True Bandwidth On Demand - What A Con

[Ian_B]

Has anybody seen the the latest scheme by True.

I've a 3M ADSL connection but if I want GUARANTEED bandwidth (at 2M) then I must change my login from @truehisp to @true2m and I will get charged an additional 25THB/hour!!

Eh?

[MadFrankie]

whats the max speeds your gettin @ the moment with the 3mbit? I have the 1mbit service and the max I can get with p2p during the day is 30-40, on an evening it goes up to 90-100 which is ok.

[Ian_B]

My DL speeds are exactly the same as yours... I'm thinking of changing to 1M at the mo

[Highwayman]

I saw that advert last week and thought it odd that no-one had commented on it. To me it's like saying, we know our service isn't great but pay us more money and we'll guarante to give you the service we indicated you would receive when we first signed you up.

It seems like they've got the idea from the Easy Click pay as you go dial up. Almost everytime l've had problems with regular True dial-up l've found that if you use Easy Click then there are fewer problems as you're paying by the minute and they want to keep you on-line as long as possible.

[StrongView]

Does anybody have a scanned image or link to said advertisment? I'd love to read it just for kicks.

It's almost like, I've got to see it to believe it. I tend to have the opposite bandwidth at my house. Mornings are stellar. Evening suck horribly. Generally, I wake up at 5:30am. 5:30am - 6:30am, D/L's are great and I use VoIP during this time for perfect calls, no delays. Around 9am it starts to slow. From 5pm - 11pm the D/L's are the worst! Generally int'l d/l's are 8 kbps - 14 kbps, with occasional ANNOYING bursts going up to 25 kbps. They really need to get their act together. I basically get usable internet in the early - mid morning, but I pay for UNLIMITED 24/7!

[kabal1234]

I'm not sure it's THAT off the wall. Most ISP around the world can't give you max quoted bandwidth because your sharing with 20/50/... other users. The question to my mind is even after using the new advertised service, WILL you get what you paid for? I will agree, however, that True do fall into the lowest common denominator bracket.

[Highwayman]

From a True advert in The Nation last Thursday:

*************************************************

Bandwidth on demand.

Introducing the latest value added service exclusively for hi-speed Internet Unlimited (@truehisp) users. Guaranteeing expressway speeds at any time of the day or night, this super hi-speed package is designed for Internet maniacs who demand speeds of up to 2 Mbps. 25 baht per hour. Usage charged by the minute. VAT not included.

*************************************************

4 easy steps to get Bandwidth on Demand.

1. Disconnect from the Internet.

2. Change your username from @truehisp to @true2m

3. Type in your old password.

4. Click connect.

*************************************************

StrongView, as you've got a high speed connection l'll let you check the True site where l'm sure the above can be found somewhere.

[Ian_B]

The sad thing is that I actually tried out the @true2m and it was indeed MUCH MUCH faster than my supposed 3M connection.

Before I was getting DL of 15-30, then the moment I changed my login to @true2m it shot up to 70!

GRRRRRrrr

[jonboy]

I have the 2.5Mbps/512 and have the same problems.Ive had the guys around to check my line and been in contact with a falang manager there.They say that they are only guarenteeing(i think this is the right %)80% of speeds in THAILAND and no guarentee international!!

I too am thinking of changing to the 1Mbps as I can't see it making any difference.I can;t think of ANY sites that I visit that are based in Thailand!! What a poooooor service! I think I must stay on this package though for the full 6 months to get the modem for free.

[kabal1234]

Yeah, that's right... I'll be pulling out after the 6 months is up... don't really wanna pay em 2000 for nothing.

It's just not worth the head f#%&s

[jonboy]

Yeah, that's right... I'll be pulling out after the 6 months is up... don't really wanna pay em 2000 for nothing.

It's just not worth the head f#%&s

Quick TRUE update.

I was on the phone to them the other day and as I could't connect to the net.Whilst on the phone I asked if it would be possible to downgrade the package to a slower connection due to only gettong 5-10%of advertised speed on international sites.The lady said of course I can.I then asked if I would get charged for the "free" modem if I did so.She checked with her manager and said as long as I paid my first bill I could downgrade the following month.She's faxed me the form to fill out and will then downgrade me(a great way of getting the modem for "free"if you want to).

Quick question.

