Mobile Hotspot prepaid suggestions

[Lov_Dog]

Hello!

I am traveling home for a few weeks, I would dearly like to hear of others' experiences with prepaid mobile hotspots. I am currently on a very cheap monthly Optus plan as I am only in Australia for a few weeks/year.

From what I understand, Telstra has a USB device that can be recharged with credit....?

Advice welcomed!
cheers!
cb.

 

[Dex]

If there is any carrier to go with it would be Telstra. Good coverage everywhere and great speed. Thats my opinion anyways

 

[Mr Invisible]

Have had all 3 as part of my work/previous work.

Telstra *claim* to have the best coverage, and yet 30 minutes from Sydney CBD by car, looking at my work Telstra phone, I get almost no signal at home. Vodafone signal is excellent.

Other areas I've had next to no Vodafone signal but decent Telstra.

Optus probably the worst of the lot both in speed and general signal coverage. In rural areas I've had greater success with Vodafone than Telstra too.

imho, I'm a long term Vodafone client and whilst they had issues a while back, their new 900Mhz network has been a HUGE upgrade, and their 4G LTE network is not far off/now in use.

Hard call though. Telstra is MEANT to have the best coverage, but time after time I'm seeing that is simply not the case.

 

[Özil]

Voda 4G coming in June/July.

I currently have Telstra 4G. While Telstra has best coverage I think its a little too expensive, $80 a month for $800 worth of calls with 1.5gb data.

Would be keen to check out Vodafone's 4G data plans before I upgrade my tablet.

 

[dogkat]

I ended up switching from Vodaphone (to Optus) because Vodaphone had no coverage in my home town of Wellington NSW. I was only there 2 or 3 times a year, but it drove me nuts each time.

Not sure exactly what you mean by Mobile Hotspots - but I'm definitely not the person to ask, anyway

 

[chadiwrx]

Target has a Telstra Elite Wi-Fi Pre-Paid Broadband Modem for half price this week. $39 save $40

Starts Today - Ends 08 May
Supports up to 5 users/Wi-Fi enabled devices. Includes 5GB data to use in Australia - 30 day expiration. This offer not available at Target Country stores unless stated otherwise.

http://target.dynamiccatalogue.com....oadband-modem/4ufo1xypd.html?source=catalogue

 

[Özil]

Speaking of Telstra, their whole network has just come crumbling down

People are going into meltdown over this

 

[Lov_Dog]

Target has a Telstra Elite Wi-Fi Pre-Paid Broadband Modem for half price this week. $39 save $40

Starts Today - Ends 08 May
Supports up to 5 users/Wi-Fi enabled devices. Includes 5GB data to use in Australia - 30 day expiration. This offer not available at Target Country stores unless stated otherwise.

http://target.dynamiccatalogue.com....oadband-modem/4ufo1xypd.html?source=catalogue

Spot on...exactly the device I'm looking for!!

Thanks so much everyone for suggestions and advice, I'll let y'all know how it goes!

cb.

 

[Lov_Dog]

Revisiting this thread...Telstra Elite Wi-Fi Prepaid for $40 with 5GB included was perfect for the 2 weeks I was back home.
I had the device delivered from Telstra (rather than chadiwrx's Target suggestion) as it was the same price and gave me direct access to the network provider.
BTW -- I tore through the data package within 10 days, as I am accustomed to AT&T's unlimited LTE.
So, for those considering these devices, I called Telstra each day I had remaining on my trip to attempt to recharge my data amount, each time they volunteered 200MB of data allowing my to connect and recharge via credit card online. It was very kind of them, as they did it 3 times.