natel easy smart - good for short travel?

[inquisitor]

1 MBit/s is four times of what EDGE (236 KBit/s) can deliver and probably 10 times more of what it usually does deliver (due to congestion or signal quality). Not that I would consider 1 MBit/s as very fast, but it's acceptable for most applications.

[wco81]

Speedtests never got about 300-400 kbps. Even with that some apps. didn't load and some web pages would take forever to load.

So I found a live chat for Swisscom and they changed it for me right away. Big difference. Even in Wengen, getting over 4 Mbps down, tho the upload is still anemic.

I imagine their LTE network must be better?

I registered for an account and it doens't show the remaining credit. There was one option to put in your number to get an SMS but now saying my number is invalid, even though they sent an SMS to give me the code to register.

What are the options for topping off? THere's no swisscom shop up in the mountains, though I can top off probably later in the week in Luzern.

[inquisitor]

I guess they throttle speeds for this tariff, as the network obviously can deliver much more.

No idea how their LTE network performs (I still don't have any LTE handset), but I doubt they admit prepaid SIMs to their LTE network and furthermore swisscom is currently deploying LTE only to LTE band III (1800 MHz) which does not improve signal propagation significantly over UMTS band I (2100 MHz). As usual the bottle neck is probably the backhaul which is shared by the NodeB and eNodeB. So I wouldn't expect too much improvement from LTE.

Btw what handset are you using? Many handsets only support receive antenna diversity and MIMO for some of the supported UMTS frequency bands, which results in subpar performance on those secondary frequency bands. Unfortunately few manufactureres disclose for which frequency bands their phones support diversity. E.g. Motorola Germany states that the European Razr i supports RX diversity only for UMTS2100 and UMTS900, despite it also supports UMTS850 and UMTS1900 (Motorola RAZR*i*? Intel®-Prozessor*? Kompaktes Design - Motorola Mobility LLC. Deutschland). So if you have an American handset it probably doesn't support RX diversity for UMTS2100 and thus will deliver less bandwidth especially on the cell edge.

You can easily top up your SIM by credit card even without having access to their customer portal:
https://www.swisscom-mobile.ch/scm/p...fladen-en.aspx

[wco81]

I'm using a Mifi, Huawei E585. I've gotten good speeds with TIM in Italy. BTW, I noticed TIM offers LTE prepaid now.

I have iPhone 5 too but it's not unlocked and I wouldn't expect it to support European LTE.

What about checking your credits? Is there an easy way to do that? AT 4 CHF per day, I will probably have to top up 4 or 8 CHF to cover my stay.

Up here in Wengen, they offer up to 5 days for 5 devices for 36 CHF on Swisscom. I guess they rent you a Mifi.

[inquisitor]

Your Huawei E585 shouldn't be the problem as it supports RX diversity for all the UMTS frequency bands, it supports (there are two versions: 850/1900/2100 and 900/1900/2100).

Assuming that you have the American GSM version of the iPhone 5 (model A1428 ) it will indeed not work on any European LTE network, as it supports only LTE band 4 (1700/2100 MHz aka AWS) and 17 (700 MHz), of which none will be used in Europe.

The European iPhone 5 (model A1429) supports LTE bands 1 (2100 MHz), 3 (1800 MHz) and 5 (850MHz), which is of limited use, too, as much of European LTE coverage will be based on LTE band 20 (800 MHz), which covers the spectrum formerly used for terrestrial TV broadcasting and is also know as "digital dividend". Those LTE frequency bands supported by the European iPhone 5 will only be used by some operators who will use them for urban coverage.

As of checking credit you can do that through the customer portal or by USSD (dial *130#), however USSD is quite complicated to use on a mifi (you need to run your Huawei E585 attached to a computer by USB in modem mode and use an USSD-tool like MDMA or use a serial console to execute rather complicated AT commands). If you cannot register on the customer portal you will need to put your swisscom SIM in another phone to submit the USSD code.

That offer for CHF 36 is called "swisscom pocket connect" and indeed includes a Mifi and 5GB of data valid for 5 days. You will also need to deposit CHF 129 and prolonging the rental costs CHF 4 per day but you need to prolong by at least 3 days:
VILLAGES | Jungfrau Region | Grindelwald | Wengen | Mrren | Lauterbrunnen
Pocket Connect - Mobiler Hotspot - Swisscom - Internet-Angebot für Gäste - Surfen - Privatkunden - Swisscom

That's not very cheap in my eyes.

[wco81]

Yeah I have an unlocked Nokia that I forgot to pack. Otherwise, I could slip the SIM in there to check.

I could have used the phone to input the PIN the first time I fired up the Mifi with the SIM. Had to go back to the shop and ask them to activate the PIN for me, which they did.

But disappointing that the Swisscom portal does not display this info, at least not where I could see it.


Maybe in a few years, unlocked LTE devices which support a lot of LTE bands will be cheap. Otherwise, what I have is good for now.

This device is intriguing, for battery life if nothing else:

AT&T’s MiFi Liberate has a touchscreen—and it’s surprisingly useful | Ars Technica

But it's locked to one network so maybe the vendor will make unlocked models of similar devices.

[inquisitor]

I've just dug out my swisscom SIM to see how you can check your balance online.

First there are two ways to log in:
After opening https://sam.sso.bluewin.ch/my/data/M...ageReload=true you can either log in by username and password (given you have created such before) or by clicking on the "NATEL Login" tab and entering your swisscom phone number instead.
If you select the latter method you will receive a six-digit code valid for 15 minutes by SMS through which you can log into the customer portal. This should work for you as your Mifi can receive SMS, which you can read through its web interface at http://192.168.1.1

Now you should see an item representing your number "Mobile 079 xxx xx xx" where it says below "Credit top up", "Set up device", "Current calls".
Just click on "Mobile 079 xxx xx xx" and you will see a "summary" showing your current balance.


By the way you can also enter, disable or change PIN codes from your Mifi's web interface.

[wco81]

When I click that link, I'm already logged into Customer Center, with the login I registered the other day.

I click "Bills & Costs" and it wants to do an identify check (when it sent me the SMS, it welcomed me by name). So I have to use a fixed network number, a mobile number or some mailing which takes 2 to 3 days. I enter the mobile number of the SIM but it says I have to enter the valid mobile number of an SME customer.

Oh and looks like today, it reverted to Natel EAsy Smart, after the support tech in chat changed it over to BeFree yesterday, increasing my speeds.

Warning, do not fall for Easy Smart. Speed is too slow to be useful.

[inquisitor]

No, it's not under "bills & costs". I hope this helps:

[wco81]

That helps a lot.

I chatted with someone and they didn't know either. Just said that without a permanent address, I shouldn't even have a login.

But I think it's fairly common for travelers who buy prepaid to use their hotel address. In fact, it wouldn't even accept my US city.