Internet & Mobile Phone Service on Princess Cruises

[BayCalif-Ariz R Us]

There have been several other Threads discussing these subjects, and I wanted to post what I know about it for the benifit of others.

 

My name is Alan I am a Techie type and have been on several Princess ships in the past few years and have followed this topic.

 

Princess Cruises has contracted with MCP [Maritime Communications Partner] to provide internet as well as mobile phone service on ALL of there ships.

 

I would think it would take some time to get all the ships working as it does require the addition of a new satellite dish, wi-fi hot spots and pico-cell sites throughout the ship. This also requires a lot of data cable to be installed. I know on the Grand Princess they did it earlier in 2008 while the ship was on a cruise, pull cables and hot up the hot spots. Other ships will get the change when it is feasible or they are in for maintenance or dry dock.

 

On the program side or software side, the older system required you to slide your room card to log on. You were automatically billed for the time or the package, and if you were elite or platinum status you receive your free package would appear as a credit on your room bill. This system was not available to wireless users, probably because there was no way to identify you by your card. If I remember correctly, wireless users had to pay by the minute even if you were elite or platinum under this system.

 

The new system is called "CompterAtSea" and is available now on most princess ships both in the intenet cafe and by wireless in any area that has wireless.hot spots installed In this system, you get a login screen where you enter your initial followed by your last name and cabin number, thus "asmithc505" could be a log in. The initial password would be your date of birth and after you enter that you have to create a new password. If you sign up for a package, it is good as long as the minutes last, especially if you are doing back to back cruises, it will carry over. I did this on a recent cruise on the Caribbean Princess, and my minutes were good on the second cruise until they ran out. Then I had to get a new package.

 

When the ship has been equipped with wireless hot spots throughout, you can usually access the internet from your cabin, and most of the public areas. The ship has the ability to turn on or off the various hot spots so if they do not want you using your lap top in the explorer lounge, they will turn it off.

 

I noted that each cabin deck usually has about 6 hot spots. They are in the hall way, they look like smoke detectors but are actually internet wireless acess points. Usually three in each passageway, one forward, one midship and one aft. If you are a real internet junkie, best book a cabin with a hot spot right outside your cabin.

 

I have used the wireless on the Grand Princess and it works throughout the ship, On the Caribbean Princess, only in some of the public areas, but it should all be upgraded in the first quater of 2009 when the ship goes into drydock.

 

Mobile Phone service is called "CellAtSea" is also provided by MCP. The system is an independent carrier with roaming agreements with most US cell phone carriers. You are not really on Sprint or Verizon or ATT but those phones will work. The technology they use is both GSM and CDMA as used by typical US systems. Your carrier will bill you accordinally. It is best to check with your carrier for rates and roaming agreements. I am not sure about the European GSM systems, or if they work. I have not tried that yet, maybe someone else can comment. The ship can usually turn on or off the various Pico-Cell sites around the ship. I know they have the sites located in the various dining rooms and enertainments lounges off during a cruise but can turn them on when they are in a disembarkation port.

 

One thing that all must remember, the ship uses satellite service. All of the satellites are over the Equator and when you are in an areas where there is good satellite coverage it all should work. When I was on the Grand Princess earlier this year, I found out that in many of the Med ports, the service would not work because of interference to the Satelitte System on the ship. I hope they get this fixed. I also found when I was on the Star Princess earlier this year on an Alaska cruise, the coverage was sporatic the further North we got. The Satellite coverage was blocked by the various mountains in the Inland Passage that were to the South. No Internet was available in these areas.

 

I am interested in hearing about experiences from various users of WiFi and Cell Phone services on Princess cruises.

 

You are welcome to email me at wa6aga@pacbell.net

 

Alan [Just a retired fellow cruisesr

[BayCalif-Ariz R Us]

One other point of interest in using Mobile Telephone Service or Cellular Service at sea, the ships will usually have their on board systems turned on only when they are International Waters as to avoid interference and problems with the Terrestrial based systems. This is typically 12 nautical miles or more. When they are in port or not in International Waters, they have to turn off there mobile telephone system. If the ship is sailing along a coast or in port, you should only get the local service.

