If you choose an unlimited plan with Vodafone there’s three different types. All will deliver unlimited data, but the maximum speeds differ.

As an example, “Unlimited Lite” delivers speeds of up to 2 Mbps, whereas “Unlimited” gives you up to 10 Mbps and “Unlimited Max” provides the fastest possible speeds.

So, when Vodafone recently announced that they were giving away 30 days of unlimited data to their pay monthly customers, my geek brain kicked into gear and I assumed that there’d be some sort of speed restriction. Y’know, some sort of catch.

So, after getting my confirmation text, I decided to check the speeds on a 5G mast.

The results, whilst sat in a car park of a busy shopping centre, were very good and on par with my speedy home Virgin fibre connection. It seems that my assumption was wrong – the 30 days of unlimited data isn’t restricted in terms of speed at all. Fair play Vodafone…

Vodafone 5G speeds

What’s interesting about this is that it’s perhaps even more real world than my previous test. I’m using the same mast, which is somewhere I can’t see, as many hundreds of others in the same shopping centre.

Oh and yes, you’ll notice that the upload speed isn’t too much to write home about. Whether that’s due to the backhaul upstream or the 5G speed itself, who knows, but it’s strangely similar to my home broadband upstream figure too…

My home Virgin Broadband fibre speeds

As mentioned before, we’re reaching a point now where – with 5G especially – mobile networks can compete and beat a lot of wired broadband alternatives.

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It’s doubtful that mindsets will change overnight, but getting broadband into your home or business no longer means sticking to a wired provider. With 5G on the horizon, the mobile networks are poised to take a substantial slice of the market – potentially delivering faster speeds in more places.

As an example, those living in rural and remote parts of the UK are stuck with either slow, expensive or laggy broadband because they’re too far from the local exchange. As an example, BT Openreach recently gave a massive quote of £502,586 to upgrade a sub-1Mbps internet connection in Cockermouth, Cumbria, which was already costing £70 every month.

David Roberts working on his laptop

The potential customer, David Roberts, refused to pay the amount and continued on with his expensive and slow connection instead. A BT spokesman told us at the time that..

His property is several kilometres away from our nearest usable network, which means significant civil engineering, build and cabling work is needed to provide a connection.

So, sniffing an opportunity, specialist internet service provider, 4G Internet, got in touch with David to offer him a solution – internet via 4G.

Now sure, I know what you’re thinking. If you’re in such a remote spot then chances are that you’ll have no 4G connection on your phone either. However, if you’re in an area like this, their engineers will fit a small high gain directional 4G antenna to the outside of your property. Once correctly aligned and installed, this latches onto available 4G signals, boosts them and pipes them down to the 4G router inside.

This means that a relatively weak 4G signal becomes a strong one, and – via the WiFi router which is fed from the antenna – you get much better connectivity.

4G Internet visited Mr and Mrs Roberts’ home and succeeded in connecting them via the 4G mobile network instead of relying on BT’s underperforming copper landline connection. The couple are now accessing speeds between 11 and 14 Mbps – at least ten times better than they had previously. The entire bespoke installation process, which costs under £400, also involved the professional fitting of an external 4G antenna and took just one day to complete.

The company does unlimited plans at £39.99 per month and you just need to pay for a 4G router and / or an antenna if there’s only a weak 4G signal.

David Roberts told us…

My wife and I had no idea we could access the internet through a mobile phone signal and we were initially sceptical that it would work. Since the installation we are now able to watch TV and movies from streaming sites like Netflix and Amazon Prime with no buffering and without losing the signal altogether.

Head to 4G Internet for more information.

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Head to Sky Mobile right now and you can bag yourself a half-price deal right now on their 30GB monthly plans.

Going live from 8:30 today, there’s also 50% off select Sky TV Packages when you take Sky Signature(£25 a month) on an 18-month contract and they’ve also got 30% off their Sky Broadband Superfast internet – now £25 a month.

Back to the mobile deal though, and that 50% off includes any phone, even the iPhone 12 range. In addition there’s a deal on the Samsung Galaxy S20 5G – £38 per month for 30GB of data.

Sky, which operates on the O2 network, also has an 8GB data plan from £8 per month as a SIM only offer.

Head to the Sky.com website for more info.

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Available on the Vodafone VOXI brand, a new “For now” plan delivers unlimited 5G-ready data, minutes and texts for six months for a mere £10 a month. It’s available until January 31st 2021 and is ideal for job seekers during these testing times.

To be eligible, you’ll need to be in receipt of either Jobseeker’s Allowance, Employment and Support Allowance or employment based Universal Credit. Just upload an image of the Universal Credit statement or a letter from the Department for Work and Pensions via the VOXI website. You’ll then be instantly verified, meaning that you can go ahead and purchase the plan. There’s no credit check and no contract to sign.

