Upcountry

clausewitz, thanks for starting this good and timely thread.

Well, it's interesting. Looks like I need to modify my old 95 burner to handle ethanol even if I convert to LPG.

Has anyone heard of the Vogas Sequential Gas Injection system? It's is an advanced system, as opposed to more conventional ones, the biggest difference being "no power or performance loss", which I'd like to avoid.

http://www.lpg-kits.com/bmw.htm

Googling does not bring up any results relevant to Thailand, so I wonder if I can find it here.

-UC

Monty, good description of routing issues, thanks.

Your ping times do look normal apart from that 10.xx.xx.xx range one.

Latency gets created by two things, physical distance (even at the speed of light it takes a little while to get round the earth) and delays at all the routers along the way.

.... I think you meant "strange" one, eh?

Three attempts, below, today. Note 4202 ms in one case. This is ridiculous and unacceptable, since it is under the control of the True (happening in the middle of all the other creepy tttmaxnet.com hops). It really must be the nefarious one. Maybe it is time we all started using encrypted email, etc., we value our privacy.

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.1

2 13 ms 12 ms 13 ms mx-ll-58.147.40-1.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.40.1]

3 * * * Request timed out.

4 * * 1990 ms 10.121.65.238

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.1

2 13 ms 12 ms 12 ms mx-ll-58.147.40-1.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.40.1]

3 * * * Request timed out.

4 2219 ms 4209 ms * 10.121.65.238

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.1

2 130 ms 31 ms 12 ms mx-ll-58.147.40-1.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.40.1]

3 * * * Request timed out.

4 * 2026 ms * 10.121.65.238

5 * 43 ms 163 ms mx-ll-58.147.0-25.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.0.25]

Just got a call from a TTT tech (follow up from call I made four days ago). He asked for IP addresses that I have used for traceroute tests. He thought most hops were normal, but a few were higher. He also said the average was okay.

Monty, you thought the numbers were normal as well, but I swear it was much better last week. Perhaps you mean normal as in "snafu".

Some of my software client connections fail, and last night a internet-connected screen saver on my mac froze up the computer thanks to the delays.

I asked about the gateway. He confirmed that they are using their own gateway now, not CAT. I explained that I did a test by tracerouting from a shell account in the U.S. to Maxnet, and found that the results were much faster from there to here, than from here to there (I suppose that would be expected). He said that they plan to improve their gateway to Europe and the U.S. in the next couple of months or so. He also insisted that my connection and bandwidth is still better than Indy!

No confirmation, of course, about snooping on emails. He said they only cache web pages on port 80.

UC

Thanks, Monty,

Lots of tttmaxnet.com hops. It does look like they are trying to get by with their own gateway again.

Also, check out the spooky 10.121.65.250 hop. It's not usually that long a delay.

Tracing route to europa.eu [147.67.119.102]

over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms 1 ms 1 ms 192.168.1.1

2 126 ms 128 ms 66 ms mx-ll-58.147.40-1.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.40.1]

3 * * * Request timed out.

4 * * 2077 ms 10.121.65.250

5 24 ms 34 ms 16 ms mx-ll-58.147.0-25.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.0.25]

6 161 ms 65 ms 17 ms mx-ll-58.147.0-86.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.0.86]

7 18 ms 30 ms * mx-ll-58.147.0-54.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.0.54]

8 * * * Request timed out.

9 19 ms 23 ms 17 ms 218.100.47.20

10 129 ms 84 ms 68 ms t3-0-1-0.0.core2.seo2.flagtel.com [62.216.144.225]

11 * * * Request timed out.

12 439 ms 444 ms 504 ms so-0-1-2.0.pjr01.mmb004.flagtel.com [85.95.25.97]

13 * 176 ms 256 ms 85.95.25.77

14 357 ms 446 ms 287 ms ge-0-0-0.0.cjr01.alx001.flagtel.com [62.216.128.157]

15 409 ms 271 ms 282 ms t2a1.uk-lon1.eu.bt.net [195.66.224.108]

16 * 333 ms 389 ms t2c1-ge2-0-0.uk-lon1.eu.bt.net [166.49.135.101]

17 * * 256 ms t2c2-ge7-1.uk-lon2.eu.bt.net [166.49.208.5]

18 276 ms 389 ms * t2c1-p9-1.be-bru.eu.bt.net [166.49.164.54]

19 * * * Request timed out.

