Compatibilty of cards provided on MTN contract with Vodacom

I am unsure if I should be posting this in this section or in the vodacom section, but working on the principle that I will be mostly paying MTN hopefully thier rep will be able to assist me.

I have been dealing with nashua mobile with the aim of getting:

a mychoice topup contract
a 3G data card

I have rung them a couple of times today, but am getting conflicting information. I wish to primarily use MTN's 3G but am a full time student and when I am at home during the vacation I only get vodacom 3G coverage. I would therefore like to be able to use my existing prepaid vodacom simcard at times.

I have been told by nashua mobile that if I were to get the novatel merlin data card I could only use it on the MTN network, and if I get one of the Vodafone cards I could only use it on Vodacom. This conflicts with a few of the posts on this forum (esp where they compare the MTN and Vodacom 3G speeds both using the merlin card)

Does any data card work on any 3G network and are data cards ever "network locked"

Thanks
D3us

Maybe if you give the exact model you are aiming to get, chances are better I think someone on the forum will have the same one and can check for you.
The service providers are generally clueless.

depends on what card you are using. Vodacom's 3G card in general is network locked onto vodacom. However if u disable pin code request and use the dashboard version 5 and work from the connection in network connections the modem will work. However on Vodacoms card you will need to be using firmware version 14 as well..
The sam concept will apply to MTN. you can use vodacom card in there but again disable pin request and work from your network connections.

The two cards do have different software , so depending on what OS you are running, you may not get the correct driver therefore you may get error messages. And that could be code 10 to error 673 port error.

Rehd

was looking at getting the Novatel Merlin U630, otherwise if that won't work any card that I can get to work on both networks.

If I can get a network locked card to work as detailed in the above post that would solve my problems.

thanks D3us