Gprs Problems

[procyon]

I have recently started using GPRS via my mobile (one2call), bluetooth to the laptop when I'm on the road. You can get a 24 hour package for 39 baht and AIS have some other packages too.

Now I knew it was going to be slow but I can live with that, there are however two other major problems:

1) I use Thunderbird for my IMAP email accounts for a number of domains. I can't send though as AIS won't let me use my own SMTP server, do they have their own one for GPRS and has anyone used it?

2) The connection constantly logs me out of everything so I can't use the webmail (Horde) interface to send email either. It also logs me out of forums and anything else so all I could use it for is reading pages.

Has anyone else experienced this and are there any solutions? Appreciate any advice!

[ballbreaker]

You might use GPRS/EDGE if only using GPRS. Its usually 3 to 4 times faster than regular 56k dialup and GPRS during non peak network periods.

Don't know anything about your server problem because I only use web mail.

[John 1]

for ais use mail.cscoms.com for out going mail server.

[Gary A]

EDGE is my only Internet connection. I use AIS and Dtac. My primary email is Gmail and I also have Hotmail and Yahoo mail. I have not had any problems using any applications using EDGE. I can't tell any difference from when I was using Shitstar except EDGE is normally faster.

[monty]

Using Edge (AIS, One2Call) regularly when on the move, and both gmail's smtp server, as well as the smtp servers of my own US based mail server are working normally.

I tend to be wary of using the smtp servers of Thai ISP's, because although they are mostly very fast, especially when needing to upload large attachments, they also often tend to be black listed for open spam relay, making your e-mails end up in junk boxes or disappearing altogether!

[procyon]

Thanks for the replies - not sure whether it is gprs or edge or what the difference is really (or how to connect to one and not the other). I get a [E] and [G] symbol on the phone when its connected.

Someone else has told me the network signal strength is a big factor also, it wasn't very good where I was connected from which may have been causing the problems.

Thanks for the SMTP server, I'll try that since they are blocking my own ones. This was my main problem - sending email. The webmail (Horde) interface logs me out every few seconds so that was a no-go too!

Can you use Gmail to send/receive with your own domains?

Edited June 30, 2008 by procyon

[monty]

Thanks for the replies - not sure whether it is gprs or edge or what the difference is really (or how to connect to one and not the other). I get a [E] and [G] symbol on the phone when its connected.

Edge is simply a faster version of GPRS. You don't have to do anything to use it, if it is available in your area, your phone will use it.

When your phone shows an E, it'll use the Edge system, if it only shows a G, means no Edge coverage available and your phone will fall back to the slower GPRS system.

Someone else has told me the network signal strength is a big factor also, it wasn't very good where I was connected from which may have been causing the problems.

Indeed. The signal strength will decide how high the data can get compressed during transmission. So the further away (lower signal) the less compression, so less speed.

EDGE will allow 59.2 kbps per slot when full signal is present, but this will go down to 8.8 kbps per slot when far away from the tower.

You have a maximum of 4 slots available for data, so a quick calculation will tell you that under the tower speeds of up to 236.8 kbps can be achieved, while at the outer edge of reception the maximum would only be 34 kbps!

Can you use Gmail to send/receive with your own domains?

Yes you can. Actually all Thaivisa e-mails (i.e. admin@thaivisa) are hosted on google servers!

More info here: google apps

[procyon]

Thanks for the detailed explanation, it seems that the signal and connection strength was causing my problems then. I'll test it nearer the tower to confirm.

Took a look at the Google Apps options but don't really want to 'move' the email from my servers or mess with domain MX records, just want to send without the SMTP headaches!