GlutinousMaximus

Cars appear about the same as European market prices here although the car companies are getting the advantages in production of Thai wages etc. Nice to see the government looking out for the population yet again!

You could be right - prices for Toyota Yaris, Vios and Honda Jazz etc. are probably pretty similar but not sure about pickups though - you can get a 4-door, 2WD, 3 Litre Auto Turbo-diesel-intercooler Toyota Vigo for about 767,000 Baht. Depending on the exchange rate, that's about £11-£12K UKP. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think you'll get them for that in the UK, probably more like £18-20K+ although it's not quite a like-for-like comparison because of extras like satnav, airbags etc. typically offered in the UK market. UK VAT is also more expensive at 17.5%.

UK car prices have been cut quite a lot over the past 10 years or so, and if there is such a thing as a 'floor' price below which the manufacturers/dealers can't realistically go then prices be approaching that, and that price may apply globally. Having said that, UK prices and US car prices used to be pretty much the same in dollars as in pounds so maybe that argument doesn't hold water.

Anyway, don't want to get too far off topic - back to the bikes......are discounts out of the question?

Sorry if this is a silly question but I've been wondering about it for a while...

In the UK, the new car market is very competitive and prices are quite fluid (not sure about bikes though). For example you have:

• Recommended Retail Prices as set by manufacturers and their dealer networks (but there's often a "deal" to be had)
  
• Some dealers may also discount nearly new ex-demonstrators or offer discounts on slow-moving or soon-to-be updated models etc.
  
• "Grey imports" - e.g. right-hand drive models (to UK spec) imported from Europe by specialist firms and sold at lower prices
  
• "Car Superstores" which sell hundreds of new or nearly new cars possibly sourced from EU imports, rental car fleet updates, lease customer returns etc.
  
• Genuine 0% finance offers from manufacturers trying to win market share
  

Canny customers can save thousands of pounds by shopping around.

What's the deal with prices on new Thai motorbikes? The bike market here also appears competitive - there's certainly no shortage of dealers.

Are prices set in stone nationwide by the manufacture/dealer network? Is there any wiggle room - e.g. on slower-moving models or more expensive models?

If the dealer is having a month/quarter of poor sales, can they be tempted by pushing hard for a discount and waving a bundle of cash at them? Can they even offer discretional discounts?

Does anyone know what sort of margins dealers are making on new bikes?

I look at the Leeyanyont price list quite a lot. The site's in Thai, so I'm not sure what they do or whether they supply to the consumer market. Are all the prices listed the standard RRP for each model?

Re: broadband availability, check out www dot adslthailand dot com, which has a comprehensive list of offerings from the various providers. You can check availability by phone number, in the case of DSL, by checking the "Coverage Area" links. (Scroll down, lower left)

This website has no English version, and the DSL availability information is seriously outdated. Apart from that, you have to check availability per ISP. And each of those links will give you a page in Thai....

I'd have to agree. I came across these sites when I was originally looking. While they provide snippets of info here and there they suffer from:

* Inconsistent Thai/English switches - ideally you would set a preference/cookie once on the Home Page and thereafter the whole site displays in English. Never seen one working example of that yet.

* The bling-bling style of web layout favoured over here rather than helpful UI design that guides the eye properly to key content.

* adslthailand dot com appears to be a useful site, yet the "Coverage Area" links are way down "below the fold" on the Home Page and require some serious scrolling to get to - these are very useful links and may be overlooked by many site visitors.

* Missing content - 404 errors etc., URLs moved

As an example, I was toying with the idea of getting a CAT product which was theoretically available in my town. I finally got through to the local CAT office and in my broken Thai managed to establish that the product was available but probably not where my residence was located as it was too far out. As a farang, it was difficult to get at that info - required a fair bit of sleuthing.

Whether or not there is a market for a well-organised Broadband site properly done in Thai & English is a moot point. Not sure if they exist elsewhere - they probably do. Well-organised consumer comparison sites can change hands for big bucks in the West.

All I was really saying in my previous post is that it's tricky to gather all the answers you need about ADSL options in Thailand and to get the information in an accessible way that helps you make informed decisions, and the number of TV posters who constantly ask the same kind of questions would suggest I'm not alone. When I upgraded my Maxnet to Premiere, I only really did it on the basis of mental exhaustion and "better the devil you know" and so far, it's been OK. However had I been apprised of all the available options and well-informed about how a differing product from another provider was likely to perform, I may have gone for it.

Although there is a lot of info on TV, it tends to be unstructured and difficult to find.

A sub-forum is a good idea, but unless there was some kind of order, I fear it's likely to end up being a lot of "voices crying in the wilderness" with much "wailing and gnashing of teeth".

Another TV poster started a topic once suggesting a website with speed test results recorded and posted in graphs etc. but not sure if that got off the ground. It's a good idea in principle though.

