Which is the Best 3G USB Dongle? – Airtel, Idea, Vodafone 3G Plans

Are you searching for the best 3g dongle in India ? then you have to spend few seconds to read this article. Usually when we talk about 3G dongles, we talk only about Idea 3G, Airtel 3G and Vodafone 3G broadband services. These 3G USB broadband services are very competitive in Indian market and have no much difference in their tariffs and broadband plans. Already Airtel 3G charges have been reduced to 70% to attract more 3G Customers. Following them, Idea has slashed their 3G  charges by reducing to 70%. The new Airtel 3G broadband plans are already dragging so many customers into their turf. And now its Idea turn to get new customers. Seeing this tough competition, we can expect Vodafone to announce their reduced 3G  charges pretty soon.

Airtel vs Idea vs Vodafone: 3G Broadband Plans

Both the Airtel prepaid and postpaid have equal benefits now. And now its Idea turn to attract more 3G users, Looks like their new sachet plan will come handy to many students and youngsters in India. If you consider these points of Airtel 3G and Idea 3G, it is very obvious to know that, it is very difficult to judge which is the best 3g broadband service. There are many ways to prove Airtel is better than Idea and also Idea better than Airtel.

When we consider a dongle to be the best, there are many factors which should be taken into consideration. Like the Speed, Customer support, Connection Errors, Network, Plans, Software updates and many more. Lets check out the pros and cons of these dongles separately. We have used both Idea 3G  broadband and Airtel 3G broadband from a month now. We saw many changes in these services, which are really interesting. Both the Idea and Airtel will allow you to enjoy the 3G speed at a lesser price. But there are few things which make us feel they are not trustworthy. Let us discuss some important features and issues which both of these devices have.

Pros and Cons of Idea 3G Dongle:

The biggest problem of Idea 3G broadband is its poor customer service. No matter how much hard you to try to seek for help, you will never get a straight response. 3G dongle is that kind of a device which needs to be having a good support all the time. Because, you will keep traveling with it here and there and never know what happens next. Another biggest problem of Idea 3g is the document submission. We really submitted our documents for 5 to 6 times in Idea office Hyderabad. They gave many reasons saying we are not responsible for the document rejection. Comon, its a minimum common sense to know that, an Idea 3G customer will go to a Idea 3G customer care to resolve it. They say its not our  responsibility if our documentation team is not responding properly. Idea has always a bad talk about their customer service.

Finally, after a big discussion and fight, our documents are accepted. That doesn’t end the story here. The first week your dongle will run smoothly and have no issues. Later, from the second week, you will see a lot of server errors in connecting the dongle. Each and every time you try to connect the Internet, it says “our remote connection is unable to understand your request”. The 3G servers of Idea are very bad. You will never get a faster 3G speed in the mornings hours. Right from 10am to 11pm, all the servers will be busy. So if you want to browser or enjoy good 3G speed, it has to be from 2am to 6am only. When i am saying good 3G speed, its only up to 3MBPS sometimes. Yes, Idea will tell you the speed goes upto 7MBPS to 21MPBS. But we never saw that speed in a month.

Now the most irritating issue which will really break your head into two pieces. Your device will not be detected sometimes even if you keep on trying to connect it. You have to keep changing the USB ports whenever you face this problem. And by mistake if you dial the customer care number of Idea, they will tell you to remove the dongle, uninstall the device software, re-install it again and then try in another port. This is the biggest joke you will ever hear in your life. But the actual problem will be a server issue which wont recognize the device from same ports. Whatever the reasons may be, you will be irritated with these issues.

Now finally with your irritated mood, you will go to Idea office or Customer Care Center to resolve the problem, they tell you to wait for few hours and then tell the same old story with a troll face, Your device is working fine now. We had some server issues earlier today and they have been resolved now. If we go on talking about the cons of Idea 3G, they will never end. Now coming to the Pros of Idea 3G, The best thing in Idea is, it will show you the amount of data used in the connection manager. You can see the stats of how much data you have used today and how much is left. Because it has only 1GB – 10GB of limited data per month. Apart from this, Idea has a nothing else to stand out separate and unique from others. Keep reading to know about Airtel and Vodafone 3G broadband plans and dongles.

