Best mobile broadband?

[stann]

Will soon be getting mobile broadband for the laptop. Have eircom wired at home at the minute and to be fair I find it good, but am getting to the stage now where I'll need it out and about.
I do need a good hefty bandwidth though, and something cheaper than eircom (not difficult I'd imagine!) would be nice. Also there's coverage issues into the mix now too. Would need good nationwide coverage, not just the southeast.
Anyone have any recommendations?

[OneRedArmy]

What do you mean by "hefty bandwidth"?

What do you get on your Eircom fixed line?

As a comparison, I (allegedly) get 3mb on my fixed Eircom product. I occasionally use a three usb dongle that never seems to get over 1mb and frequently much, much less.

From anecdotal evidence, the 3.6mb speeds HSPDA promises are never delivered on in Ireland by any provider, not even close.

But three do seem to be about the worst of the lot.

[stann]

What do you mean by "hefty bandwidth"?

What do you get on your Eircom fixed line?

Hefty would be the 3mb or thereabouts. The theoretical 3mb anyway, which I do get some way close to with eircom much of the time in fairness.
Thing is, and I don't know enough about mobile broadband to know what's available, but if it turned out that round about the 1mb is the most you could hope for then I'd probably look at keeping the fixed one and getting a mobile dongle as well.
That was another one of my technophobe questions, but from what you said I take it there's no problems with compatibility if I had the two types then?

[paul_oshea]

its all about the contention rate lads. 3mb is all well and good on a low contention rate on a high one is SFA.

[stann]

Bumping this to see if anyone has any more recommendations.

High bandwidth (with decent contention rate ) required, or failing that, the ability to easily co-exist with the eircom fixed line.