price was set to £0 ;)

No, the Z1010 won't compete with a smartphone. Still, leaving it bunged in your laptop bag with Bluetooth enabled might be an option... Still, best wait for something like the 6630 which could fill both roles I guess.

Having good signal but poor throughput can't be right though... have you run speed tests on something like adslguide.org.uk?

[nigel_kelly]

Finally got Tech support to confirm my problems. they tried speed test site and achieved 13 kbs throughput and requested remote shop to test service and they were getting 3 min+ to open web page.

Emailed one of the directors and things appear to be moving now. I'll keep you informed.

[owendwright]

How I wish I had read this thread before I purchased my mobile office card. But as a long term Orange customer I thought I could rely on them.

I have struggled for the last 2 months to work up a reliable service in a number of locations, including one in Bristol 5 miles from Orange HQ. However, I never achieve a sustained connection except on GPRS. That would be OK if I could rely on it. However, I find that it appears to conflict with my Firewall - Zone Alarm Pro.

A connection appears to crash the True Vector programme that is core to the firewall. I can only get a reliable service if I turn off the firewall. That makes me nervous, of course, even through I am runing AV in the background.

I have been advised by technical support that GPRS system problems continue and not to try to adjust Zone Alarm until they are resolved. But how do you know when the problem is sorted? It often takes 30 min to get through to technical support?

Can anyone give me advice on what to do to resolve this issue? Any input would be welcome.

Regards

Owen

[Gunner]

Mhmm. Do you have XP? Can't you ditch ZoneAlarm and use the Windows XP Personal Firewall to guard against incoming connections? That combined with good antivirus should render the use of any further firewall products unnecessary.

[owendwright]

Thanks.

Yes I do have XP - SP1. So far, I had been led to believe that the XP firewall was not very effective.

Regards

Owen

[Gunner]

It's totally effective for blocking incoming connections. You need to get SP2 though really - not even Zone Alarm will protect you from some of the expoits fixed in it.

[nigel_kelly]

Sorry for the delayed update but I’ve been rather busy.

Since emailing senior management within Orange things do appear to have improved. The service is still far from ideal with regular line drops and poor responses but it’s rare now that I cannot establish at least some type of connection.

I have backed-off a little in the last few weeks due to sheer frustration. I just hope the launch of the general 3g service today does not start degrading the data services.

Owen

Have Tech support provided you with the latest software from the download site, it might help. I use Win XP SP2 with native fwall.

I work much closer to the Orange HQ in Bristol than 5 miles and suffer problems. Probably all those Orange staff with their free phones/data cards grabbing all the bandwidth playing games.

[adam.wetzel]

I don't personally have a 3G Datacard and have only seen one in use once, which was at the Orange store. However, I do have a 3G handset (see separate review in another thread) and I'm generally pleased with the service.

That said, for what it's worth..... I was speaking with the guy at Orange data services to get my devices set up with the Z1010, and once we were successful, we chatted for a minute about 3G stuff in general. He told me what to expect in general, and said something along the lines of "if you like what you see now, just wait a few months... there's REALLY cool stuff coming..."

... which brings me to my point. The topic of the Datacard came up, and I mentioned that I had read about the shabby Flash app that controls the thing. To which he replied with a giggle and an emphatic "No comment," which clearly was a politically correct way to say that he totally agreed but didn't want to bite the hand that feeds him.

HOWEVER, and this is the important part: He said that he had successfully gotten the Datacard to work with no additional software (operating system only, no crap Flash app) on both Mac OS X and Windows XP.

Sooo... it can be done, although I don't know how. Perhaps Orange data services will tell you? I don't want to give out the fellow's name, for fear that he might get in trouble with Orange (don't know, but will err on the side of caution).

That said, I've seen his name floating around these forums...

Best,
adam

[owendwright]

Nigel, Thanks for the advice, but things have moved on.

I had the updated drivers and a replacement card but it was still unreliable. I would have been happy with GPRS if I could rely on it.

The final straw for me was that the "system" lost key business e-mails. The card appeared to connect and work but 2 out of 3 outging e-mails simply vanished. There was no return error report. I only got to know when a client rang to query where was the deliverable I promised. 3 test e-mails the following day also vanished.

This was not acceptable in a business service and I am now battling with Orange to get my money back.

Any chance you can let me have the e-mail address of that director? At the moment I am being stonewalled by lower-level staff.

Regards

Owen

[strangely]

HOWEVER, and this is the important part: He said that he had successfully gotten the Datacard to work with no additional software (operating system only, no crap Flash app) on both Mac OS X and Windows XP.


I've managed to this myself but it seems quite slow to connect.

If anyone wants the info on how to do it then i'll post it, although i must admit it's not an exact science and i'm not sure out of the 3 steps i did which ones were needed.

