Tablet / Phone...

[Destination Unknown]

What is a decent size/make Tablet to go for, which will take Sim Cards (Unlocked) and use as a Hotspot/Tether.
Also a decent size phone, thinking a Samsung s4 as they should be a bit cheaper now as s5 has come out. Again unlocked.

Chris has very good contract with 3, so do not want to lose it so thinking just to but a new larger screened phone.

 

[Forestboy]

Can't go wrong with a Samsung I reckon.
Just changed after several years with a IPhone got the new S5.
What a revalation the IPhone was okay but frustrating with all that Apple crap and inability to do what you want instead of what Apple want where as the Samsung is like a breath of fresh air.
Android rules
It's so good Jan wants one and she's the least techie person in the world.

 

[jollyrodger]

Try a Cubot X6 very fast an a fraction of the cost of S4/5 duel sim has worked well for me

 

[Speve]

Bit pricey but look at Apple refurbished iPads you can get some really good ones with standard Apple guarantee as well last time I looked 4th gen ipad cellular & wifi £239.00 they have different stuff all the time.

 

[pappajohn]

Are there any tablets which have a personal hotspot function.

I know most are wifi enabled and some are simcard enabled.

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[pappajohn]

My 7" samsung tab 3 was handy....it easily slipped in my jacket pocket or the back pocket of jeans.....but i found the 10.1" is much more usable, after the 7" got waterlogged and died.

 

[CherryPirate]

The IPad can create a hotspot to share internet but will depend on your network provider SIM deal you purchased. In my experience most providers do not allow this type of connection.

Colin

 

[wingman]

Apple are doing 0% interest free at the moment with payment option of spreading over 3-12 months. (Minimum spend £399) Offer ends 15th Jan 2015.

Maybe a bit more than you wanted to spend?

 

[carolyn]

If any of you have children/grandchildren at uni you can usually get 15-20% off apple products, it seems it can work with schools. Ive only done it for uni and it can make stuff more affordable. I have bought macbooks, ipads and a phone.

 

[DanielFord]

Personally I am in favour of using a MiFi unit to handle the cellular side of things, that way you are not restricted to cellular tablets (which are very expensive). When new technology is developed (5g is coming soon) you can replace the relatively inexpensive MiFi unit rather than your tablet PC.
You also get the advantage that all of your WiFi enabled gadgets can connect up to the MiFi including laptops etc. When roaming, you can purchase a foreign SIM card and use the data plan on that but the phone number on your phone will remain the same.

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[CherryPirate]

Personally I am in favour of using a MiFi unit to handle the cellular side of things, that way you are not restricted to cellular tablets (which are very expensive). When new technology is developed (5g is coming soon) you can replace the relatively inexpensive MiFi unit rather than your tablet PC.
You also get the advantage that all of your WiFi enabled gadgets can connect up to the MiFi including laptops etc. When roaming, you can purchase a foreign SIM card and use the data plan on that but the phone number on your phone will remain the same.

I totally agree that this makes the best use of your purchased SIM however the WIFI only versions do not have a GPS and therefore cannot use location services to give you information on the area you are in but more importantly will not be able to give you a navigation device e.g. TomTom, Garmin and others

 

[Peter & Elaine]

I totally agree that this makes the best use of your purchased SIM however the WIFI only versions do not have a GPS and therefore cannot use location services to give you information on the area you are in but more importantly will not be able to give you a navigation device e.g. TomTom, Garmin and others

That why I bought a iPad Air with sim for Internet
I use EE now on pay as you go about £18 3 months 6 gig of flebay
And I can tether to Elaines old ipad 2 and my laptop
And run tomtom it works very well
As for iPhone i gave up on that 3 months ago and went back to a old Nokia brick
And just use it for phone calls only better reception and not as many missed calls
Then use ipad for every thing else
When my contract on the phone is up in new year I may consider a galaxy phone if it's free and give one a go

My old iPhone is sat in van just as a MP3 player

 

[Judge Mental]

We have I pads etc.. While the rest of family favour iPhones I have a large Acer liquid S2 phone it's about 6inches (steady ladies!)