20 420 ms 308 ms 266 ms 166-49-157-158.eu.bt.net [166.49.157.158]

21 370 ms 270 ms 446 ms 212.8.176.130

22 * * * Request timed out.

23 * * * Request timed out.

... etc.

As I understand it, the difference between the Indy and Premier packages, besides the advertised speed increase for Premier is this:

1. Fewer users per "connection" (forgot the correct term) I.E., 20 per connection for Indy, and 10 per connection for Premier, which means less competition for bandwidth.

2. Better international bandwidth and less or no bittorrent/P2P throttling.

I upgraded to Premier last month, and for a while I did see a noticeable, though not dramatic, improvement. But for almost a week now it has been very bad.

Traceroutes are in the 3 digits, especially starting at the singapore.teleglobe.net hop. The response remains at 200 to 500 ms for the remainder of the route. Using a US based shell account I that I can telnet to, I did a traceroute back here to my IP and various Maxnet IP addresses. Response times were much faster, at least until the Singapore hop.

Something is strange about that*. Given the kind of results I'm getting right now, I'm thinking of going back to Indy, because seems like their statement about international access is a lie, or their policy may have changed along with the speed increases and whatever Big Brother activities that True may be engaged in.

Has anyone else noticed this?

*I should add that one reason for the slow access from here could be True's available bandwidth in general, but it was better last week.

Wow, this is an old thread. Doubt anyone will see this post.

These days, rather than make just CD's from my record digitization (though I still do that), I archive the results in FLAC format. I'm also making FLAC archives of my CD's, and I have found FLAC versions of my records on the internet (various sources). In the not-too-distant future disc based media will become obsolete.

It's mid 2008 as I write this. My old Thorens 125 MKII needs refurbishment but language problems make it hard for me to figure out what to do with Thorens "authorized service center" at Amarin Plaza. I may need to replace the old classic if it is too hard to clean up, and if that is so, I'll be looking for a Rega P3-24, maybe used if an audiophile has moved up.

Any advice or tips would be appreciated.

UC

My international access has gotten very bad over the last two days. While web access is okay, bittorrent has ground to a halt. Seems like it is blocked.

I did a speed test and got a surprise. My Premier service is supposed to give me a maximum of 1024, but I was getting 1734kpbs! The first thing that went through my mind, with the speed discrepancy and the blocked bit torrent, was that Maxnet had somehow converted me back to Indy.

I called them at 1103, pressed 9 for English and of course got the Thai menu again. The Thai-speaking operator, that I eventually reached, said she'd have someone call me back (I had asked for English). A Thai-speaking tech called back. He couldn't grok my problem, so he had someone else call back. This one also could not understand the issue, didn't see a problem, and said he'd have my account checked, and someone else would call. No call yet, many hours later.

I stopped in at the Maxnet office to pay my bill. The clerk said they were making many changes and improvements in speed. I saw a flyer showing that my speed was going to increase from 1024/512 to 2048/1024. So that would explain the 1734kpbs. Maybe the changes are causing a disruption to overseas access. I can't authenticate with Eudora to one ISP right now, and that might be related as well.

With all the Maxnet hops I see with traceroute lately, it's clear they're messing around. I really hope they are not masking a move to Big Brother behavior with the speed increase, etc.

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.1

2 13 ms 13 ms 13 ms mx-ll-58.147.40-1.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.40.1]

3 * * * Request timed out.

4 * * * Request timed out.

5 17 ms 17 ms 16 ms mx-ll-58.147.0-25.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.0.25]

6 18 ms 17 ms 17 ms mx-ll-58.147.0-86.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.0.86]

7 19 ms 16 ms 16 ms mx-ll-58.147.0-54.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.0.54]

8 17 ms 16 ms 17 ms mx-ll-58.147.0-106.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.0.106]

9 46 ms 46 ms 47 ms if-2-0-1.core2.S9R-Singapore.teleglobe.net [209.58.96.45]

...

In any case, I realize it's now too late, but please if you go buy a computer monitor, buy it in a store where you can see for yourself what the picture looks like, which ports it has, and whether it swivels or switches. That's better than reading a thousand reviews.

