New customers signing up between now and Christmas Eve to O2 Mobile Broadband will also receive a FREE Prepay Sony Ericsson T280 with every contract. This fantastic handset has a recommended retail price of £49.99, and features –

• 1.7 inch TFT Display
• MP3 & Polyphonic Ringtones
• 10 MB shared memory
• Bluetooth
• 1.3 MP camera
• SMS & MMS Messaging
• WAP 2.0/xHTML Browser
• MP3 player
• Games
• FM radio
• Up to 7 hours talk time
• Up to 300 hours standby time
• 82 grams weight

This fantastic promotion is only available for the next 5 weeks, so combine that with the O2 50 day Happiness Guarantee and 6,100 unlimited Wi-Fi spots throughout the UK, there’s never been a better time to sign up to O2 Mobile Broadband than today.

> > click here to sign up to O2 Mobile Broadband

Read our O2 Mobile Broadband review

Well today’s the day the Apple iPhone has gone on sale in the UK, as well as in 22 other countries around the world.  Around 100 people were queuing at the Regent Street Apple store, whilst round the corner, Carphone Warehouse saw almost the same amount of people queuing from as early as 7am.

 

 
But what should have been a nice easy day at the office turned into chaos as O2’s in-house system crashed, leaving stores having to process iPhone 3G customers manually. Sources claim software problems linking the Macs in the Apple store to the Windows-based O2 system caused long delays, some customers having to wait up to 4 hours!

One disgruntled customer said -

‘I woke up at 6am and was in queue by 7am, when O2 confirmed the system crash at 9am. I’m now at home waiting for a call from O2 to say when it will be back up and running. And no, I wasn’t allowed to take an iPhone home with me. At least I have it reserved. My local store only had 24 units’

This is the second major setback for O2 in the last week, with their online ordering service also crashing on Monday through weight of demand. Those lucky few who manage to get through and order online will have been looking out of the window this morning waiting for their courier.

The 3G iPhone is not the only new Apple launch today, as existing iPhone owners will no doubt be checking out the release of the new firmware software, iPhone 2.0, that has gone live today with over 500 applications for the touch screen mobile.

Looks like the iPhone mania that’s washing over the world has even managed to infect the companies computers. I was planning to purchase an iPhone myself, but I think I may sit back and watch the show first!

> > click here to shop online with the Carphone Warehouse

> > click here to check out the latest deals at the Carphone Warehouse

O2 Broadband have lowered the prices of their excellent value broadband packages to non-O2 pay monthly mobile phone customers. Their new prices range means that if you don’t have an o2 mobile phone you can now get broadband for £5 cheaper per month – for the duration of your stay with o2 Broadband!

The new prices are as follows :

• Standard Up to 8meg unlimited broadband from only £7.50 for O2 pay monthly customers, standard price £12.50 instead of £17.50
• Premium Up to 16meg unlimited broadband from only £10 for O2 pay monthly customers, standard price £15.00 instead of £20.00
• Ultimate Up to 20meg unlimited broadband from only £15 for O2 pay monthly customers, standard price £20 instead of £25.00

>> Sign up for 02 Broadband from £7.50 a month

>> Read our review of o2 Broadband

All o2 broadband packages include :

• unlimited downloads
• o2 wireless box included - connect up to ten computers at once with In built security
• 100 day money back guarantee
• FREE uk customer service available 27/7
• O2 e-mails to your mobile: its free to recieve up to 1,000 e-mails every month. They appear on your screen like a text message
• 1GB of storage for main email account and 200MB for all the others
• Online calender
• McAfee security included
• Up to 10 email addresses with 1Gb storage space

It’s been a busy couple of months for O2 recently. Hot on the heels of the successful launch of O2 Broadband sees the long awaited launch of the Apple iPhone which hits the stores this Friday 9th November, there is however one catch – you need to either be an O2 customer or willing to switch to them to benefit from this excellent device. The iPhone has sold at astonishing levels in the states and the UK looks set to follow as you will finally be able to make phone calls, store your itunes collection whilst also surfing the internet on a decent sized screen!

The iPhone is available directly from :

• Apple Online Store
• The Carphone Warehouse – Get the Apple iPhone
• o2 Online

A full review will follow once the product has been launched but in the meantime take a look at this iPhone review from the Guardian

Apple iPhone Tariffs

* Fair usage policy applies. ** Unlimited access to any of The Cloud’s 7,500 hot spots. Subject to fair usage policy

The word on the underground broadband grape vine is that the eagerly awaited o2 Broadband could be launched within a matter of days. We’ve noticed that there are the first signs of an online media campaign with paid search listings appearing in the Google search results offering customers the chance to pre-sign up – this in itself suggests that the launch of o2 Broadband is imminent. According to our sources, the delay in launching their own broadband product following o2’s acquisition of broadband provider BeThere broadband early in 2006 has been caused by several factors.

Firstly, o2 were keen not to go down the same route as rivals Orange whose own broadband product has been poorly received and plagued by problems with customer service. This is especially of concern to o2 given Be Broadband’s excellent reputation for customer service and it’s growing popularity through viral methods. Be Broadband offers customers up to 24 meg speeds and this, coupled with its great customer service and competitive price point, has seen its popularity rocket, particularly now that it is available in far more areas than it has been historically. O2 Broadband are now faced with the tricky decision as to whether to drop the Be Broadband brand or to run with two broadband products simultaneously which are effectively competing with each other! (more…)

Hot on the heels of picking up the Apple iPhone contract o2 have announced that their broadband packages are soon to go live. O2 purchased Bethere broadband in August 2006 and since then the broadband world has been waiting for an announcement as to when the super fast broadband would be bundled with the o2 phones. O2 are now taking registrations and no firm date has been set yet but we’re thinking a Christmas launch would make pretty good business sense!

>> Read more about o2 broadband

As predicted previously in this blog O2 have beaten off stiff competition from other mobile phone providers such as Vodafone to sign a deal for exclusive distribution rights for the Apple iPhone within the UK. According to an article written in the Guardian O2 won the bidding war by reputedly signing a deal which would give up to 40% of the revenues it makes back to Apple!  Although O2 have sole rights to the distribution they will also be using Carphone Warehouse outlets to sell the device on O2 contracts to gain maximum exposure for the must have gadget for 2007 – in fact Apple have already shipped it’s first 1 million units with a target of 10 million by the end of 2008 as the product is rolled our worldwide. (more…)