High-speed Internet Options In Pattaya

[NanLaew]

I have just about given up in getting any satisfaction getting the phone line fixed at the Pattaya house. I have had TT&T there for a couple of years but the service lurches between blistering hot and non-existent. The primary fault is the basic land line is very, very noisy with loads of static. I assume that this is probably water in the circuit somewhere but TT&T's techs always show during the day when it's half-arsed working and even had me replace my modem as theirs worked on the line whereas mine wouldn't. A few months later, the new one didn't work and the old one did which is an indication of how good a modem can latch on above a threshold of 'noise'. Since TT&T lease the line from TOT, getting either to fix it it pretty much a waste of effort, so...

what is the recommended high-speed internet access alternatives for a laptop while I am at the house. There's all sorts of EDGE and GPRS cards and dongles out there so looking for something that is RELIABLY FAST and doesn't cost the earth. The new laptop doesn't support cards so I guess USB devices and services are what I need. I am not interested in any satellite dish services like IPStar.

Thanks for your help!

[monty]

Only 1 option.

Hutch EV-DO.

16000 Baht/1 year, includes the USB modem. Afterward around 1000 Baht/month.

But try to get the engineer to come over to your place to trial it, it seems that quality of service is very dependent on location.

Friend of mine has it in the Nong Plalai area (close to Pattaya prison behind 36 highway), and is getting over 1 Mbps most of the times. Upload remains slow at 40 to 80 kbps.

Hutch shop is between Friendship supermarket and Kasikorn Bank on South Pattaya road...

[MeetJohnDoe]

No that's not the only option. The op wants internet service while at home (not at home and when out and about with the notebook) so there is the option of cable-internet service. If you live in an area serviced by Banglamung Cable TV, you can get their cable internet service (internet only or both cable and internet service). The beauty of this is that they install a cable connection to your house...so you are not using an old unreliable land-line connection. Banglamung is basically re-selling CAT internet's service over their cable lines. So you get what is generally considered to be the best internet service (CAT) through B-TVs cable lines...so no hassles dealing with any Thai phone company bureaucracy.

No wait either for a phone-line as they were out to my place the day after I inquired about signing-up. I have had the service for about 6 months and am very satisfied. Very stable connection (a few auto re-connections a day) and out for a few hours max 3-4 times over that period. Download speed of 2+ mg on a consistent basis. The price was just reduced from B 2000 to B 1500 per month. When I signed-up they had a promo that included free cable modem and 1st months service.

Sure it's more expensive that the TOT/TTT/CAT dsl packages, but from all the complaints about those services (including yours), I am happy to pay B 1500 for my fast, steady, and stable connection.

PS: Also very good for torrent downloads, in my 6 months, I have downloaded about 2 TB of music, tv shows, and movies

Edited May 30, 2009 by MeetJohnDoe

[think_too_mut]

I have just about given up in getting any satisfaction getting the phone line fixed at the Pattaya house. I have had TT&T there for a couple of years but the service lurches between blistering hot and non-existent. The primary fault is the basic land line is very, very noisy with loads of static.

Has anyone told you your land line is ADSL capable? Hanging off a digital exchange?

What you are saying sounds like an old analog exchange that can not be better than what you said.

[NanLaew]

I have just about given up in getting any satisfaction getting the phone line fixed at the Pattaya house. I have had TT&T there for a couple of years but the service lurches between blistering hot and non-existent. The primary fault is the basic land line is very, very noisy with loads of static.

Has anyone told you your land line is ADSL capable? Hanging off a digital exchange?

What you are saying sounds like an old analog exchange that can not be better than what you said.