That would be my only reservation on Dell - they have a great reputation but you have to mail-order.

Out of personal interest, does Samsung make these monitors in matte? Did you come across any reasonably priced 23 or 24" models with 1080p resolution?

I wasn't looking for 1080p, so I might not have noticed if I saw one, but I don't believe I did.

I was able to inspect and test the monitor when it came in. Rather, I inspected the 2253 and noted the lack of HDMI. Then I tested the 2233GW to be sure there were no dead pixels.

I probably would have gone to Commart if I hadn't decided to order the monitor. Although I could have seen that the 2253LW did not have HDMI, I wouldn't have been able to test any monitor there before buying, right? Too busy, they aren't set up for that. So, I could have hauled a defective unit home.

Yes, Dell is mail order, but I may have mentioned above that they go out of their way, even here in Thailand, to be very responsive in cross-shipping defective devices - at least that was my experience with the hard drive for a business-level PC I had bought from them. Both Acer and Samsung have local service centers, but they want to take a least a week or two to test and repair things. I don't know what their policy is about returns and refunds but they are probably pretty good about that, as they try to compete with IBM etc. I returned an IBM laptop a few years ago after it arrived via mail order (in the US).

UC

The 2253LW I ordered arrived today. No swivel, but it did have a tilting base.

However, it did not come with HDMI. Basically, it was pretty much the same as the 2232GW with a slightly smaller screen and less attractive case.

I suppose if I had studied the Thai sites more closely, had been able to read Thai or got help to talk to someone about it, I could have found out before seeing it. It is a little cheaper, but otherwise I don't see why it either is just not offered here, of they at least use a different model number (small 'th' after the LW? )

So, I got the 2232GW instead, since I'd obligated myself to buy something. Glad they let me change. It is a beautiful monitor, but if I had to do it again I'd probably go for the Dell, despite the additional money because of the extra features, the larger viewing area and good warranty support.

UC

Indeed, the 2232GW doesn't have swivel (probably not tilt either). The 2235LW has a bit less Max vertical angle (160 instead of 170) but it has an HDMI port, with help future-proof it a bit. According to specs on the web, it the 2236LW uses less energy (45 watts) than the 2232GW (50 watts), and a lot less than the Dell (75 watts!).

One thing I didn't research thoroughly is the contrast differences.

2232GW: 1000:1 / 3000:1 (dynamic)

2235LW : 1000:1 / 8000:1 (dynamic)

I think that means that the 2235LW has a greater contrast range.

One thing to be careful of when buying Thai models of Samsung monitors is that they aren't always exactly the same as in US reviews you find on the internet. The US versions often come with tilt and height adjustment, the Thai models may not so do check before you buy.

Edit: Looking at both models on a US retail site it appears there isn't a height adjustable version, only tilt and swivel.

Thanks for the heads up. Now I have two reasons to regret committing myself to to ordering a 2253LW today. First, I just saw the Commart notice in the Events and Training section of the Post Database (wish I'd seen it earlier). So, I could have saved 1200 baht (minus travel expenses and beer) by going there. And now it sounds like one of the main reasons for buying the 2253LW (tilt and swivel) may not be there.

Well, I hope that the unit meets my needs in spite of that.

I did a search on Commart, here in the computer area of Thaivisa, and a thread on Commart mentions March of this year - I remember that. Is there really another one this weekend? Hadn't heard of it until it was mentioned in this thread.

UC

This link gives one explanation for the difference between the Samsung 2253LW and 2253BW models.

http://www.eggxpert.com/forums/thread/312273.aspx

Thanks for the links!

I did some more research on the Dell by the way. The SP2208WFP does support HDMI (still not sure which version). It is in fact 2ms. The contrast may not not technically be as good. Review sites seem to prefer this model over the Samsung 2232GW, particularly for the HDMI and other features. But the 2253LW seems to address that question.

I called Dell. The price they gave me with VAT is 12,305 Baht. One big drawback, according to reviews is a limited viewing angle. The spec says 160 degrees horizontally and vertically. I guess I don't grok that. Sounds like a lot. Sadly the sales rep I spoke to was English challenged. She said it rotates 90 degrees, but that's not true according to the website.

Side issue - has anyone had video card problems with wide screen? How about switch box problems? I have an Aten Masterview.