As my connection is alot slower than advertised I decided to downgrade to the 512/256 package from the 2.5Mbit package.Will I get the same speed as I do now on international sites or will it be slower?Anyone done the downgrade already?

Kabal1234...get on the phone to them

[lopburi3]

The modem is currently free at any speed as is set up so that may be why you were told that.

I have 512 service and normally get 30-40k downloads but don't do enough to have good information on any average or times. For me having a circuit that works when I want it is more important than speed. Believe the 512 service would probably be all you need and if important at some time for higher use the 25 baht per hour sign on. For me the 512 service is fine for software upgrades and other downloads that I make.

[jonboy]

And theres me thinking I was getting special treatment!!!

So would you agree that if I had the 2.5Mbps connection...or...the 512k connection that my download speed will be the same on international sites??

[lopburi3]

I have not had the 2.5 so can only guess on what I have seen reported. My guess is the 512 used during day will probably be close to the same speed but at other times perhaps not. You also have to consider what your specific line can give you. Are you getting good 2.5 service to the ISP? If you are you would probably get better than 512 service during off peak times. So now you have to decide if it is worth the difference in price. No one answer fits all. Never anything easy here.

[Crushdepth]

I'd just like to know if True will ever upgrade things so that you can get a reasonable approximation of what you paid for. I have no problem with not getting the full 1MB I shelled out for at peak periods. I'd probably be happy if I could get even half the maximum speed, but I think a 90% shortfall is pretty lame.

I am sceptical that the higher bandwidth packages *ever* reach anywhere near the advertised rate. Why offer packages that can't be serviced ? IMHO that's just dishonest.

Anyway, I'm still happy even with my totally lame 150KB/s - its better than the dial up and the new WIFI toys are a joy

[jonboy]

I've just done a few speed tests on true today just out of curiosity and whether or not its because its saturday I don't know, but my conection speed is at least 50% faster.Maybe they are doing upgrades?

As regards to whether or not to downspeed, can someone else goto the same speed test and report back their speeds?I'm using :-

http://homepage.tinet.ie/~leslie/testpage.htm

and chosing the larger 470k file. The result is in cps(what ever that stands for?)and my average is about 43000cps. As low as 29000 and as high as 59000.I did the test quite a few times just now.Would be interested to know if the 1Mbps conection that Crushdepth has(with TRUE) gets the same speeds....and anyone else.

Thanks

p.s. I stopped all other downloads and relevant internet programs first.

[Crushdepth]

I'll try it when I get back home and let you know. I have only seen my 1MB package operating at full speed once - that was the day after after they installed it (of course !) and fairly early in the morning. The best I've seen since is 300kb.

[lopburi3]

Average 32,000 over 5 tests at 4:44 on 512 circuit.

[jonboy]

Lol

Mines only a little faster and it should be around 5 times faster. I think I'll be getting the 1 meg not the 512 as sometimes(only sometimes )I can exceed this speed

[Crushdepth]

10,700 cps "Your throughput is typical of a connection speed of greater than 64,000bps". I think it says something about the test being for ordinary modems, so not sure how accurate this would be. Anyway, according to the bars for different types of connection that puts me somewhere between a 56KB modem and a 128KB line (fairly embarassingly short of 1MB IMHO).

By way of comparison I tried the CNET Bandwidth Meter a few times and got between 147KB/s and 287KB/s, all over the place but a bit faster than normal. My interpretation of this is that apparently some of you guys DO have lives and are currently down the pub !

[monty]

I currently have two broadband subscriptions, iptv (256/56 sattelite down/modem up) and ji-net's compax adsl (256/128)

I just did 5 speedtests on the leslie page, 5 on the cnet age and 5 on the mcafee speedometer page for each broadband connection. This gave some strange results, in that the adsl connection differed a lot depending which of the three tests i ran.

Mcafee : between 150 and 170 kbps

Leslie : between 15000 and 18000 cps (which equates to between 120kbps and 144 kbps)

cnet : between 85 and 95 kbps

All the tests done with iptv where between 245 and 270kbps, regardless of testsite!

Why does iptv gives hardly any difference between the different webpages I tested on?

Why such a big difference when using adsl? The cnet test went very slow, while the Mcafee test was close to normal but still short of 256kbps...

Please note that overall adsl gives a much faster surfing experience eventhough "topspeed" is lower then iptv. Probably due to much lower ping times compared with sattelite connections which suffer from a lot of lag...