Yes, the exchange serves Pattaya-Naklua (I am off Soi Potisan) and there's loads of internet cafe's in the area and the original 2nd line purely for ADSL was plumbed in years ago. I upgraded my service about 6 months ago from Indy to Premier so that I could eliminate the possible problem with having too many subscribers on that loop. The service is faster when it's on but the outages are just as frequent and prolonged. Having static on the phone line is bad as the digital signals still ride on top of regular copper wire from the exchange. When 2 modems are declared 'bad' by ATT techs and still work depending on the amount of 'noise', tells me the basic analog (copper wire from exchange to house) part of the system is buggered.

[NanLaew]

No that's not the only option. The op wants internet service while at home (not at home and when out and about with the notebook) so there is the option of cable-internet service. If you live in an area serviced by Banglamung Cable TV, you can get their cable internet service (internet only or both cable and internet service). The beauty of this is that they install a cable connection to your house...so you are not using an old unreliable land-line connection. Banglamung is basically re-selling CAT internet's service over their cable lines. So you get what is generally considered to be the best internet service (CAT) through B-TVs cable lines...so no hassles dealing with any Thai phone company bureaucracy.

No wait either for a phone-line as they were out to my place the day after I inquired about signing-up. I have had the service for about 6 months and am very satisfied. Very stable connection (a few auto re-connections a day) and out for a few hours max 3-4 times over that period. Download speed of 2+ mg on a consistent basis. The price was just reduced from B 2000 to B 1500 per month. When I signed-up they had a promo that included free cable modem and 1st months service.

Sure it's more expensive that the TOT/TTT/CAT dsl packages, but from all the complaints about those services (including yours), I am happy to pay B 1500 for my fast, steady, and stable connection.

PS: Also very good for torrent downloads, in my 6 months, I have downloaded about 2 TB of music, tv shows, and movies

Thanks MJD. What quality of programming is on BCTV? I could ditch the hardly-watched Truevision and save more money if BCTV has the basics that any resident-farang needs.

Is that price you quote over-and-above their basic cable TV service or all inclusive?

I have cable internet back at the Houston home as it was the first broadband service provider and for speed and reliability, it still pisses all over the subsequent DSL and ADSL 'competition' in the city.

Edited May 31, 2009 by NanLaew

[NanLaew]

Only 1 option.

Hutch EV-DO.

16000 Baht/1 year, includes the USB modem. Afterward around 1000 Baht/month.

But try to get the engineer to come over to your place to trial it, it seems that quality of service is very dependent on location.

Friend of mine has it in the Nong Plalai area (close to Pattaya prison behind 36 highway), and is getting over 1 Mbps most of the times. Upload remains slow at 40 to 80 kbps.

Hutch shop is between Friendship supermarket and Kasikorn Bank on South Pattaya road...

monty,

Sounds a little expensive but I would assume this would work nationwide wherever there's EV-DO coverage? How big is that USB modem?

I just looked that the Hutch TH website. Looks like the EV-DO still touts the card type modem but there's something called Hutch MBI with a USB modem. Looks like different deals for prepaid and postpaid.

Edited May 31, 2009 by NanLaew

[longball53098]

Be careful about Hutch EV-Do. If you subscribe to Hutch the data system only works in the central 25 provinces around the BKK area and not upcountry where CAT controls it or the south the same. Also if you have the EV-DO system it only works in BKK and Pattaya not system wide. So, if you take you're laptop to say Rayong it will revert to the slower MBI system speeds

EV-DO by Hutch is very dependent on how close/far you are from the cell site. If you get too far away it's speeds drop greatly.

I tested it a couple of years ago in Pattaya in a house close to BKK-Pattaya Hospital and it worked as advertised in that location.

[NanLaew]

Be careful about Hutch EV-Do. If you subscribe to Hutch the data system only works in the central 25 provinces around the BKK area and not upcountry where CAT controls it or the south the same. Also if you have the EV-DO system it only works in BKK and Pattaya not system wide. So, if you take you're laptop to say Rayong it will revert to the slower MBI system speeds

EV-DO by Hutch is very dependent on how close/far you are from the cell site. If you get too far away it's speeds drop greatly.

