Lopburi99 Posted July 23, 2009 Share Posted July 23, 2009 Hi, I'm way out of date on this, but I will be traveling a lot soon and want to use a wireless USB modem for dialup purposes. I thought by buying an prepaid internet card and using a wireless modem on my laptop I could get my email, etc, from anywhere in Thailand. This is true, right? I hear the wireless USB modems are actually faster than land line dialup these days. BTW, I have an old notebook and the USBs are 1.0 Do you have a recommendation for me please? Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
webfact Posted July 23, 2009 Share Posted July 23, 2009 (edited) Let me try to clarify and ask some questions. You got an old notebook with USB 1.0 port. Does it come with a phone line outlet? It should - than you have a built-in modem already in your notebook. To the best of my knowledge you cant dial-up wireless. I trust you mean a WiFi connection? Could you pls. mention model/brand and age of your notebook. Edited July 23, 2009 by webfact Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NHJ Posted July 23, 2009 Share Posted July 23, 2009 yes, it's gonna work almost everywhere in thailand, you just need the cdma modem and sim card, that's it. it's gonna be slow btw but enough to read your mail. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
balo Posted July 23, 2009 Share Posted July 23, 2009 A USB modem and a simcard is all you need. It will work everywhere but not very fast. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
monty Posted July 23, 2009 Share Posted July 23, 2009 Cheap USB gprs/edge modem will do, start at around 2000 - 2500 Baht. Put in pre-paid simcard from AIS or Dtac. Without an internet package they'll charge both 1 Baht/minute of internet access. Not sure on the internet package pricing with Dtac, but with AIS you can get a pre-paid "net-sim" card, for every 100 Baht you top-up you get 30 days validity (sim-card costs 210 Baht). 20 hours of internet/month costs 100 Baht + 7% vat. 100 hours of internet/month costs I think 350 Bah +7% vat. Just make sure there is enough credit on your sim-card when renewal time comes up. AIS will send an SMS if not enough credit is available, but when you top up later it'll automatically re-activate the internet package... Make sure you get the net-sim card, regular pre-paid sim-cards need to get topped up with 300 Baht to get an extra 30 days of validity, it's very likely you won't use that much credit so it'll be wasted money. Speeds vary between 80 and 200 kbps, so you are looking at between double and 5 times faster then old style dial-up! Just make sure that the usb modem is "edge" capable... Don't worry about the USB 1.0 connection (1.0 is 1.5 mbps, more likely your usb will be 1.1 which is up to 12 mbps), it will be much faster then the internet you'll get throug the modem... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steppenwolf108 Posted July 23, 2009 Share Posted July 23, 2009 Before buying a USB modem, why don't you check if you can use your mobile phone as modem connected to your notebook? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave_boo Posted July 23, 2009 Share Posted July 23, 2009 Another vote for using the phone as a modem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
khunjake Posted July 23, 2009 Share Posted July 23, 2009 Dialup is Dead. Use a GPRS/EDGE connection man.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
verydumbubba Posted July 23, 2009 Share Posted July 23, 2009 No Worries Mate - so is the Internet in LOS Bubba PS Go with the USB/GSM phone thingy - less to lose & spend BTW, I have an old notebook and the USBs are 1.0 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lopburi99 Posted July 23, 2009 Author Share Posted July 23, 2009 (edited) Thanks for the info guys. I just got up (its the morning in the U.S.), and now I know what my options are. Webfact, it's a Fujitsu Lifebook Notebook, about 7-8 years old. Durable old beast, I've had it around the world. Yes, it has an internal modem. When I said wireless, I meant to use with no land line. Very sorry, I am horribly out of date on all this, things which I was a near expert on in my previous life. B.S. Computer Science 1970 . Now I'm a freaking retard. Don't even know the correct terms to use. <embarrassed> I just have a piece of crap mobile phone but I guess it could work as a modem. I'll research all of your posts above. I need to be careful with what I spend, so I will get whatever is not costly and provides decent speed. Thanks again for taking the time to reply. P.S. Flying back to LOS tomorrow - can't wait. Edited July 23, 2009 by Lopburi99 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lopburi99 Posted July 31, 2009 Author Share Posted July 31, 2009 Cheap USB gprs/edge modem will do, start at around 2000 - 2500 Baht.Put in pre-paid simcard from AIS or Dtac. Without an internet package they'll charge both 1 Baht/minute of internet access. Not sure on the internet package pricing with Dtac, but with AIS you can get a pre-paid "net-sim" card, for every 100 Baht you top-up you get 30 days validity (sim-card costs 210 Baht). 