Mobile Network Comparison

Asda have really stepped up the game after the price for the HTC Sensation XE plummeted this week. The phone was only released a few months ago and cost over £450 at the time. But, if you’re quick can now grab it online for only £329. You even get a free pair of Beats headphones worth over £80.

The HTC Sensation XE is one of the most high end handset on offer from the mobile phone giant. It comes packed with a 1.5 GHz dual core processor, the latest more-beautiful-than-ever HTC Sense 3.6 software as well as Google’s Ice Cream Sandwich and a 1080p HD 8 megapixel camera. And interacting with the phone is a pleasure thanks to its beautiful qHD screen.

HTC is one of our favourite mobile phone manufacturers, and the HTC Sensation XE does not disappoint. In fact, having used this handset, we actually prefer it to the iPhone 4S. It is certainly a good product to look at and feels solid in your hand whilst not being too big or bulky. Best of all, thanks to the Beats Audio if you use your phone as a music player it will sound fantastic.

If you want one of the latest and greatest Android handsets but can’t quite afford the Samsung Galaxy SIII (although there are some tricks we can recommend to get the price down) this is a fantastic choice to go for. And there’s no doubt that, if you want a PAYG phone, you can grab a bargain now the price has been reduced by over 25%.

Golly goodness! Big news from Giffgaff towers this week. The network run by you claims that they are paying out a million smackeroos this June.

For those of you who don’t know, Giffgaff works slightly differently to the other networks. They don’t run expensive call centres or pay for price high street leases. Nor do they splash out on billboards and big bucks advertising. Instead they rely on their loyal customers to field the majority of customer support queries and to spread the word about their amazing offers. By saving all this money, not only can they offer the best value deal in the UK, but they also are able to give back to their users by paying out money every six months.

Last December they paid out a total of £250,000 as well as a huge charity donation but they’ve really outdone themselves this time. No matter how you look at it, it’s pretty amazing that they’ve hit seven figures already. We crunched some numbers and ran some polynomial extrapolations and have actually managed to predict how much they’ll pay out next payback period in December this year. Assuming things carry on pretty much the way they’ve been going, we reckon there’s a good chance Giffgaff users will be cashing in over £2 million in six months’ time. Astonishing, eh?

Check out this graph we’ve made:

Wanna get involved and earn a share of the cash next time round? One lucky member actually made over sixteen grand! Can you say “cha-ching”? If you want in, simply order a SIM and sign up and you will be able to start earning as soon as your activate your SIM card.

Did you think that this would ever be possible? Are you a Giffgaff member and if so how much did you earn this time round? Do you think our prediction is accurate? And finally, will this revenue model be able to last?

Following hot on the heels of the merger of Orange and T-Mobile to form Everything Everywhere, Vodafone and O₂ have just announced that they will be joining forces. This can only be good news for consumers who still struggle to get decent 3G and even 2G connectivity even now in 2012. By pooling their resources, O₂ and Vodafone will be able to provide a far better service with superior signal strength and coverage for all their customers.

There will still be some separation between the networks until 2015 but then, they will join and link up all their backend trunk cables across UK. They have promised that, in three years time, there will be lightning-fast 4G coverage for 98% of the British population. It might seem a long way away now, but we can’t wait.

The network sharing agreement will result in there being a total of 18,500 cell tower sites usable by Vodafone and O₂ customers across the country. This is a truly massive amount that even dwarves the 18,000 shared between T-Mobile, Orange and 3 Mobile. Despite the sharing agreement though, O₂ and Vodafone will still compete with each other on the high street and will retain control and sovereignty over the wireless spectrum that they own.

The obvious reason for the two networks to join together is to make them force to be reckoned with in the upcoming 4G spectrum auction. It will put them in a much better position to compete with Everything Everywhere so that they’ll build on providing customers with the best possible service once LTE 4G rolls out across the UK. They will be able to reduce their costs and plough more money into providing 4G connectivity all over the country.

So what do you think? Is this going to be a good thing for the networks and consumers alike? Do you want your 2G and 3G coverage fixed first? And how excited are you about 4G signal on your smartphone?