The great 3G data card road test

Introduction
Third-generation mobile technology has great potential to speed up mobile connectivity for consumers and businesses. That's just as well -- having doled out some £22.5bn in licence costs in the UK alone the service providers need to see some money back, and soon.

Out of the five 3G operators, only Hutchison-owned 3 initially targeted consumers -- the company offers videophones and a selection of other services, but no data access.

The other operators have taken a different path. In the past six months, Vodafone, Orange, T-Mobile and O2 have all launched 3G/GPRS data cards for the mobile businessperson -- the semi-mythical road warrior. The data cards and their associated services aim to provide a broadband wireless link to company network or Internet services: in other words, make your mobile laptop a near-equivalent to one back at base.

The four operators make some pretty bold claims for their technology. "With our wireless data cards, you can do all your usual PC things on the road as fast and as easily as you do in the office," says Vodafone. "O2 Connection Manager… will give business customers the most cost-effective, high-speed mobile data access where and when they want it," says O2.

Over the past few months we've had the chance to test and review all four offerings. We've been generally impressed, but there have been enough problems with all of them to make us wonder if 3G is really ready for commercial deployment.

So in the world's first group 3G road test a team from ZDNet UK set out to discover which card coped best out in the real-world of hills, valleys and high-rise urban landscapes.

Methodology:
We recreated many of the scenarios a typical 3G user on the road will encounter by driving from London to Reading by car, then returning by train.

Beginning at ZDNet HQ next to London's Tower Bridge, we drove north and west out of the City, joining the M4 at its start in Chiswick. We then headed along the motorway to the first services outside the city at Heston, onward to Reading -- the throbbing centre of the UK's high-tech corridor -- taking the opportunity to check the connectivity around Microsoft's UK HQ campus.

Reading was also a good spot to check how the cards coped with Wi-Fi. Each of the networks have access arrangements with thousands of Wi-Fi hot spots.