Use of SIM card and router to obtain internet

[dillsquatt]

Our contract is coming to an end with our current TV and internet provider.

We are moving to Satellite TV therefore once off payment. It leaves us with just internet with current provider and the price they are quoting is still quite high probably penalising us for not taking TV up with them again.

We are thinking of just buying a router and buying a SIM card – we both work from home (mainly) and will use internet for Netflix and Amazon but not much else. Do you think router and SIM card would suffice for our purposes?

Thanks

 

[jpd]

That will depend on the coverage in your area

 

[ClubMan]

We are thinking of just buying a router

I presume you mean a 4G or 5G router?

and buying a SIM card – we both work from home (mainly) and will use internet for Netflix and Amazon but not much else.

What's your usual monthly download usage?
Most SIM only packages will have a monthly cap on usage.
E.g. 48's €12.99 offer comes with 200GB after which the fair usage limit kicks in and your data may be cut off.
As far as I recall most or all others have much lower caps.
E.g. see here - and note that "unlimited" usually doesn't actually mean "unlimited" as there's usually some fair usage policy cap.

Ireland's best SIM-only deals | Cheap SIM only deals | 4G & 5G

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Do you think router and SIM card would suffice for our purposes?

As @jpd says, depends on the coverage/signal strength/demand in your area so difficult to tell in advance.

 

[Enviro]

Hope this might help you

I'm in a rural location and no national broadband rollout here yet meant I explored alternative options.

For the initial 18 months after moving in, we used a three Sim (all you can eat data) for 20 euro per month in a 4g router bought in Argos for around 100 euro and positioned it in the attic.

Coverage is very poor here generally but actually up the extra height of the attic we were picking up coverage.
Netflix worked well enough, the very occasional buffer but mostly solid performance.

General browsing all ok too.

Heavier things like updates and streaming live weren't great.

Speed test was showing low sub 5 meg on average download, upload a little less if I recall correctly.

If I was going through it again I'd test on a sim in a phone in the areas around the property including the attic. Do this before buying the router. I discovered the attic coverage by accident, just up there one day doing a bit of work and notifications started coming in.

For 20 per month it was a great option for us when stuck with limited options.

More recently I got Starlink , night and day comparison. Easy setup and I would recommend it.
Also 3 times the price but worth it in my opinion as the connection is above 75meg download mostly and upload is 10 to 20 meg on average (at least when I've tested it)
No performance issues as of yet, no buffering or outages.
Multiple users and live content streams without issue.

 

[dillsquatt]

Hope this might help you

I'm in a rural location and no national broadband rollout here yet meant I explored alternative options.

For the initial 18 months after moving in, we used a three Sim (all you can eat data) for 20 euro per month in a 4g router bought in Argos for around 100 euro and positioned it in the attic.

Coverage is very poor here generally but actually up the extra height of the attic we were picking up coverage.
Netflix worked well enough, the very occasional buffer but mostly solid performance.

General browsing all ok too.

Heavier things like updates and streaming live weren't great.

Speed test was showing low sub 5 meg on average download, upload a little less if I recall correctly.

If I was going through it again I'd test on a sim in a phone in the areas around the property including the attic. Do this before buying the router. I discovered the attic coverage by accident, just up there one day doing a bit of work and notifications started coming in.

For 20 per month it was a great option for us when stuck with limited options.

More recently I got Starlink , night and day comparison. Easy setup and I would recommend it.
Also 3 times the price but worth it in my opinion as the connection is above 75meg download mostly and upload is 10 to 20 meg on average (at least when I've tested it)
No performance issues as of yet, no buffering or outrages.
Multiple users and live content streams without issue.

thanks so much that is very helpful. Must look into the Starlink option.

 

[dillsquatt]

thanks everyone for replies, very helpful

 

[Blackrock1]

We pay 35 a month for 500mb Fibre, is what you are being quoted more or less than that?

 

[Marsupial]

I have a GoMo sim in my phone that gives me 120Gb of data a month. The missus has a 48.ie SIM in her phone that gives her 100 Gb of data a month. We alternate between using our phones as hotspots and are able to work, rest and play comfortably with the combined 220 Gb every month. (GoMo costs €9.99 a month, 48 costs €7.99 a month so we're getting this for €18.)

It would cost us €5 more a month to upgrade one of the SIMs to 5G, but we haven't yet felt any need to do so.

One extra benefit of this setup is that 48 uses the Three mobile network and GoMo uses the eir network, so if one is down, the other is normally still working which matters to us as we are in a remote area of the country with coverage from only one cluster of antennas.

 

[Leo]

We are moving to Satellite TV therefore once off payment.

Just be aware that satellite TV's days are numbered as providers including Freeview are reducing content being streamed over that medium in favour of IP services.