Hungary

[Frank_Costello]

Does anyone know a websites where you can top up Vodafone-HU by credit card online?

[90180360]

Originally Posted by frank_costello

does anyone know a websites where you can top up vodafone-hu by credit card online?

Where to top-up?
You can top up your prepaid card:

• at atms/cash machine and internet banking (otp and k&h banks)
• at any vodafone shop
• at top-up pos terminals (e.g. Post office, petrol stations, newspaper kiosks, lottery kiosks)

Vodafone.hu

[hkr]

Hi,

I live in Hungary and I think I know the market. It would be a long story for one single post, and also, offers change every other day

All I can promise right now is that if you tell me what you want the best option for, I'll try to give you hints.

Mobile internet is not cheap, but a lot depends on how much traffic you want to generate. You can get dedicated data SIMs, or you can get mobile data bolt-ons with a certain amount of traffic.

As for dedicated prepaid data SIMs, all three providers have offers, Telenor has hidden their offer, it is worth taking a peek at 'Djuice Reload Net', which is an alternative to Telenor's own, minute-based offer. Unfortunately I cannot find a link in English, perhaps because their target audience is local youth

T-Mobile and Vodafone both have their flexible prepaids, where you pay for the amount of data you use and not a fixed monthly fee, but these offers are meant for people who only use the card occassionally and do not generate a lot of traffic. Like me. If you know for sure that your traffic will exceed a certain limit a give month, you might be better off with a normal voice SIM with a certain amunt of prepaid gigabytes.

People are different, and the choices are abundant

[hkr]

Originally Posted by Frank_Costello

Does anyone know a websites where you can top up Vodafone-HU by credit card online?

Vodafone - Elektronikus egyenlegfeltöltés

But you'd better speak Hungarian. Enter phone number twice, choose the amount you wanna topup, and click its icon. Amounts over HUF 3000 extend validity with a year. You also are eligible for free minutes or free SMS, you can choose which bonus you want by sending an SMS.

Once you are okay, click on "Feltoltes" and then you can proceed to the payment page.

[90180360]

Thanks for your help, hkr!

I don't know yet if my flat has internet, as I don't have any yet.
I'll soon be on flat hunt though for three days. During those three days it would be perfect to have a sim for calls and a sim for the dongle, so that I don't have to rely on WiFi.

T-Mobile prepaid doesn't look very flexible to me.

Originally Posted by hkr

But you'd better speak Hungarian.

You can also use Google chrome which has Google translate integrated.

[hkr]

Hi,

T-Mobile is not renowned for being the most flexible or cheapest... However, their 'Domino Web' package is sort of copying a similar package of Vodafone. It is for people who need to have a stick ready for emergency, and use it a few times, but cannot/don1t want to commit themselves to paying a monthly fee for something they do not use that heavily. I have the similar package from Vodafone in a backup modem, should my CATV and ADSL connections fail at home, the router automatically uses the 3G. I do not pay a penny apart from topping it up once every year. If I use it, it certainly costs more than it would, but it is still cheaper than paying for X Gbyte each month if I only use it once a year... Another similar card I put in my stick, once every week or so, when I am out with my netbook, I check my e-mail on the road. Only once have I used up more than the free allowance of 50MB/month...


Certainly, if you know you are to use your 3G heavily, you can buy a normal voice SIM and activate a data package. I believe such packages are available with all three providers.


T-Mobile offers the following bolt-ons for voice packages:
Mobile broadband

Vodafone has the following bolt-ons:

Vodafone - Mobil Internet - dij_vitamax


Telenor's offers are around here:
Mobile Online 5 GB - Telenor
Mobile Online 10 GB - Telenor



Telenor has the Djuice brand aimed at young people, their Reload Net package might also be interesting: djuice



Mobile internet is not cheap, and there are no real "unlimited" offers. But if you only use the net moderately (ie. surfing, some emails) a few gigabytes must be enough. For applications like FTP, videos etc, you can be better off by finding a neighbour who can share his internet access with you

Another point to consider is coverage, a lot depends on which carrier has best signal and bandwidth in your area. It is perhaps worth checking before purchase.

[hkr]

Two things I forgot to mention.

a) Vodafone has two APNs. One of them works with compression, ie. they compress pictures, text and everything they can. This means you get less good looking pictures, but a lot less data. If you do not need full resolution of ads and all, you can save a lot by this.

b) It is also worth noting that while Telenor and T-Mobile offer EDGE for the most of the country, Vodafone only has GPRS in areas where their 3G is unavailable. If you travel a lot to rural areas, this can be a factor. But as a matter of fact I have found that EDGE can sometimes actually feel slower than GPRS...

[90180360]

I went with Vodafone and was not disappointed. Didn't do any tests, but speed seemed very fast. Also apparently latency is low, made several flawless calls through VOIP.

[90180360]

Originally Posted by hkr

T-Mobile is not renowned for being the most flexible or cheapest... However, their 'Domino Web' package is sort of copying a similar package of Vodafone.

Ok, maybe I understand now what you're talking about.
I think on their website, there is only information about Domino Net and not Domino Web.
Finally I found information about Domino Web in the Domino Tariff Guide... (page 15, 2.2.12.2.)
I don't like it though as you're paying 490 HUF even if you don't use it and for most usages it's more expensive than Vodafone.

[90180360]

Let's compare:





So for <1.5GB, Vodafone is generally better.
Above 1GB, you might want to get a fixed data plan from T-Mobile (Domino Net M or L), as you high premiums for the flexibility.