When I've tried to do research, I've found it difficult to work out:

* What ISPs operate in my area

* What products they offer - ADSL, DSL, Leased Line, costs of each etc.

* Where there are multiple ISPs to choose from, which is better and what product offering I should choose

* Possible options/permutations - e.g. landline from Company A and ADSL from Company B

* What their performance might be like before I sign the contract

* How well a particular package will support different requirements - Skype, P2P torrents etc,

I would also say that it's not all bad - in my case I've used TOT ADSL and more recently Maxnet. TOT was not as good as Maxnet (in my subjective opinion). After starting off on the Indy package, I'm now on Maxnet Premiere 1536/512 and on the whole am quite happy with it.

Also, sites like Speedtest.net probably hold a lot of historical information & have a rich data set They know for example:

* what date/time tests are conducted.

* roughly the area where tests are being run from

* who the ISP is

* how fast the speedtest was within the country (if tested)

* how fast to international servers (if tested)

* ISP rating (if provided)

If TV could affiliate with them or anopther speed test site in some way to get that info provided in an easy-to-read tabular format, it could tell you an awful lot at-a-glance & it's objective fact at a macroscopic level.

...Actually, as a dyed-in-the-wool biker for all my adult life who's personally owned more than 50 bikes, if you'd have said to me 3 years ago before I moved to LOS that I would be discussing the nuances of automatic scooters, I'd have bet it all against it - funny old world eh?

Pikey - yes, I see your point. Sadly, your reviews although great, are not going to make it to "Power Bike Monthly" or any such & you may not be able to post your trip reports on Adventure Rider with your head held high.

Although this thread's not quite matched the blizzard of page views and posts that is Honda Cbr150 An Owners Club, nevertheless, there is interest out there & you can perhaps think of your posts as public service broadcasting.

Hey, perhaps there's an untapped demand for a web site or magazine - "CVT Scooter Monthly for Dweebs", or "Exciting Commutes" or "Supermarket Runs - Your Ride Pics"....

Thanks for your posts on the new Nouvo Elegance Pikey - very informative. I for one would love to hear any more observations you might have as you spend more time with it.

A couple of questions:

• An earlier post in this thread suggested that the alloy wheel version might have tubeless tires - is that true?
  
• What's the engine sound like? The Honda Clicks and 115cc Nouvos etc. can sound a bit whiney like they're revving hard as they go past (which they probably are) - does the 135cc sound a bit more stately/refined?
  

I have a 3110 and use EDGE, and it is terrible. That may well be due to my location in the Sattahip hills - I wish I knew for sure, but it really sucks. Not so much download speeds but the constant start and stop of downloads whether it be web pages or files. It reminds me very much of a landline dialup connection 15 years ago.

Peter

Thanks for the info - perhaps I'll cross the Nokia 3110 off my potential shopping list then!

I've started another topic here asking for ratings of EDGE-enabled phones used as modems which will hopefully get some responses.

With regards to your experience PMK, you might be able to run a benchmark test on your own phone to isolate the problem - i.e. determine if your EDGE problems lie with the phone itself, the reception, the network or from some other part of the chain like connection to the computer, software drivers etc.

Why not test the phone standalone - e.g. locate and download some biggish files on the net (2 or 3 meg) and download them to your phone memory 1) in a town with known good coverage and 2) at home and time the download in both cases. If you know someone with an EDGE SIM on a different network, you might be able to borrow it for a bit to see how that compares. At least then you'll have some metrics to go by.

Do you use an EDGE phone as a modem for your computer?

If so:

• What make/model is the phone?
  
• Which network/price plan are you on?
  
• Do you use a PC or Mac - any particular problems in either case with getting it setup and connected, software drivers etc.?
  
• How reliable/steady is the EDGE connection once it's established?
  
• Does your performance vary depending on whether you're in a good/bad EDGE coverage area?
  
• Does your performance vary by time of day - e.g. when the network is under load?
  
• What kind of download speeds are you getting on average?
  
• How do you connect it to your computer? (USB/Bluetooth/Infra-red etc.)
  
• Any other comments?
  

Sorry, the v3i definitely does not have Edge capability.

With regular gprs speeds limited at 48kbps, as opposed to the 238 kbps of Edge, you'll clearly see it's not much use for anything but retrieving e-mails!

Today's websites will take ages to load...

dam_n!

Sounds like you might be having a bit of a Homer Simpson "Doh" type moment garo - commiserations are in order as I for one have had quite a few of those! It's not helped by the fact there are so many mobile phone models on the market at any one time and so much jargon that goes with them.

Here are my suggestions:

• If you've already paid for it (and can't get a return or a refund), you might be able to trade it in for another model or sell it privately. They're still popular phones after all and there's lots of used mobiles for sale at Thai shops - yours will be a prime example as it'll be boxed and as-new. You'll probably lose 1000-2000 Baht on the deal but just put it down to experience. In fact, the dealer you bought it from might be prepared to do this as they can just turn it around and sell it on as new (that's if you're still talking).
  