Can comfortably surf on the inter webby thingy, watch stuff comfortably, full HD etc....it's great. I bought it because I thought it had twin sim slot. But UK versions only single. Guess why? Because the UK Mobile companies don't like selling dual sim phones offering consumers an easy choice of networks

 

[DanielFord]

I totally agree that this makes the best use of your purchased SIM however the WIFI only versions do not have a GPS and therefore cannot use location services to give you information on the area you are in but more importantly will not be able to give you a navigation device e.g. TomTom, Garmin and others

I think you misunderstand the role that the WiFi plays in the GPS portion of your device. It is true that when you turn off WiFi on an iPhone, it will show a message saying that location services are improved with Wifi turned on. The GPS chip is actually in the device, in this case an iPhone. In conjunction with this, a cellular device will also use AGPS, or assisted GPS, whereby the location of the phone cells you are connected to are also used to pinpoint your location. With WiFi enabled, the iPhone will query the internet to find out which general area it is in, then use its own GPS chip to fine tune the location. This speeds up a GPS lock. When no location information is received from the WiFi, the iPhone will take longer to get a GPS lock. I have used the MiFi in conjunction with the iPhone to send GeoTagged photos to family, I just view the maps app and wait until I have a GPS lock, and then take the photo. We have also used the maps app on the iPad, and it works just fine, provided the iPad has a clean view of the sky, the GPS aerial is not very good in the iPad.
Obviously devices that are not GPS enabled will not be able to use location based services, my netbook has no GPS, and thus does not get locations. My Toshiba satellite tablet on the other hand works just fine.

 

[scally]

Personally I am in favour of using a MiFi unit to handle the cellular side of things, that way you are not restricted to cellular tablets (which are very expensive). When new technology is developed (5g is coming soon) you can replace the relatively inexpensive MiFi unit rather than your tablet PC.
You also get the advantage that all of your WiFi enabled gadgets can connect up to the MiFi including laptops etc. When roaming, you can purchase a foreign SIM card and use the data plan on that but the phone number on your phone will remain the same.

This is the way I have gone with EE. I change my SIM every three months and get the latest pays deal for another three months. You can fit an external Arial hard wire it to a happy or desktop

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[scally]

Lappy or desktop which keeps it charged while running up to 5 other units. I've done away with my useless bt line 1.5 meg and now get 4g in my village had 57meg once mostly 30 meg.

 

[mjltigger]

My kindle fire hd uses clever ways to get a location lock when connected to my phone's hot spot.. I have no idea on the detail but it works. On that subject actually I highly reccomend the kindle fire tablets and there are some great deals out there.. again you will need to either use the hotspot on the phone or get a mifi. The Samsung note 2 I use for work has hot spot on it so I presume an s4 will have as well.

As regards the phone, android is the best option and then it comes down to price and spec. For what you describe the s4 sounds about right or look at HTC one m7 which is available at good prices right now.. The m9 is out soon so the m 8 will be a good deal but they have been built as effectively disposable devices due to the way the screen is attached to the body and I'm not sure I could reccomend that.

Edited as Jim's anti text speak thing changed M 8 to mate

 

[DanielFord]

+1 for the Kindle Fire, my daughter has one, and it is excellent.

 

[sadlonelygit]

a bit old school but the galaxy tab gtp1000 is a decent bit of kit. it's 3g enabled, you can use it as a phone, video player, surfing etc and it acts as a hotspot if necessary. takes a 64gb memory card which is enough movies for 6 months away.
not a fan of apple products as i don't like being tied to their software, having updates foisted on you, and the lack of expandibility on the storage side...........pretty though!

 

[Wildman]

I totally agree that this makes the best use of your purchased SIM however the WIFI only versions do not have a GPS and therefore cannot use location services to give you information on the area you are in but more importantly will not be able to give you a navigation device e.g. TomTom, Garmin and others

Are you sure, my 3 mobile Mifi allows me to use my tablet or netbook as a GPS with full mapping.

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