Virgin Media Mobile Broadband USB Modem Comments

Whilst you say Virgin is very upfront about their 3G coverage. They are also very confused. The page your article links to clearly says mobile broadband = 3G = 85% coverage.
But then on their more upfront "Mobile Broadband" home page it says:
"With Mobile Broadband you're connected to the internet through our mobile phone network which covers 99.5% of the UK"
http://www.virginmobile.com/vm/genericContent.do?contentId=mobile.broadband.howdoi.sm374

A warning to all existing Virgin Media customers who also have Virgin mobile phones i.e. 2 phones. Having the mobile broadband dongle counts as a third 'sim' and it takes at least 72 hours to get clearance for this on your account. I've just spent an afternoon on the phone with Virgin Customer Services trying to get this sorted out. All I got was an apology and the offer to upgrade my home broadband at an extra cost to myself !!!!!!

I am currently having problems with the Virgin dongle.
I have managed to install it once on Windows XP Pro (SP3) on a Dell laptop but I can't see the modem device on my Scaleo L desktop running XP Home (SP3) or on my Gateway Win2K (SP4) portable. Note that only the Professional version of Win2K is supported (although this is not clear from any documentation).
I can also not see the modem device on my Linux EEE PC 900 and when running Ubuntu on my Scaleo and my Gateway.
This points to a possible firmware problem in the dongle. I am waiting for a replacement and will report back on progress but it is strange that I can see the USB virtual CD drive and install the software, but not see the modem device.