• Keep it and use it for your actual mobile calls and get another Edge-enabled phone with a different SIM with a private number which you use for data comms - you don't want people calling you up when you're on the computer anyway as it can cause the data connection to drop in some cases
  
• Earn some serious brownie points with your loved one by letting them know you've just bought them a "wonderful gift"
  
• Turn it into a handy little car-decoration type thingie by hanging it from your rear-view mirror
  

Well, if it doesn't have EDGE, the surfing speeds may be a bit slow. It's probably OK for checking emails and so on but not that much faster than a dial-up connection - maybe that's OK for you.

Personally, I'm in the market for a phone with data capability but torn between going for a reasonable EDGE-enabled phone for now like the Nokia 3110 Classic (at 4,400 Baht) or waiting a bit, saving up my satang and getting a bit more of a future-proof model with both EDGE and 3G capability like the Nokia E51 at 12,000 Baht or so. There are rumours that Thailand will be getting HSDPA 3G at some stage and one would hope that a phone like the Nokia E51 will be able to connect to it when it's available.

Then I can use it for the next 6-8 years like my trusty old Sony Ericsson T68i

I also like the idea of getting a phone that can connect to a wireless ADSL router (which I have at home) because then you can install software on it (like Fring) that allows you to make VOIP calls for free and/or you can also connect your VOIP call over public wi-fi points when you're out and about.

Ok guys, well I ordered a Motorola Razr v3i from our local shop. I had a look at the Nokia 5300 but the shopkeeper talked me out of it. So so I just sync it with the Mac tomorrow via isync and its ready to go? I tried to search the internet for answers but I'm more confused than ever.

Hi garro:

Does the Motorola Razr V3i you've ordered have EDGE data capability?

There's another interesting article on a similar subject at Bangkok Post with quotes from Martin Gutberlet, research vice-president of Gartner's technology and service provider research group.

Bangkok Post Database Article

Here's a quote from the analyst:

Asked how he saw the future of CAT Telecom / Hutchinson's CDMA2000 network, Gutberlet said, "It looks like CDMA is not going to be a winning standard. One of the largest CDMA networks, Verizon in the US, has recently announced that its commitment to LTE (4G) for the next generation, which means that there is little progress to be seen in this standard", he explained.

There's a Platinum website (see link below) - take care though as the site tries to run an ActiveX control. If their programming is anywhere near as unreliable as their bikes, your computer may explode I was looking at the site in Firefox which is immune to the horrors of ActiveX.

Have a look at the Platinum website

On the left hand navigation there are some light brown/yellowy colour buttons - if you hover over them the different Platinum bike models popup and you can see them on the product detail pages (I can't read Thai).

There's even some pictures of massed Platinums at a BIB parade - that's got to be one very juicy maintenance contract!

Police Platinums

Result: 42-45.000 and u can have fast Nouvo of your favourite color and can save more than 15.000 Baht!! (cost of new one is not less than 58-60K). So why not??

and drive slowly!!

I've just ordered the new one with alloy wheels. Cost = 55,700. The lowest I've seen was 55,500. The spoke version goes for 53,000.

That's not much more than the mag wheel version of the Air Blade or Nouvo.

Apparently the alloy wheels sport tubeless tires - (to be confirmed). There's also improvements in the front brake and suspension and being water-cooled it seems like good value for money.

Nice one tropo - we're all looking forward to the detailed ride report you will no doubt be preparing once you've taken delivery

It's out - I saw it today.

Looks quite nice; similar to the existing Nouvo body shape with a few style tweaks like rear indicators on their own little stalks. I thought the stick-on decals at the front were a bit tacky looking though. I was also hoping that they'd integrate more aluminium in the visible bodywork (near the footwells) because it would look much better than the light grey plastic on the current Nouvo but they haven't. The AT casing is also black plastic, whereas on the 115 CC Nouvo it's metal which seems like a retrograde step. Yamaha is postiioning it as a kind of de-luxe/up-market model & the promotional literature is aimed firmly at trendy young guys (like me).

The quoted cash price was 55,000B (wire wheels) and 58,000B (Mag wheels) although a possible discount was intimated - I didn't ask what that might be as it was only a junior salesperson I was speaking to and didn't want to get into a heavy sales pitch.

It's also shown on the Thai Yamaha Website - see Yamaha Nouvo Elegance Page (Thai)

I'm personally tempted although I'm minded to wait a few months i) to allow me to talk the Mrs into it and ii) to see if it's presence in the market spurs some promotional/discounting activity from Honda or Yamaha with their current offerings to help them shift stock.

No further tech detalis to report as yet - perhaps someone can glean them from the Yamaha website.