I tested it a couple of years ago in Pattaya in a house close to BKK-Pattaya Hospital and it worked as advertised in that location.

Thanks for that longball. How slow is MBI then compared to EV-DO? I am not looking for streaming video or bitorrenting, just reasonably fast and secure web browsing and pop3 email.

[goofie]

John Doe, Do you mind doing some speed test check on www.speedtest.net to international please? O am very interested in the up/down speads intl.

Thanks

[monty]

Be careful about Hutch EV-Do. If you subscribe to Hutch the data system only works in the central 25 provinces around the BKK area and not upcountry where CAT controls it or the south the same. Also if you have the EV-DO system it only works in BKK and Pattaya not system wide. So, if you take you're laptop to say Rayong it will revert to the slower MBI system speeds

EV-DO by Hutch is very dependent on how close/far you are from the cell site. If you get too far away it's speeds drop greatly.

I tested it a couple of years ago in Pattaya in a house close to BKK-Pattaya Hospital and it worked as advertised in that location.

Thanks for that longball. How slow is MBI then compared to EV-DO? I am not looking for streaming video or bitorrenting, just reasonably fast and secure web browsing and pop3 email.

MBI tops out at 153 kbps, but expect an average of maybe 80 kbps.

[longball53098]

Be careful about Hutch EV-Do. If you subscribe to Hutch the data system only works in the central 25 provinces around the BKK area and not upcountry where CAT controls it or the south the same. Also if you have the EV-DO system it only works in BKK and Pattaya not system wide. So, if you take you're laptop to say Rayong it will revert to the slower MBI system speeds

EV-DO by Hutch is very dependent on how close/far you are from the cell site. If you get too far away it's speeds drop greatly.

I tested it a couple of years ago in Pattaya in a house close to BKK-Pattaya Hospital and it worked as advertised in that location.

Thanks for that longball. How slow is MBI then compared to EV-DO? I am not looking for streaming video or bitorrenting, just reasonably fast and secure web browsing and pop3 email.

I have been on Hutch MBI for 3 years now. In that time I can easily say that I have only had one or two times when the system was not working and then only for a short time and a phone call resolved the issue. There are days when I leave the connection "on" with say my Outlook mail open. I use a POP 3 download of mail from Gmail and set Outlook to check mail about every 10 minutes. The Hutch connection will stay connected for as long as I leave it. I have been online and connected for as long as 10 hours a day. I pay the "unlimited" package price or 999 baht per/month. Hutch has never bumped me off the system and never said I download too much data. If you leave a "live " connection open with no activiity for more than about 10 minutes the system will disconnect and then I would have to connect again. Which is painless. So by leaving my mail open and checking every 10 minutes the Hutch connection remains open indefinitely.The average connection speeds are about 100-130 kbps down and about 65 kbps up. This is consistent. Is it slow compared to DSL? But of course but in my case I have no choice and i have gotten used to slow. But more important is it is always working.

When I tested the EVDO two years ago in Pattaya it seemed to work for the 10 minutes use at my home. I believe the max speed for the EVDO system is 2 mbps but more normal speeds are about 800-1mb.

If I understand correctly Hutch only offers the EVDO connection in the Pattaya area and in the Bangkok area. If you are in Pattaya I would recommend going to the Hutch shop on Pattaya tai next to Tukcom, next to Kaisikorn bank. They are open 6 days a week I think. Talk to the sales rep there and ask about a demo at you're home. I would not buy it without the test drive.

Hutch MBI max speed is 153kbps. The latency of this system is very slow. So any Skype type calling will not work. You can do the normal stuff, such as chat messages and POP mail and minor downloading and uploading. If you don't mind the waiting I even downloaded Windows SP3 package and other things.

If you can get the EVDO connection at you're place I think it behaves much like an ADSL connection and most things are possible.

Here are snaps of the speed tests I did today using my Hutch connection. Note 3 different servers and the latency of each.

I hope some of this helps you or another looking at the options out there.