I'm a N900 owner and have a great contract with 3UK (which is now on a rolling 1 month notice period) of £5 for a few 100 calls/texts and an additional £5 for unlimited (1Gb FUP) data.

However I'm traveling to the US - New York - in April, and it would be so useful to have my device connected for checking out ticket information,. tourist information etc. It appears my hotel has free wireless which is a start, but I was thinking about getting a PAYG (prepay) SIM card for my unlocked phone

In the UK prepay SIMS with data start from
£10 ($16) - 3 - 120Mb, 600 texts, up to 90 days
£15 ($25)- as above but with additional 2Gb data for 30 days
£15 ($25)- O2, "unlimited" (think it's 500Mb fup) for 30 days
not sure about tmobile/vodafone - think tmob has same

So anyone traveling to the UK can pretty much get plenty of data cheaply. It also means kids, students, those not earning can also often afford to use data regularly - and indeed 3's £10 offering is used by both of my children.

However I can't see such an offering for the US. Data plans seem to be contract and pricey over there. I was rather surprised for a high tech economy to not see anything attractive

The multiplicity of standards/3G bands doesn't help either. For the N900 tmob is obviously a better option than AT&T as it will allow for HSDPA although edge would be sufficient

Is there also much reselling of mobile spectrum in the US. Don't see a lot of evidence? In the UK we have virgin, tesco, asda ... etc, everyone's at it!

Another example of Europe being more forward in the mobile space?

Has anyone got any recommendations. Since I have wifi in hotel it's not critical, and I expect NYC has a fair share of free wifi around cafes/bars, but I was still surprised........