-UC

Mistyped. The Dell is 5ms, not 2. I don't do games, but sometimes movies.

Faster monitor without HDMI vs slower one with. Who ordered the diet lasagna! Jessh!

Thanks for your thoughts and links.

Another interesting issue is HDMI. Some monitors have it now. In two years or so, it may be a more standard feature (especially HDMI 1.3 or 1.3a, etc.).

The DELL SP2208WFP has it. I have a Dell computer and I know they have good support here in Thailand (they rushed a hard drive to me and kept bugging me to return to bad one (which they hadn't warned me about before. LOL)). The Samsung center in my town takes weeks to get me a new printer tray, etc., so that may make a difference for me.

Other than that, there is the speed issue. The Dell has 2ms and the Samsung 2232GW is 2ms.

No easy answer!

Hm, RGB, maybe I misunderstood that. I imagined three RGB RCA inputs similar to a TV. But I looked at 2232GW today and only saw the DVI and VGA ports. I've noticed that the VGA is sometimes referred to as RGB. So now I understand that.

One website I looked at compared the features of the two Samsungs, and that's where I notice that not all the "magic" stuff was listed for the 2253LW. Could be an accident of spec-listing on the site. I figured that the newer model didn't need the magic stuff due to firmware updates.

Thanks, Sniffdog,

Seems like the 2232GW has a few things that the 2253LW doesn't have some of these: MagicTune, MagicColor, MagicSpeed, MagicBright 3, etc. I don't know if that matters yet.

The 2253LW has a better vertical viewing angle (if not horizontal as well). It has RGB inputs, which indicates that it may have usefulness away from the computer at some point.

But the bottom line is that I don't know if the 2253LW is even available here.

Some reviewers claim that Dell's monitors compare well, so I need to check that out as well.

UC

I'm looking into the best 22" monitor I can get in Thailand these days (June '08).

I can get a Samsung 2232GW in a local shop, with a glossy screen. I comes with HDCP, 2m, etc., for 10,200 Baht.

I've been looking into the difference between the 2232GW and the 2253LW. Shop4Thai seems to want more for the 2232GW.

The 2253LW seems to have more inputs, etc. I'm guessing it is newer. So I'm a bit confused about that.

If anyone has seen Phantip or Fortune prices for these monitors, It'd be great to hear about it. I want to find out for sure if the local price is really a good one. It seems so, from what I can tell.

I read a review about Dell's closest equivalent, but the downside seems to be vertical (at least) viewing angle. Still, it may be a better choice compared to the 2232GW, anyway.

UC

Well, here's an update to my stories above.

I finally got the electric company techs out here to look at my problem. They rearranged the circuits so that the air conditioners are on a separate line form the office outlets. The fact that the a/c was involved might explain my UPS burn-outs.

I was able to speak English with a Powermatic engineer (may have mentioned that above) regarding getting my units repaired. I also asked his advice about protecting my DVDR and TV, etc. He recommended thier SMK-600A for them, because the put out a sine wave instead of a square wave. He explained that the QUN and KIN UPS's might damage my non-PC equipment over time. I'd heard something along this line in the past, so I went along with that.

He also recommended the TCA-1200's for my audio equipment, since the don't really need a UPS. The total bill was rather high for everything I needed, but I only paid 1,100 for each of two TCA-1200's. Based on comments above, I think I got a good deal on them, as well as my other stuff, buying directly.

It was a HUGE pain dealing with the sales department with limited Thai, but eventually a good English speaker got on the line with me and helped me out - he could have been the CEO, for all I know!

At any rate, I wonder if Crossy and others can confirm that quality UPS's with a built-in AVR (the Powermatic units have them, per the engineer - hence no need to put them between the wall and the UPS) can preclude the need for an AVR as suggested in earlier posts.

Thanks,

-UC

Okay, I upgraded to Maxnet Premier 1024/512. It took effect on Saturday, so I've had a weekend and four weekdays to test it.

For me, so far, it is a dramatic improvement. BitTorrent, etc. started working again at a reasonable clip. Pando flies, relatively speaking.

