EE vs Giff Gaff vs Vodaphone - signal and 3G

[Zak33]

Lo people

A few of you know.. I drive a lot. Over 1000 miles per week, all UK.

I have had an EE phone for over a year on a work contract and I personally have a giffgaff sim in my own phone. (O2 network)

the difference in 3d speed is astonishing.. with EE I can nearly always get some form of connection. With Giffgaff, regardless of the signal strength showing, the download speed is up and down like a fiddlers elbow. It can start,.. stop.. fail... or never begin.

I swapped sims over from phone to phone for a day.. it's not a phone issue. The O2 network is rubbish for data.

However, the 2g signal for texts is good. Calls are less good.. they clip and cut when signal is still there but for text it's fine.


I now have a Voda sim. I'm 3 weeks and 3000 miles into it.... It's literally half way between the two in terms of 3g effect. I do need however to reboot the phone daily if I want 3g reliably.

I FULLY understand why you can get a GiffGaff sim so cheaply with lots of data.. unless in a town, with awesome signal.. you cant use it.

[Bluecube]

I thought Giff Gaff were ok until I moved to Three. The difference was night and day - I can get a full 3G signal in the backend of beyond now whereas with Giff Gaff I got nothing or one bar of 2G if I was lucky.

[DanceswithUnix]

Have you tried a Three sim? You can get one on their website for free as pay as you go, add a tenner to it to try it out. Is bound to depend on region, but for me worked as well as EE.

[Zak33]

ok.. superb idea

thanks

[herulach]

Third for 3, i get faster performance on 3G than most of my friends do on 4G, and the 4G performance is incredible.

[gl30]

It all depends on where you are. I have several SIMs and all vary depending on whether I'm in the city, countryside, etc.

One solution (not applicable in your case) is to ask for a "Signal Box" which routes signal through your broadband connection.

[Rob_B]

Giffgaff has known issues with data speed, I'm on it and as you say it's totally unreliable and inconsistent.

GG is low tier on the O2 network so they have priority as business>contract>O2 pay and go>Giffgaff (if my memory serves) I'm looking to switch too but 3 signal at home is non existent.

[The Hand]

Remember O2 and 3 are merging at some point so you'll get O2's good 2G coverage and 3's good 3G coverage, plus their 4G coverage.. not sure what this will mean for pricing though. Regardless though I'm getting really tired of GiffGaff myself and I'll probably leave for O2/3 or EE(BT Mobile soon) at some point, Vodafone are expensive, though 2G coverage tends to be pretty good but their customer service is sub par IMHO.

[MrRockliffe]

Yeah GiffGaff is pants. Used them for 3 months, didn't have any better signal, but I couldn't actually stream spotify music on the second highest quality any longer.

Tried EE too, and while speed was great, signal was no better than 3 (had no 4G with 3 at the time). And it was a lot more expensive. Now that there's 4G with 3 in Cardiff, it's, as Kevin Bacon would say, a no brainer!

Vodafone? Having a laugh. I don't know anyone that uses them and is happy with them anymore. Maybe this is why emergency services never get to us on time, because they use vodafone.

[LightningJC]

I'm on GiffGaff and have been for 3 years. I always have more signal that anyone else I know but then I probably don't travel as much as you do, maybe my area just has better O2 service. Not sure about the speeds as I don't download on my phone but streaming has never been an issue.

Its cheap and you don't get screwed over by the monthly tariffs. I used to have a phone on Vodafone and the signal was appalling the calls would drop out constantly.

[peterb]

I'm with Vodafone. I looked at moving to three when I bought a phone that would tether but while I was getting rid of my data only sim, voda made a good offer on the remaining line so I stayed. I get pretty good coverage from Vodafone in my area, and 4G coverage isn't bad either. Trouble with resellers like Giffgaff is that you don't know what their terms and conditions are with the backbone network providers. They are effectively selling off spare capacity, so when push comes to shove, the network's own paying customers are going to get priority.

[Noxvayl]

I have been using giffgaff for 3 years, mostly because of how cheap it was back then and also because of the ability to earn payback for helping out on the forums. As a student it has worked out brilliantly from a financial perspective, I have not had to pay anything to use my phone over the last 3 years as payback has covered all my needs. I am now looking to move on as the data network is ridiculous. My experience, mostly up and down the A3 and the surrounding region, is that I am lucky to be able to search for a route using Waze let alone get timely traffic data. It is becoming more and more of an annoyance.

I recently found out about The People's Operator (TPO) which is run on the EE network. Really good prices and you already know what EE coverage is like. If you like EE but don't like their prices try them.

[The Hand]

Thanks, I might look into this TPO network you mentioned. They look like the new sim free low cost king at the moment.

[watercooled]

Maybe this is why emergency services never get to us on time, because they use vodafone.

Emergency services use TETRA; the thing about 'emergency services using Vodafone' IIRC was their personal phones as they got a good discount.

I'm considering switching myself at some point but it's not a priority. I'm currently with Talkmobile (Vodafone) for a good price and coverage/speed seem pretty solid. I'll frequently get >10Mb/s on 3G with a good signal and can get a strong signal in areas of the Lakes where weirdly even EE have zero coverage (Patterdale is one recent example).

However the thing is that Talkmobile is 3G only, though since I currently have a Nexus 4 it doesn't matter either way for the time being. I'm glad I've read this thread WRT GiffGaff - it's not the first time I've heard speed complaints. Three is looking like a good contender now but I might also carry a second phone with a 3 SIM to check coverage as I'm not sure about how well they'd cover remote areas, something Vodafone seems to do relatively well.