20 hours of internet/month costs 100 Baht + 7% vat. 100 hours of internet/month costs I think 350 Bah +7% vat. Just make sure there is enough credit on your sim-card when renewal time comes up. AIS will send an SMS if not enough credit is available, but when you top up later it'll automatically re-activate the internet package... Make sure you get the net-sim card, regular pre-paid sim-cards need to get topped up with 300 Baht to get an extra 30 days of validity, it's very likely you won't use that much credit so it'll be wasted money. Speeds vary between 80 and 200 kbps, so you are looking at between double and 5 times faster then old style dial-up! Just make sure that the usb modem is "edge" capable... Don't worry about the USB 1.0 connection (1.0 is 1.5 mbps, more likely your usb will be 1.1 which is up to 12 mbps), it will be much faster then the internet you'll get throug the modem... Update: Bought a Go3G wireless modem, EDGE USB reg 1,990 on sale for 1,200 baht. The tech couldn't get it to work on my PC's USB ports so he put in a USB 2.0 - 1394 Combo card (790 baht)into my PC Card slot then the modem worked fine in those USB ports. He said something about "low power" from my USB ports being my problem (?). Anyway, everything works fine now, albeit slower than I thought. The modem connects at 460.8 K but the software's chart shows my throughput of only about 17.6 K/s max. I can live with this, just wanted to let you all know. Also got the GPRS net sim for 290 baht (12 call?). I think it's for 30 hrs but the docs are mostly in Thai so of course I can't understand them. Evidently it is renewable for 99 baht as Monty said. How do I refill? I never refill my mobile because I never use it and am not aware of how to refill prepaids. Seems to me I buy something at 7-Eleven. I'd rather not use my credit card online but I will if I need to do it that way. Thanks again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jiu-Jitsu Posted July 31, 2009 Share Posted July 31, 2009 TRUE is the cheapest at 250 baht for a month of unlimited usage. http://www.truemove.com/eng/product/package/pre_wifi.htm DTAC is next because the SIM card is cheaper at 49 baht and is generally more user(foreigner) friendly. http://www.happy.co.th/en/low/17_service_m..._internet02.php AIS/One2Call would only be a choice for me as a backup if the others didn't work. Their website and literature are just horrible. It's like they know that they have to cater to the foreigner, but they don't like it. http://www2.mobilelife.co.th/internet/subi...php?nServID=208 The 99 baht Top Up info for AIS you have been given is simply nonsense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jiu-Jitsu Posted July 31, 2009 Share Posted July 31, 2009 Also, don't mix your bits with your bytes. 1 byte equal 8 bits, so your 17.6 kB/s download figure is equal to a bandwidth of 140.8 kb/s. The 460.8 kb/s figure is the maximum the modem can transmit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
monekyface Posted August 28, 2009 Share Posted August 28, 2009 If anyone has advice or recent experiences with the go3g usb modem it would be much appreciated. I have a heck of a time getting it to work consistently and the techs at both AIS and True are totally baffled. Last night after the True technician gave up, my girlfriend and I did some fiddling and figured out that True GPRS needs a password so we filled in "true" and then were able to connect. Also under the device manager and modem, AIS has no initialization string and True has a funky one like +cgdcont=1,"ip","internet". Since I use both AIS and True sim cards in this modem I set up two different hardware profiles, one with that init string for True and another with no init string for AIS. The funniest thing is that I can get one of the services to work, but then when I disconnect I am not able to reconnect. I get errors like "sim is locked" (from the go3g software) or windows tells me that there is a problem with my modem- and these problems vary. Sometimes I ditch the go3g modem and just use my Motorola 6267 quad-band cell phone to connect, but it sure would be a lot easier if I could use the edge modem full-time. I also wonder if go3g has any support website that will update the drivers or the firmware on this unit. I can't seem to find anything. Thanks a million!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dudeyone Posted August 28, 2009 Share Posted August 28, 2009 Can somebody list a couple of available 3g USB modems that I can buy here? I want to try out True's 3g. I heard you need a 850 band capable modem or something like that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crushdepth Posted August 29, 2009 Share Posted August 29, 2009 Bluetooth dongles are much cheaper than USB modems - if you have a PC you want to connect to a bluetooth phone's built in modem just get a dongle. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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