There are two gadgets we take along with us without fail. One is our mifi so that we have internet and the other is our media server so we have our own content to watch.
We use a mifi because we really don’t want to have to be swapping out the SIM cards in our iPhones. By having a mifi we can buy a SIM card for that device, create a mobile wifi hotspot, and then connect our iPhones (or iPads) using wifi. Otherwise we’d have to get two SIM cards (one for each phone) or one SIM card and turn one of the phones into a mobile hotspot.
So the mifi solution works great for us. We don’t have to change anything in our phones and aren’t draining the battery in one of the phones by making it a hotspot. Of course you can only make wifi phone calls but we don’t tend to talk on the phone while we’re out of the country so we’re really just focused on data so that we can get live maps and information on the go. It also lets us post to Twitter and our blog during the day.
The mifi we use is a Novatel Mifi2, which is an unlocked global mobile hotspot.
The keyword in that phrase is “unlocked”. You can easily pick up a mifi that is “off contract” or “prepaid” but that is not “unlocked”. Those marketing phrases are not synonymous and here is the difference:
“Off contract” or “prepaid” just means that you don’t have a recurring monthly charge unless you choose to have one. But if it is not unlocked you are bound to the provider’s network and you must buy your internet service from them (either prepaid or postpaid which is a fancy term for “on contract”).
You can buy prepaid or postpaid mifi’s easily at Best Buy or via your cellular provider. AT&T and Verizon are very aggressive at selling mifi’s so you have to be careful when they scream about “no contract”. They will tell you that you can use it anywhere in the world. Don’t be tricked.
If you hope to travel internationally and use your mifi you really don’t want to be stuck using AT&T or another cellular provider because the cost is prohibitive. Depending on your level of usage you could be paying as much as 50 cents to $1 per megabyte for the privilege of roaming off the providers network while you’re hobnobbing across Europe. Also many times the internet speed you get when roaming is of poor quality. T-Mobile offers FREE international roaming in big letters. The small print tells you that it is essentially only 2G (or Edge) service. Remember that speed? That’s what we all got on our flip phones 12-15 years ago and it’s painful. They give it to you for free because they know no one will want it.
Rather the word to focus on is “unlocked”. By definition unlocked devices are off contract because they aren’t locked to a carrier. They allow you to easily choose your provider and you can simply switch at will by swapping out the SIM card in the device. This allows you to buy local SIM cards and get local service.
For example, we bought a SIM card for Vietnam from Vietel the main provider in Vietnam. Our cost for enough data for a five day stay was $8. Australia was a little more expensive, it cost us about $40 for the week for 6GB of data. The AT&T equivalent is $120 for 800MB of data plus 15 cents per megabyte over that. Estimated cost for using 5GB of data is $750 vs the $40 we paid to Optus at the Melbourne airport. That’s not a typo.
Here’s the rub: it’s very difficult to buy unlocked devices in the United States. The market just doesn’t understand how all this works and the providers would prefer to have you locked to them. So there is no store you can walk into and buy an unlocked mifi. Except for Amazon. Here’s a link to the unlocked device:
This device regularly sells out and if it’s sold out when you look, just keep checking it will come back in stock at some point. The current price point is $65 which is a great price and you’ll have it paid for with one trip out of the country.
Don’t be afraid of SIM cards. They are intimidating the first couple of times, but once you get used to it you’ll see it couldn’t be simpler. It’s just that our feeble American brains aren’t wired to understand how they work. But trust me, the whole rest of the world understands them and has embraced the concept lustily.
Our other beloved gadget is our Sandisk Wireless Media Drive. We use this to load content from our iTunes media library and then share it while we’re flying as the device creates a mobile wireless network. You simply turn on the device, it will create a secured wifi network and then you connect your iPad or other tablet to it, open the Sandisk app, and hit play on any media file you have loaded, and it will wirelessly stream media to your device. It supports up to 10 connected devices which means if you have kids and are traveling (even by car) you’ll want this device.
You can pick one up at Amazon for about $95.
As you can see it’s quite small. It appears on your desktop as an external drive so you can just drag and drop files to the drive. Once you have all your files loaded, you disconnect it like you would any other external drive. It’s USB and you can also expand the storage with an SXHD card that you would buy for a digital camera.
We’ve used ours on several trips without a single problem and absolutely love it. There is no buffering, even with HD files.
Feel free to send me an email with any questions you might have about either of these gadgets.