I found that I could carry on a good Skype Out conversation overseas while running Pando, BitTorrent and FTP at the same time. Sometimes email doesn't want to connect (Eudora, anit-virus proxy, overseas mail host), but a bit of persistence on my part got the email within a couple of minutes or so - with Indy it could take hours. I'm getting better performance with youtube and other streaming video, albeit with some buffering (but not enough to make me give up).

I still may be speaking too soon, but I'm cautiously optimistic.

As they say, "your mileage may vary". Since I'm in the provinces, maybe my Premier setup is in an area with little competition (assuming I'm separated from the Indy crowd with this account). But I'm certainly in the pool with all others who are trying to get international access.

It could also change as a bot or tech somewhere in the TT&T cloud decides that I'm doing too much torrent stuff, etc. I can only speak about my current experience.

Needless to say, it is clear that TT&T isn't kidding when it states that the Premier package is designed to give better international bandwidth.

Hope this helps.

-UC

I have Maxnet Indy 2048/512, and shaping has slowed my BitTorrents so badly that my client is invisible to some trackers (avoiding details here so I don't get biffed). I use Pando for file transfers, and lately these have halted almost 100%.

So, I've gotten fed up, and decided to try TOT. Today I called TOT and spoke to a support representative there. He explained clearly that BitTorrent is shaped, not blocked, based on the amount of traffic, and that this varies per area. So someone in a zone where many other users are creating traffic will experience slower torrent speeds than someone in a zone with less traffic going on. I couldn't get him to tell me if this decision was made locally or not.

In contrast, when I tried to get TT&T support to admit that the traffic shape, I had to wait for someone to call me back. Hours later I was told that I should move up to Premier 1024/512 in order to get better international speeds. This jives with what others on this and/or other forum threads about Premier throttling back a little less.

I guess a lot of factors play a role, including modem, etc., and also general international traffic or problems going on.

I can't afford the 1236 or 2048 Premier prices, so I would like to find out if, in general, the 1024/412 Premier package is a good choice. The compromise is obviously that the down speed is half that of Indy 2048, so in theory we are giving up some general speed for better international access. Is it a good trade-off?

I wonder if I'll be able to view YouTube etc. very well. Probably not, more like the old Indy 1024 days I saw. But if BitTorrent and the like will actually not get squashed, maybe it is the way to go.

-UC

I've got a TOT phone line, and I've had TT&T for a while (first HiNet, then Maxnet). I'm fed up with TT&T's traffic shaping and general speed problems, so I've decided to give TOT a try. I'll wait to cancel TT&T until I am sure TOT works better.

Thing is, when I signed up with TT&T, all I had to do was pay money at the office and take a modem home with me. I set it up myself, based on instructions (called if I had questions) and that was it.

TOT, in my area, wants to send a man over to the house to see if my line can be connected to their service (I think). I live less than a kilometer from the local office (hopefully also the ADSL hub), so I'm not sure why they can't just send me home with a modem. If there is a problem I could call or bring it back. The upside, hopefully, is that they will spot any problems in the phone wiring that might slow down my connection, but it seems odd that they would insist on doing it this way. I don't particularly want some guy sitting down in my office to configure the modem for me when I can do that myself.

Hey folks,

I have TTT/Maxnet in central Thailand. BitTorrent used to work okay, though email would sometimes be unusable (via client to POP/SMTP). Streaming like YouTube was a frustrating experience.

But for the last few weeks "youtube" and email works very well. The problem for me is that BitTorrent/FTP, etc., has slowed to crawl... make that creep ... except very late at night.

Since (as I have heard) TTT uses satellite instead of CAT, the are probably under more pressure to protect users from the bandwidth demands of P2P users. I used to curse the gamers when I used dial up a few years ago, so I don't blame them too much, but I think they have gone overboard. I can't even keep a ratio on a very good tracker I use.

I'm thinking about moving to TOT (means new phone number, etc.), but I want to be really sure it will make a serious difference and won't at the same time cause email problems. I can live without most streaming video.

Any thoughts?

UC

Some English language literature can be a challenge for English speakers too.

I remember dealing with some James Joyce short stories long ago. Then there is "The Sound and the Fury", by Faulkner.

I'd read it today if I had a copy, but I remember starting the first page or so, and noticing that it had some peculiar cultural references.

Goes to show how different Thai and Western cultures are, and how worthwhile the challenge is to try to appreciate it.

UC