The VOXI job seekers deal would normally cost £35 per month, so this is a significant saving.

Nick Jeffery, CEO, Vodafone UK, told us..

We want to provide financial relief to those people most in need at this incredibly difficult time. And we want to make sure those people keep connected, because we know how vital that is – vital to finding new work, and vital to good mental health.

In addition, NHS workers and vulnerable customers can also enjoy unlimited mobile data until the same date. It’s available to existing customers who redeemed the original Vodafone offer back in April.

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You may have accidentally left your phone on during a flight and, if you’re a geek like me, you may have spotted that sometimes – for a brief moment – you get a mobile signal.

Even 7 miles up, your phone can lock onto the odd network mast as you fly over countries. I’ve accidentally had queued text messages sent this way, and yes – it works.

So… how about doing that in reverse?

Well, that’s what the guys at Cambridge Consultants are planning, and they already have Deutsche Telekom on board and funding the project. Working in conjunction with Stratospheric Platforms Limited (SPL), it’s a wireless antenna unlike anything seen before. Put simply, it (currently) involves sticking high-capacity 5G mobile masts into a fleet of “High Altitude Platforms” – currently these are planes, with test flights being conducted in Bavaria using a H3Grob 520 aeroplane which is remotely piloted and flies at 45,000ft.

However, the end goal is to deploy a fleet of zero emissions HAP aircraft at around 65,000 feet (that’s a smidgen higher than Concorde used to fly at), flying effectively in hold patterns for more than a week at a time.

Each “HAP” plane will provide coverage over an area of up to 140 kilometres (87 miles) in diameter. That would remove the need for hundreds of “normal” 5G masts on the ground. A planned fleet of around 60 HAPs could blanket the whole of the United Kingdom with speedy 5G connectivity.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. Isn’t this all a bit… mad? A bit .. costly?

One “HAP” pushing 5G to everything in the M25

Well, first you’ve got to consider how many mobile masts are needed to keep our phones going. As an example, here in the UK, Vodafone have 21,000 masts. Each one needs to be built on some land or placed on a building. That costs money and a rental has to be paid. It’s somewhere between £5,000 and £11,000 depending on the location. Then there’s power. More money. Then there’s a high-capacity backhaul (fibre). Loadsa money. Cheap it isn’t.

Imagine being able to turn them all off and instead use some remotely-controlled (or, in the future, computer-controlled) aircraft using zero-emission hydrogen power. It would, according to Stratospheric Platforms Limited, “operate at a fraction of the cost of building and maintaining normal terrestrial masts and infrastructure, with minimal environmental impact”. It would completely rewrite the economics of providing mobile telephony and data.

So, the proof of concept is complete. Once fully ready, the 5G antenna will be large, powerful and lightweight. It’ll sit below the HAP measuring three square meters and will weigh around 120kg.

Best of all? Not much will change. Your current phone will connect to the 5G signal (which will be coming from above instead of alongside you), and the backhaul will be handled without thousands of complex and expensive fibre-optic links.

Imagine just how costly and difficult it currently is to cover Wales with current ground-based masts.

Stratospheric Platforms Limited tell us…

With radically cheaper costs, this new platform has the potential to connect the unconnected in the developing world, to fill gaps in coverage across the developed world and to ensure rural areas aren’t left behind anywhere across the globe. In addition, the hydrogen power system creates a long endurance, low environmental impact aircraft, with low noise, zero CO2 and zero NOx emissions.

Rollout of the first commercial service is anticipated to begin in Germany during 2024.

The clever mobile “masts in the air” will effectively be a modular design which can scale seamlessly. Within the antenna is 480 individual, steerable beams, creating patterns that can be “painted” onto the ground to cover specific areas such as roads, railway lines or towns. Here you can see that the beam has been altered so that the sea isn’t covered…

With the 5G rollout and heavy investment already happening across the UK, the big question is – will networks wait until 2024 and use this instead?

More information on StratosphericPlatforms.com.

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We mentioned it just yesterday but now it’s available – the £35 goodybag from giffgaff. It joins the existing £10 golden goodybag but, for £35, you get unlimited UK calls, texts and data.

Available right here, it’s 5G ready. Just set the purchase to “recurring” whilst and, if you need a SIM swap for a 5G ready SIM, you can get that online too. You should, though, check the O2 / giffgaff 5G coverage before diving in, as this is being rolled out still.

Head to giffgaff.com for more details.

The post New giffgaff £35 golden goodybag offers unlimited everything plus 5G access is original content from Coolsmartphone. If you see it on another news website, please let us know.