The actual price of Idea 3G Dongle starts from Rs: 1600 for 7MBPS stick and Rs: 4500 for 21MBPS stick. You can check the Idea 3G Broadband Plans and Tariff’s online. Just enter the State and City you are in. Also take a look at the screenshots added below.

Pros and Cons of Airtel 3G:

It has been one month we are testing Airtel 3G USB dongle. We found few issues at the beginning, but they all were fixed with just one update. We will tell you the problem Airtel 3G Dongle has and how it can be resolved. The main complaint of Airtel 3G dongle is its error connection while browsing Internet. Which means, when ever you are trying to browse something, all of the sudden you will find the connection has been lost. If you check the connection manager software, you will find that the Connection has be reset to connect. Each and every time it gets disconnected, you to keep on trying to connect again.

Airtel Connection manager has a connect button at the bottom to connect the Internet. When you browser more than 2hrs or open pages which are heavy or unresponsive, it will automatically disconnect. So you have to connect it again and again and again. Then we found out how the issue can be resolved. We called the customer care, but no use, they always ask you to reinstall your connection manager. The issue which we resolved is already posted in our previous article  Upgrade Your Airtel 3G Dongle Software to Avoid Connection Errors.

After this upgrade, we never found any problem with Airtel 3G at all. The speed is really amazing with nearly 3MPBS to 6MBPS through out the day. We actually feel this is the best USB drive you should ever buy. Make sure you find some good deals in buying the dongle. Because, stores like The Mobile Store, Universal, or any Local stores will offer you dongles at a lesser price. We bought Airtel 3G dongle for just Rs: 999/- in a local store, where it was Rs: 1899 the same day in Airtel Stores. You can find many good deals for Airtel 3G if you start looking for them.

You can check Airtel 3G broadband Tariff Plans online. You have to choose the State and City in the required information to proceed further. Also take a look at the basic 3G broadband plans of Airtel 3G.

Pros and Cons of Vodafone 3G:

Whenever we think of Vodafone, we always keep thinking why Vodafone is so costly. Vodafone has not been friendly to their customers with their 3G services. The tariffs of Vodafone seems to be very costly and not that good enough too. We have reviewed one of our friends Vodafone 3G dongle. The speed will be only up to 2MBPS where you will get around 1MBPS or 1.5MBPS in day time and around 2MBPS in night if you are lucky.

There were no much technical issues with Vodafone 3G dongle, but we got to know some surprising plans of Vodafone, which are not at all impressive. Vodafone dongle costs you around Rs: 1500/- After that you have to pay Rs: 60/- for FRC. You will get Rs: 20 talk time for 3 months. Again you have  to install with another 3G data plan of any one of the following. Just look at the above screenshot to understand the 3G tariff rates.

The worst part in Vodafone 3G is, there is no unlimited plan for 3G. It doesn’t matter if you are a Post paid or a prepaid customer, you have to pay 10paise / 10kb of data usage after the download limit. And now coming to the cons of Vodafone 3G. The funniest part of Vodafone 3G is, the customer care. They will listen to your complaint and act as if they solve it for you. But at the end of conversation, they will tell you to walk to a nearest Vodafone store to resolve the issue. As if we all don’t know how to walk to a nearest Vodafone store.

If you want to find out the latest tariff plans of Vodafone 3G, Just enter your Connection type (Prepaid or Postpaid) and check the list for various broadband plans.

By reviewing all these 3G dongles, we come to a conclusion that Airtel 3G dongle is really amazing if you know how to use it. The best dongle always depends on how well you chose you tariff plans. The cons of above 3G broadband providers are basically experienced by CoolPCTips team and some people who are reading it now. There is nothing personal about what we write here and we are not friends with Airtel. We did this review to just educate the people to get a better 3G dongle. Be wise in selecting your 3G dongle and keep browsing the amazing 3G super fast Internet.