 

Alan

[malindac]

I called my service provider (Sprint) yesterday to make sure my phone included international calls. It did not, so I'm glad I called :). It was easy to add and there is no monthly or service charge.

 

The Sprint rep. did warn me that sometimes the ship does have it's phone service on in port. For my service, ship charges were over $2 per minute and less than $2 on land (in Mexico ports). She recommended making all calls in port off the ship. Of course, she was not talking about Princess in particular. She just said they get calls from people complaining about being charged the higher price while onboard but in port. Especially on embarkation and disembarkation when they think they are using their regular service.

[Spender Nui]

Hi Alan and thanks for the information. We're just off the Emerald. Had our own notebook and was able to use it in most public locations. We had a stern cabin and couldn't couldn't connect there. We mostly used Skywalkers because we were all the way aft.

[Pam in CA]

Thanks! Excellent explanation. I know that AT&T charges only $5.99/month for international roaming so you can use your cell phone while outside the U.S.

[TravelnAl]

Thanks! Excellent explanation. I know that AT&T charges only $5.99/month for international roaming so you can use your cell phone while outside the U.S.

 

For $5.99, you get to make calls in most countries for $0.99/min. If you have the int'l. service but don't pay the $5.99, the cost is $1.29/min.

[BayCalif-Ariz R Us]

The following are some of the things that I have learned about using my Lap Top and wireless connection on Princess Cruises.

 

It was pretty easy to connect and receive view the log in page. All you have to do is provide your user name and a password and they tell you how to do that.... Then you select a plan. For a 7 day cruise you can get 150 minute for 75.00. You are billed automatically on your room bill and if you are entitled to free time, they give you a credit.

 

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The first thing I did was to use my Outlook program to access my email accounts as well as my wife's. Between the two of us we have 9 mail boxes. Four at cox.net, four at pacbell.net and one at register.com... Using the POP3 protocol in Outlook, I was able to receive over 40 messages from all the mail boxes in just under 4 minutes. I would then log off and we would read our messages off line and respond. The next time I logged in, we would get a new batch and any of the previous messsges we responded to would be sent out using SMTP protocol....

 

Logging onto each account with a webmail browser, would have taken 30 minutes or more each time we did check e-mail and attempt to reply.

 

If you have someone that is always sending graphics or pictures, tell them not to while you are on a cruise. The graphic enclosed messages eat up minutes while they download.

 

Some free mail boxes do not allow you to get your email using POP3 and SMTP unless you pay for it.... They want you to read there graphic heavy advertising before you can to go your mail box.

 

Don't forgot to bring your email address with you as you need them to create email messages off line.

 

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Before you leave home, disable any automatic updates that may occur on programs that you use. When you are logged in, you may get stuck with some program you have downloading updates which you may not be able to get out of properly until it finishes... I learned about this on the Grand when I first used my laptop. I got several Windows updates as I had not used my lap top in a while... Other programs that routinely check are Adobe and your anti virus software.

 

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If the Log Out screen gets closed by you or somehow, you can get it back by typing 1.1.1.1 in the URL line.

 

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The system does block some programs from running, maybe because they do not want you talking on a voice connection or using data intense programs. I know that Skype will not work nor will Slingbox.

 

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I do not use my normal home page which is full of news... It takes time for all the photos and graphics to download. After I get the Princess home page, I use the favorites button on my browser to go place I need to visit. Most of the time a site may have a graphics free page for dial-up access or those without high speed internet...

 

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I would like to hear from others that have had experience using a lap top connect to the internet through the ships wireless and connected to some sort of external program. You can post here or send me an email at

 

wa6aga@cox.net

 

Alan

[cdngrl]

i was on the grand nov 10-22. i'd brought my laptop and was able to log on to my hotmail account every day. (italy, turkey, greece, egypt). i was expecting problems on our sea days in the med, but internet worked fine. i had an aft cabin (caribe deck 10) and had no issues logging on. i also used skype a handful of times without a problem. loved having my own computer as i would write my travel blog in word and then just copy and paste into my hotmail email.

[Pushpop]

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