If you’ve read my previous article, you know that I carry a mobile broadband hotspot with me when I travel abroad. I was recently in Singapore, and researched the data SIM options there.

SingTel and M1 sell prepaid data SIM cards, but they are recharged with a dollar amount from which data charges are then deducted. The best value I found was the StarHub MaxMobile Prepaid Internet Plans. A five-day unlimited SIM with an advertised speed of 7.2Mbps is SG$18. There is also a SG$32 MaxMobile Prepaid SIM card, the value on which can be used to activate flexible access periods from 1 hour to 60 days. While most of these offers have a fair usage policy of 2GB per day, the 30 day and 60 day periods have 2GB and 3.5GB data caps, respectively. If you use a lot of data, you’d be better off recharging every few days for unlimited use.

I never ran a speed test, but I also never encountered unacceptable speeds. Technology that is forgettable is good technology. You want to be thinking about your work, not your Internet connection, and that was exactly my experience.

The cards are perforated at both the full-size and microSIM form factors, so you don’t have to hunt for a different product for microSIM devices like iPads.

If you need to modify your device’s APN settings, “shppd” is the correct APN for StarHub MaxMobile Prepaid Internet. Username and password fields should be left blank.

You can purchase the MaxMoble Prepaid Internet SIM cards at StarHub Shops, 7-11, Cheers, and the UOB Foreign Exchange counters at Changi Airport.

You can find full details of the StarHub MaxMobile Prepaid Internet plans here…

http://www.starhub.com/content/broadband/onthemove/maxmobileprepaid.html