3g In The Real World

[nikster]

I am currently back home where they have many 3G networks and pre-paid data cards / USB modems. Connected with full connectivity on HSDPA, I get 125KB/s.

Theoretical max speed is 7Mbit/s but obviously, it's nowhere near that. I am in a region where I am pretty sure there is nobody else using the network, and 125KB/s seems to be the max speed at any time during the day or night.

It really is disappointing. The EV-DO connection I have in Thailand tops out at 150KB/s or sometimes 180KB/s. While its slower in theory (2Mbps), it's faster in practice. I was waiting for Thailand to go full 3G for a while but the results I am getting here means there's nothing to get excited about or worth waiting for...

Granted, upload speeds for HSDPA seem to be around 50KB/s vs 10 for EV-DO, but thats about it.

[paveet]

I've never gotten more than about 120KB/s on HSDPA in the UK either.

[dave_boo]

Which makes the headlong rush into HSDPA kinda odd in my book. AFAIK, Japan is still on the CDMA bandwagon, and their networks are the fastest in the world. I understand trying to standardise around the globe, but to do it on what seems to be an uproven technology is a bit naive.

[OriginalPoster]

Which makes the headlong rush into HSDPA kinda odd in my book. AFAIK, Japan is still on the CDMA bandwagon, and their networks are the fastest in the world. I understand trying to standardise around the globe, but to do it on what seems to be an uproven technology is a bit naive.

In Singapore HSDPA is delivering pretty close to its advertised speeds, so I doubt that the problem is with the HSDPA protocol itself. If one is only getting 120 Kbs then I'd suspect that the service provider must be downshifting them to GPRS or EDGE instead of giving them a HSDPA connection.

[OriginalPoster]

I've never gotten more than about 120KB/s on HSDPA in the UK either.

Do you mean 120 kilobits per second or 120 kilobytes per second? Using a Samsung EDGE cell phone as a modem just north of Bangkok, I'm getting 220 kilobits per second down and 35 kilobits per second up with 900 ms ping times (according to speedtest.net). Could you try your HSDPA connection with that site and see what numbers it reports?

[monty]

The OP clearly posted kB/sec (capital B means bytes), which is exactly 1 Mb/sec.

So it looks like they're capping at 1 Mb/s because it works out to a very round 1 Mb/s, probably from keeping the system getting overloaded.

I too have seen real life speeds of 350 kB/s on a 3.6Mb/s HSDPA network, so at 2.8Mb/s it's probably close to the max real speed you'll see.

I reckon the 7.2 Mb/s standard should manage around 5Mb/s in real life, provided they don't throttle and that the back bone is up to handling the traffic.

[Crushdepth]

I might be wrong, but I thought there were different flavours of HSPDA that operate at different speeds. Anyway, if you're getting 1MB stop complaining man! We in Thailand are lucky to get 250 out of ADSL!!!!

My experience with EDGE in Thailand is that around 100k is typical speed, 120k if you're lucky

[paveet]

I've never gotten more than about 120KB/s on HSDPA in the UK either.

Do you mean 120 kilobits per second or 120 kilobytes per second? Using a Samsung EDGE cell phone as a modem just north of Bangkok, I'm getting 220 kilobits per second down and 35 kilobits per second up with 900 ms ping times (according to speedtest.net). Could you try your HSDPA connection with that site and see what numbers it reports?

kilobyte.

[anotheruser]

3G is way over rated and is more of a marketng term.

[dave_boo]

3G is way over rated and is more of a marketng term.

Unless you live in the sticks and it's the only high-speed internet access available.

[monty]

3G is way over rated and is more of a marketng term.

So is most "broadband" in Thailand

[uniq]

i'll be moving to thailand for a year from october - is there any provider you would suggest for 3g living in Silom?

[dave_boo]

i'll be moving to thailand for a year from october - is there any provider you would suggest for 3g living in Silom?

You shan't find any 'real' 3G inside Bangkok. Currently there is only EDGE and CDMA 2000 1xRTT offered. Both those will net you speeds in the 14-18 KByte/s area download.

[uniq]

You shan't find any 'real' 3G inside Bangkok. Currently there is only EDGE and CDMA 2000 1xRTT offered. Both those will net you speeds in the 14-18 KByte/s area download.

wow, that's a shame... which provider would you suggest for EDGE or CDMA?

[dave_boo]

You shan't find any 'real' 3G inside Bangkok. Currently there is only EDGE and CDMA 2000 1xRTT offered. Both those will net you speeds in the 14-18 KByte/s area download.

wow, that's a shame... which provider would you suggest for EDGE or CDMA?

Well, for EDGE, you either need to go AIS or DTAC. I always use AIS, but there's some wisdom in keeping both SIM cards in case one is slow where you're at. Simply swap to the other SIM and it MAY speed up.

For CDMA you're stuck with Hutch. If you were not inside Bangkok, you could get CAT which offers EV-DO.

[anotheruser]

3G is way over rated and is more of a marketng term.

So is most "broadband" in Thailand

Can't argue there.

[Trevor]

I get 500-600 kbps via the ThaiVisa speed test with a Huawei E220 HSDPA modem on the 'Three' network in the UK. I was pleasantly surprised after suffering a dismal 150-250 kbps with Thai broadband. My UK home has Virgin Media and their slowest fibre-optic speed option is a constant 2 Mbps.

Next move is to Indonesia which does have HSDPA service, at least in the major cities. Anyone measured their available speeds yet?