NASA have selected Nokia to setup an actual mobile phone network on the Moon. Key points involve reducing power, size and cost whilst delivering reliable lunar surface communications with high data rates.

As part of a potential future sustainable human presence on the Moon, a super-compact, low-power, space-hardened, end-to-end self-configured 4G system will be prepared for late 2022. It’ll then be responsible for vital command and control functions, remote control of lunar rovers, real-time navigation and streaming of high definition video.

The solution involves a 4G Base Station with integrated Evolved Packet Core (EPC) functionalities, 4G User Equipment, RF antennas and high-reliability operations and maintenance control software. It’ll be rugged enough to withstand the harsh conditions of the launch and lunar landing, and to operate in the extreme conditions of space.

Let’s hope there’s unlimited data.

The post 4G Coverage. Coming to the Moon! is original content from Coolsmartphone. If you see it on another news website, please let us know.

We’ve gone through quite a few iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Pro deals already, but now giffgaff have got in touch too.

They will be offering the whole iPhone 12 lineup, including iPhone 12 Pro, iPhone 12 Pro Max, iPhone 12, and iPhone 12 mini.

You can already pre-register your interest for the iPhone 12 Pro and iPhone 12 and they’ll be arriving on October 23rd. The iPhone 12 Pro Max and iPhone 12 mini beginning will be arriving a little later, on November 13th. The guys have sent us a lovely table showing the cost of each phone – just add on whichever giffgaff goodybag suits yourself.

The post giffgaff iPhone 12 pricing and offers is original content from Coolsmartphone. If you see it on another news website, please let us know.

I’ve spent a couple of hours looking for a new SIM-only deal. I had one requirement – it had to be with Vodafone or one of the virtual networks (like Voxi) running on the Vodafone masts. This is because, in the areas I’ll be needing it, Vodafone is the strongest signal.

Of course, this is different for everyone, so always head to the Ofcom mobile coverage comparison to see who’s strongest in your area and the places you’re going to be the most. Check indoor coverage too, because with COVID-19, we’re all going to be inside most of the time.

You can also get a map to see how each network fares..

So, in the places I’m going to be the most, Vodafone is strongest. To get my Vodafone SIM-only deal, I Googled just that. You’ll end up on this Vodafone page, presented with some decent deals and 6 month half-price offerings which definitely looked interesting.

There was a lot of choice but the well-priced unlimited data plans were a bit unnecessary for my needs. The other data-limited plans were a little out of my price range and had extras that I didn’t need, so I ended up heading to the Voxi website instead.

I only needed about 12GB of monthly data and this Voxi deal seemed like the ideal solution. It was the one I was going to go for..

However, as I’m a bargain hunter, I went across to the Uswitch website to double-check and do some comparisons, and that’s where I found this 12GB data offering for the very same £10 price on Vodafone. Wait a minute, I hadn’t seen that on the Vodafone SIM-only pages?

Sure, the Voxi offering is better because it throws in unlimited social media, but in this particular case I chose to stick to Vodafone even though Voxi uses Vodafone masts. So, I headed to the Vodafone website to find the 12GB deal I’d found on the comparison site. I just couldn’t find it. I Googled, I Googled some more, but it was no-where to be seen.

Eventually, after going via a completely different website, I found it.

The deal is part of the Vodafone Basics range. This is a set of SIM-only deals which don’t deliver 5G and don’t deliver roaming. However, they are cheaper because of that. Here’s the differences…

Getting to these “Basics” SIM-only plans can be a bit tricky, so if you’re having trouble, head here to get the Vodafone Basics SIM-only deals.

Here’s a look at all of this in video….

The post The hidden Vodafone SIM-only deals you need to know about is original content from Coolsmartphone. If you see it on another news website, please let us know.

As someone who’s in hospital for a few months, I can certainly attest to the hard work and dedication of the NHS staff. It isn’t just a job. I’ve seen doctors, nurses, HCA’s and everybody in-between caring, sharing, helping and listening. They work harder and longer than anyone I’ve ever met.

Now EE have extended their unlimited data offer for NHS Heroes until January 31st next year. Over 270,000 NHS staff have taken up the offer since the launch in early April, and those using it will continue to get unlimited data until next year. Meanwhile, new customers can register for the deal online with a valid NHS email address.

Marc Allera, CEO of BT’s Consumer Division, told us..

We want to show our continued support to NHS staff as pressures of Covid-19 remain. Extending our unlimited data offer will help NHS workers as they can easily keep in touch with friends and family, without worrying about their data. Along with the 20% discount we already provide, this is a thank you for NHS staff who work so hard to look after us all.

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