[Killahurts]

It doesnt get more patronising that this when 3GSU tells an A u s s i e poster posting a UK report: "Hey, who cares!. You live in Australia and wont actually be using this or any other UK based service. Your opinions are utterly worthless as all they ever amount to in terms of UK services is 2nd hand reports. "

I am the only one that thinks that smacks of hypocrisy.

3GSU constantly posts sources from all over the globe attacking 3 - the Shanghai Surprise is his favoured outlet! More often than not he posts them in the UK threads in what I can assume is only an attempt at deception...

And yet when someone posts a UK based report he attacks them for doing so as they live in Oz.

The report is from a British journalist so who cares!!

[User Has Gone]

It doesnt get more patronising that this when 3GSU tells an A u s s i e poster posting a UK report: "Hey, who cares!. You live in Australia and wont actually be using this or any other UK based service. Your opinions are utterly worthless as all they ever amount to in terms of UK services is 2nd hand reports. "

I am the only one that thinks that smacks of hypocrisy.

3GSU constantly posts sources from all over the globe attacking 3 - the Shanghai Surprise is his favoured outlet! More often than not he posts them in the UK threads in what I can assume is only an attempt at deception...

And yet when someone posts a UK based report he attacks them for doing so as they live in Oz.

The report is from a British journalist so who cares!!


So, do you have anything constructive to add to this thread about the subject matter? Have you had personal experience, or heard from others that may have had problems or success with the MOC? Otherwise I'd like to suggest a seperate thread for the both of you to bicker in, you can retort to each other untill the cows come home. In 3GSUs defence, although he may have been a bit blunt in his shooting down of 3glive, he at least offered another viewpoint with his link.

[A1c]

Unlikely that anything constructive will be tendered. I won't be responsing to flamebait that is designed to take the thread off-topic. I'll leave this subject to those who actually have and use the Datacard as I have no personal experience of it yet.

[nigel_kelly]

Hi all,

sorry for the delay in keeping you all up-to-date. Been taking time off work since late December and hence have only recently started using datacard recently.

The latest is yet another email to one of the directors of Orange complaining about this very poor product.

orange released a new version of the dashboard software which while does have some improvements on my system it has added too the problems e.g WILOGSRV process hangs after closing the software, before it would crash. New drivers and datacard firmware have had no affect.

Configuring Windows DUN to bypass the orange software had no affect.

I'm now working in Bracknell and Leeds and neither location has given any improvement in the service.

Tried the new software etc on another laptop and got the same connectivity issues although the dashboard software does appear more stable.

Following the latest email i now have a customer relations manager handling my issue.

I'll try and keep you all up-to-date more frequently.

[Killahurts]

So, do you have anything constructive to add to this thread about the subject matter? Have you had personal experience, or heard from others that may have had problems or success with the MOC? Otherwise I'd like to suggest a seperate thread for the both of you to bicker in, you can retort to each other untill the cows come home. In 3GSUs defence, although he may have been a bit blunt in his shooting down of 3glive, he at least offered another viewpoint with his link.

Im sorry you take that tone but unfortunately ahead of him deleting it - after seeing my post - 3gsu had posted one of the most patronising and offensive threads on this board that I have ever seen.

If you saw it and decided to ignore it i find that v interesting.

If you didnt see it cos he deleted it, its yet another example of flamebait that hes withdraw under close scrutiny

[User Has Gone]

Sorry Killla, I didn't see the other post, I really do stuggle half the time to keep up with the bickering back and forwards, it sometimes takes away from the post so much I have to log off and go for a walk.

If you've had any experience of the Orange MOC, or even suggestions that may help nigel then please post it on here for him to make use of.

Nigel, WRT your post, could it be a faulty unit? Have you had a chance to try a different MOC in the areas you're having difficulty with? Or does it seem to be the SW thats making things difficult?

[nigel_kelly]

Purchased this card some months ago when I was Contracting for a very colourful company. At that time i tried an alternate card which showed exactly the same symptoms.

Think I done all the standard problem management procedures:

alternate card
alternate PC
alternate location(s)
clean reinstall
new software
new drivers
new firmware
new company (NOT YET)

[yola@hotmail.co]

Jones -v- Orange 26.1.06 Chester County Court

Had all the above and the LOT!!!!

Got Judgement against Orange for Poor Product & Poor Service and compensation and full refunds for data line rental and Data Card! Also had bills wiped that they said we owed - but we didn't 'cos of "faulty" billing system.

Hope this is a help to anyone recovering money.

over 12 months of communication with Customer services, Data Control and their legal department - finally!

Just Go For It!

[jamesunique]

Hi Yola,

I'm just about to go legal on exactly this issue, I will try and get in touch with you off-forum to find out what your approach was, Orange have a major problem on their hands if people become aware of their datacard billing inaccuracies, in 2 months they've tried to overcharge me £800. The tone of their customer services suggested they had no desire to discuss the subject - quite daunting 1 consumer vs. a heavy hitting machine like Orange but you have given me hope for justice. Congratulations and thanks !