WiFi on Oceana ?

[Southendweather]

:confused:

I have a great interest in the weather and the internet is great for upto date charts, satellite images etc, so whenever I go away I always take a netbook with me as WiFi is generally freely available in most hotels etc Worldwide. My Wife reads a lot and with a number of days at sea it would be nice to keep up to date on weather matters ~ a Biscay Gale !

http://www.southendweather.net/

 

Now I read that WiFi is available all over the ship but would like to know what experiences people have had and how reliable it is?

 

1. Does it work in your room ~ I have read reviews that indicate there are only hotspots?

 

2. How does the 'time plans' work ? 250 minute gift plan (280 minutes ~ 4.7 hours) ? Sometime I may download and then disable the WiFi to read or view etc.

 

3. How much does it actually cost for a 12 day cruise, 25p to 35p per minute + £2.50 (£65 to £90).

 

4. Are there any other deals, like unlimited, and how much ?

 

5. Finally, how releieable is it, how fast, does it drop in and out etc. I would hope for the cost it would be OK, but I need convincing.

 

Many thanks...

[BrianI]

All P&O ships now have wifi and I have experienced it on Aurora, Oriana and Ventura. It will probably work from your cabin but there is no guarantee. It worked from all the cabins I have been in and various parts of the ship. However it is extremely slow (remember dial up?) and can frequently drop out. The time plans only clock up for the time you are actually connected to the Internet. You can access the P&O website free for what it's worth.

 

The best thing to do it to find a wifi spot when you are ashore. There are usually plenty around these days - just follow the crew.

Brian

[CCFC]

If you are using an Apple product to connect remember to go to logou.com as it has been reported that sometimes they stay connected ever though you have closed your browser.

 

Its a bit iffy but I find using your own device is quicker (but by no means fast!) than the internet café on the ship.

[Southendweather]

My Netbook runs Windows 7 starter, so not an 'apple' issue. Quite easy to just disconnect from the internet and re-connect, so should be able to save time used, a bit of a faff all the same, especially if it's slow speed as you could use all your time up waiting for it to download.

 

I wasn't intending taking it on shore with me, although I have seen crew outside certain places with their laptops in the Caribbean. Also, it looks like P&O are cutting short the time at any port, for finincail reasons I dare say and we have trips booked for 3 locations.

 

Be interested in any other experiences before I ring P&O up, as the information is a bit vague on the questions & answers and I will read between the lines what I am told officially as I'm sure they will be keen to take some money off me :rolleyes:

[Host Sharon]

Welcome to Cruise Critic Southendweather. Keep a look out in Horizon daily paper as very often they have internet specials such as buy a package and get 20 mins extra free or the like.

[Southendweather]

I emailed P&O and in all fairness got a reply back within 24 hours, but to be honest I don't know any more than I already knew. They keep saying when in port you should be able to pick up your own provider, but I didn't think WiFi would work with this and as far as data is concerned I switch this off on my phone as it costs an arm and a leg. So I was anticipating using the ships satellite internet most of the time. I may call the customer contact centre regarding gifts, as I may get more than just the 'corporate' reply. My gut feeling is I won't really be able to do what I was hoping, but may take it along to see and report back.:rolleyes:

[CCFC]

If you look along the walls when going to your cabin there are WIFI repeater points all along the corridor, if your room is close to one of those you should be fine. With ships walls being steel they have to have them fairly close together to get the signal out.

[Southendweather]

OK, I've pre booked 250 minutes, for the record for the Canaries trip this works out at £62.50, expensive, but hey ho. I think this gives you 280 minutes. I'm interested to see how it works and performs etc.

 

The Oceana is one of the older ships so WiFi only works in the following: Deck 7: Cyb@ Study, Library, Deck 5: The Atrium Lobby & Explorers Bar:cool:

 

I hope this helps anyone else thinking of using it on board.

[Southendweather]

WiFi on board Oceana E320 to the Canary Island.

Speed with a download test showing 1.83Mbs and upload speed of 0.92Mbs.

A bit of a problem in that they had no record of me pre-booking via phone, the 250 minute package.

However, once confirmed they will just remove amount from cabin bill.

A number of applications are blocked, such as P2P and Skype, due to the bandwidth.

Quite easy to log off, thus stopping the clock running, as it were, so you just need to be careful.

But on the whole, for what I use it for, works better than expected.

Message sent while on ship to the west of Portugal.