Mobile broadband unlocking becomes reality
THE PRACTICE OF unlocking handsets so that the owner can swap between mobile network operators is well established. The INQ has managed to prove that the same thing now applies to mobile broadband dongles as well.
The last piece of the puzzle – acquiring a SIM only deal – was solved by that great leveller, Ebay. Hence, the INQ has been able to unlock a Huawei E220 broadband dongle and utilise it with a PAYG (Pay-As-You-Go) SIM from Vodafone acquired on Ebay.
Picking Vodafone as the target network was the logical choice given that the operator supports the highest data throughput - 7.2 Mbps – in key parts of the UK.
The catch is that officially Vodafone doesn't sell just the SIM – even though it supplies them for use inside '3G-ready' notebooks from several leading notebook PC suppliers. 3 UK also doesn't sell just the SIM either.
However, these 'grey' SIMs have leaked into the open market via electronic traders operating over Ebay. But the buyer must beware. The first SIM the INQ acquired wasn't HSDPA/3G enabled as sold.
The vendor claimed we must have installed the wrong parameters but the second SIM which arrived by post worked first time with exactly the same parameters that were first suggested to us.
The final obstacle with our 'grey' SIM was topping it up with credit without the use of a credit or debit card. This was achieved by acquiring a standard E-Top up card from the local Vodafone store.
Incidentally, the means of unlocking the Huawei E220 without paying an unlocker for the code was previously described by the INQ here.
And for the Brain of Britain who questioned the INQ's knowledge of unlocking zipped files - you do need extra unzipping software.
It's probably yet another bug in Vista because even renaming the file with the suffix .zip still failed to persuade Windows to recognise the file type of Huawei's update software as being zipped. µ
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Vodacom sells sims on their own in South Africa, and you can just add the 3G pay as you go packages to it and use it. I was doing that with my unlocked Samsung U800 which I got from Virgin Mobile SA, since they didn't offer 3G at the time (and still don't I think). I'd just swap over to the vodacom prepaid sim any time I wanted to use the phone as a usb modem, and that worked fine. 

But that's not uncommon there, since all phones in SA are sold unlocked (by law I think). Had no problems getting 3.6mbps on it so I would assume if they roll out 7.2 it'd work fine as well.

Same phone works fine with a prepaid AT&T sim here in the USA too.
Errhhhh - you were having trouble getting hold of a 3 SIM? 

Do what I did some 6 months ago - go into a 3 shop. Buy a SIM card for £5 (they sell them there you know!). Top it up and buy a PAYG mobile broadband bundle for 30 days.

No need to resort to Ebay! :)
The author is incorrect in stating that 3 do not offer SIM only broadband. I've been using a 3 SIM in a Dell notebook with an internal HSDPA card for the last six months.

SIM is availble here for £10...

http://threestore.three.co.uk/payg/?modem=1&id=1201

Click on 'SIM with Credit' button bar.
I went into 3 and one assitant told me you couldn't get a sim for a mobile broadband dongle, but when I went in again another assistant said that a standard 3G 3 phone sim would work and tried to sell me one for £1.99.
I might go back again and ask a 3rd assistant.
Thanks for the information that you provide. My father presented me a sony ericsson & i got the unlock code from a href="http://www.mobileunlocksolutions.com/" mobileunlocksolutions /a which was unlocked
I unlocked mine using this:
http://www.jhangra.com/blog/2009/07/how-to-unlock-your-3-zte-mf627-usb-mobile-broadband-dongle/