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Thinking of sending back MiFi4510 and using Thunderbolt as Mobile Hotspot

Right now I'm paying $20/month for 300MB on my phone, plus $50 a month for 5GB on the MiFi, so that's less than 6Gigs for $70. For the same $70, I could send back the MiFi (just got it, it's still within the return period) and start using my Thunderbolt's mobile hotspot capability, and get 12 gigs per month. However, I talked to a Verizon agent who said the drawback would be that I couldn't make or receive phone calls while using my phone as a hotspot, plus he said the upload/download speeds could be slower than the old Mifi-to-computer connection. Does anyone have experience, opinions or advice? Thanks

Comments

Wildman

That information is incorrect, the Thunderbolt is the only device that allows voice and data on 3G and 4G, I have the TB and I have made and received calls while I had 4 devices using my hotspot, taking the Mifi back and use TB is a smart decision..

I havent had any issues making calls and using my Hotspot from my TB... Go for it....

abdiziriel

I can't believe how many lies can customer service say just to keep people buying their stuff. Yes, you can use your Thunderbolt for hot spot and talk, text or even surf the web on your device at the same time. Return that and get HotSpot.

GabeGregoire

DONE DEAL, THANKS MAN!!!

John_Getzke

Some questions for you on this subject:

1. Would you say that the TB hotspot feature is more stable than the MiFi, about the same, or worse?

2. Have you noticed disconnections, slow surfing or misc errors that would be exclusive to the MiFi?

3. Does the TB create a true WiFi hotspot connection that appears and functions like a home wireless network? Or are there software and drivers, blue tooth or Ad Hoc networks involved?

Being that I do not have a TB to compare I would assume more traffic (voice and data) over the same 3G connection would hurt performance. I'd think the same traffic over 4G would be fine due to the abundance of bandwidth on those channels.

Wildman

John Getzke wrote:
Wildman,
Some questions for you on this subject:
1. Would you say that the TB hotspot feature is more stable than the MiFi, about the same, or worse?
2. Have you noticed disconnections, slow surfing or misc errors that would be exclusive to the MiFi?
3. Does the TB create a true WiFi hotspot connection that appears and functions like a home wireless network? Or are there software and drivers, blue tooth or Ad Hoc networks involved?
Being that I do not have a TB to compare I would assume more traffic (voice and data) over the same 3G connection would hurt performance. I'd think the same traffic over 4G would be fine due to the abundance of bandwidth on those channels.

1. I haven't used the MIFI but I can say my connection has been very stable, I have one location I visit that has no internet connection and have used multiple device to the web with the TB hotspot without noticing any difference from my home wifi. So I can say it is pretty stable.

2. Browse for hours with phone in my pocket and haven't had any disconnects or slow browsing but like all internet connection if the network has heavy traffic the connection could slow down but I havent noticed it yet.

3. The Mobile Hotspot functions exactly like a home network router, you can configure a security WEP, WPA or WPA2 encryption where the user requires a password (Phrase Key) to connect or you can remove security and on the device it will read a open wifi connection. You can also set the connection manager so that any along attempt requires you to authorize it from your device before the user can use the connection.

At times I have used my Hotspot and forget that I am using my phone and power down laptop and forgot to disable my Hotspot so the security connection manager is nice.

Hope that clearly answered your questions.. If not let me know and I will help where I can.

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