O2 3G speed

fliegenaffe

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I seem to be getting consistently slow 3G speeds on my iphone 4 (I'm on the O2 network) yet a friend of mine gets far superior speeds (he's on the 3 network). even if we're sat side by side trying to stream the same content,I can barely get anything and he has no problems. Is O2 rubbish with their 3G speeds compared to the 3 network?
 
I am with orange and the speed compared to 3 is slow as well. My work phone is with 02 and seemed slow to my orange. Is your friends mobile a Iphone too?
saying that most of SE London and England are out of action on o2 today due to some Technical Problems.
 
Where I am, I seem to get about 200KB/s (so I'd assume about 1600Kbit), which I can't really complain about given I'm in a rural-ish area. I think when I was staying in Peterborough last month, I was managing 300KB/s (approx 2400Kbit).

I believe I'm right in saying the max for 3G is 3600Kbit, and HSDPA is 7200Kbit, so assuming I was only on 3G, the 2400Kbit I achieved was 2/3 of the maximum possible, which I think is fair (much like broadband claiming 'up to 8Mbit' and actually achieving 5>6Mbit.

I gave up with 3 because where I lived, it was either 3G or nothing - that is, there wasn't any 2G coverage, and as soon as you left a 3G area the phone was useless. I also don't recall the 3G speeds being any faster than what I currently receive with O2. I'm 10x happier with O2 customer service compared to that I received from 3, which resulted in me never wanting to touch 3 again after being lied to over and over again.
 
I am with orange and the speed compared to 3 is slow as well. My work phone is with 02 and seemed slow to my orange. Is your friends mobile a Iphone too?
saying that most of SE London and England are out of action on o2 today due to some Technical Problems.

Yes my friend has an iphone 4 too. I've had mine since last September and 3G speed has always been pretty dire,unless I'm in a major town/city (Maidstone,London etc)
 
I am with orange and the speed compared to 3 is slow as well. My work phone is with 02 and seemed slow to my orange. Is your friends mobile a Iphone too?
saying that most of SE London and England are out of action on o2 today due to some Technical Problems.

I think they were actually "building up" to their technical problems because for the past two weeks my service has degraded even further(is that possible with O2?). If I'm in a notoriously weak signal area it has said Searching... On my phone
 
I ordered a PAYG three micro sim to compare it to my existing 3G provider, O2, who I feel have had a falling service level in recent months (lots of outages and slow connections) and generally poor coverage compared to other networks. In parallel to what others have observed, Three in my locale is consistently quicker than O2. Unfortunately it cost me £10 worth of credit to find this out and an additional £5pm in switching to a Three bundle which provides less than what I had with giffgaff...

My results at home (where I never get a great signal) from the speedtest app
O2 : DL 0.83; UL 1.09; Ping 201ms
Three : DL 1.73; UL 1.59; Ping 158ms
 
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Can't say the same for me. o2 have been brilliant in London. I have full bars almost everywhere, even in places when every other network barely has any network signal at all. That's why I'm loyal to them I guess....but 3 is tempting me on value, although the coverage is still a joke.
 
I've been with O2 for years on other phones getting signals in places others struggled which is partly the reason i always stayed with them. Got my iPhone with them as well and generally get a good 3G signal in most places i go around here including, importantly, our cricket ground which means i can stream stuff to keep me occupied whilst sat around waiting....the fact i'm still on an old unlimited data contract is a bonus as well.

In general the only times i've had an issue is when i've been in places with a large amount of people such as Wembley for the American Football last October when the local towers i assumed just couldnt cope with the large numbers in a small area.
 
i am with three and it is by far the best 3g coverage of any other providers i have tried. the speed is just as fast as my wifi at home in some areas.
o2 were very bad, voda equally as bad, orange good but slightly slow.

having said this it all depends where you live and what your coverage is like. i cover a massive area with work and three is the best network i have used for internet on my iphone/smartphone
 
Been with o2 since iPhone 3g launch day. Coverage where I am is very good, and the speed is pretty snappy as well.

Also, get a fiver a month off my broadband, so the total cost of the switch would be pretty high (and my ADSL is awesome fast with o2).
 

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