Wireless 3G router Huawei E5331: Freedom of Roaming with Local PrePaid Data SIM

As a frequent traveler overseas I am faced often with the dilemma of roaming data fees for my smart phone and limited ability to get data to my Android Tablet and/or laptop. My home carrier is Verizon which does allow my smartphone to access data from global partners. However, this possibility is pretty expensive with the data coming in 100MB bundles for $25/per unit. While this does allow some flexibility to access my email and do a little bit of data (for browsing or mapping) it does add up very quick.




After a previous one week trip created overages in the sum of 400 MB at a cost of additional $125 on top of my typical monthly fixed costs. The boss was not too happy about this development and I sought alternatives to this arrangement.

We had used in the past a rental data roaming unit by XComGlobal which allowed for "unlimited data" at a cost of $15/day rental. I used it for a two week trip to Germany and Switzerland recently for a total of $280 in costs (rental daily rate + shipping). The results were good, I used some nearly a GIG in data over that period and was freely using it for my Laptop, Tablet, and smartphone. Mostly VOIP calling, some media up-downloading, and assorted browsing. Some cost avoidance and much more use than if I had been tied to my plans rates.
     
Unfortunately, it is not a very good spending reduction. So the next trial is to own the modem and buy locally a pre-paid data plan. With pre-paid data plan I gain much more flexibility and security for use. I ordered an Unlocked Huawei E5331 (Wireless Hspa 21m Pocket Wifi 3g Mobile Modem 21mbps). Then purchased at the local airport a pre-paid sim card for DATA.  In this case I opted for a Swisscom Natel Easy Data prepay. Which had a nominal cost of $20 (19CHF). This prepaid sim came with a $20 credit and a plan rate of $9/100MB.  This represents a 70% reduction from roaming with my home carrier, and potential savings from the rental of the XComGlobal unit as my daily use seemed to land around 40-60MB in a day.
After this first trip I can say that the Huawei Wireless 3G modem is pretty reliable. I have had the SIM installed for now two days (actually 3 days but registration of the SIM with Swisscom took longer than typical as the re-seller had misfiled some of the important information on my order).

My Wireless 3G router with sim card installed

After the card was successfully activated I used the data plan to handle all my data from my phone and tablet for a full day and a half. In that time I used close to 90MB. I will admit that I got pretty greedy with the data initially and pulled down lots of high res photos to show some friends while we were drinking, which is not typical volume. I also used data at work to do much of my heavy lifting. But for general tourist type of use I think the 100MB should last me 1-3 days variably.

source: http://www.kiphakes.com

With the simcard installed in the device I next had to join the WLAN established by the Huawei device and establish the connection. Each device comes pre-configured with a FACTORY set Broadcast SSID and WPA encryption key. You will need that to join the network for the first time.

By using the browser I accessed the admin control dashboard at http://192.168.1.1 . With most SIM card there will be a PIN and your will be prompted for the PIN prior to viewing the controls. Fortunately the device is enabled to remember the PIN and associate the PIN to a particular "Profile" that it will use for the same sim card each time you power the unit up. Therefore PIN entry is something you only have to do once for the device.

source: http://www.kiphakes.com

From there you can perform the typical WLAN settings that you might like. For instance I changed my devices SSID and WPA encryption key. Doing this through wireless is a little bit dodgy, as if I mis-remember the WPA key immediately after setting it I could lock myself out of the unit. IF that happens one cam perform a hard reset to put the unit back to factory settings (hopefully avoiding bricking the unit).

Once the initial configuration is done the unit will break the current WLAN connection and you will have to "re-join" the network. Using the new SSID and WPA key, or course.  After this configuration is complete and the SIM card is successfully registered to the network you should be in business.

I spent a lot more time in the WEB interface for the admin functions as I had to keep checking to see if the data from the carrier had yet been registered. With the SIM that I purchased APN and all other settings were automatically read from the card. So no issues there, but I did have to frequently while negotiating with Swisscom tech support manually attempt to get the device to register to the network.

Android App homescreen (source Google Play)

There is also an APP for iOS and Android devices.  The App provides some control over the device, however with the unit I have you cannot "force" device to enable data. Only in the WEB interface can you define Automatic or Manual connection prompts, and define roaming privileges.  This was a bit of a pain. i did successfully trick the unit by setting my Phone and Tablet browser to use a "desktop client" then go directly to 192.168.1.1 from the mobile devices browser; but it is not ideal as the interface is then very small. But fully functional.

Connected devices and Blocked devices views; Source GooglePlay

Power use and data tracking from the App is pretty useful as well as the ability to view which devices are logged in at one time. Up to 5 devices can join the wireless network and even one device can "tether" via usb and connect. However, a device driver is required and you will want to be on some other network when initiating the first USB contact.

So far so good. I will next set my Eye-Fi Wireless SD card to use the data connection from to upload pics direct from the camera and see how that goes. This will likely drive up my DATA usage, but will greatly simplify the use of my non-phone based camera while traveling.