3G USB modem

As I'm working from home at the moment I need to get outside now and then, and have started going to the nearest Starbucks after lunch. I can do most stuff off-line, and it's nice to have people around you, even though they're strangers. Only thing is, that sometimes I really need an internet connection, which was why I bought a 3G USB model from 3 (they have an offer with pay-as-you-go for £15 per month for three GB of data - cost of modem: £99).

Having bought the thing on the way to Starbucks, i expected to be online in matter of minutes...but I wasn't. After having figured out that I needed the other of the two supplied usb cables (the one with two usb plugs in one end) to get the device to register as a CDROM drive, I installed the software without a problem. But it wouldn't connect. I called 3 a few times, but everything seemed to be fine with my account and they even helped me apply my pay-as-you-go voucher to see if it did any good. Nothing helped.

After a while I gave up, and decided I needed an internet connection to figure out what was the problem (talk about a catch 22...) so I tried again once I was back home. I googled the error message and tried all sorts of weird and/or logical things, but nothing worked. It must be the device then? No...plugging it into my iBook (and installing the software) i was able to get online in a few minutes!

I tried a few other things, gave up for a while and watched Casino Royal instead, and in the end started uninstall all sorts of stuff from my laptop. I've had a lot of bluescreens lately, so something must have been acting up because after having removed almost everything, I re-installed the software, plugged in the modem and was online in no time. Why is it, that stuff like this always happens on Windows? I suspect it was a conflicting driver problem or something like that (even though the manual for the modem mentioned that it would work if programs like Nero, DVD Shrink etc. was enabled/installed?!?!) so now I have to start from scratch and see what I can install and still be able to use the 3G modem

How I wish i could have had a MacBook Pro with parallels instead :)