Sophon Broadband Internet Pattaya

[Kadafi]

I live in a small housing village in Pattaya, everyone here has been using maxnet which is ok at times but most are desperate for a faster connection.

I spoke to Sophon Internet on Pattaya Tai and enquired about there broadband, prices as follows:

Economy - 4Mbps - 990 baht / month

Standard - 10Mbps - 1,490 baht / month

Premium - 2/1Mbps - 1990 baht / month

Either service is charged with 1500 baht installation fee and a 2500 baht modem fee(unless pay year in advance and get modem free).

They say premium is very fast, they have already brought the cable to my house (which was unexpected as i didnt officially order it) but they say its ready to connect and i can have it running tomorrow if i want.

Just wanted to know has anyone used Sophon broadband and what are the speeds like? i googled it and it says sophon joined part of a korean company or something...

p.s miss typed sophon in the heading if a mod can edit it.

regards

Edited October 30, 2009 by Kadafi

[johninbkk]

I live in a small housing village in Pattaya, everyone here has been using maxnet which is ok at times but most are desperate for a faster connection.

I spoke to Sophon Internet on Pattaya Tai and enquired about there broadband, prices as follows:

Economy - 4Mbps - 990 baht / month

Standard - 10Mbps - 1,490 baht / month

Premium - 2/1Mbps - 1990 baht / month

Either service is charged with 1500 baht installation fee and a 2500 baht modem fee(unless pay year in advance and get modem free).

They say premium is very fast, they have already brought the cable to my house (which was unexpected as i didnt officially order it) but they say its ready to connect and i can have it running tomorrow if i want.

Just wanted to know has anyone used Sophon broadband and what are the speeds like? i googled it and it says sophon joined part of a korean company or something...

p.s miss typed sophon in the heading if a mod can edit it.

regards

If it is anything like there cable TV and service, it's pathetic.......

[givenall]

I live in a small housing village in Pattaya, everyone here has been using maxnet which is ok at times but most are desperate for a faster connection.

I spoke to Sophon Internet on Pattaya Tai and enquired about there broadband, prices as follows:

Economy - 4Mbps - 990 baht / month

Standard - 10Mbps - 1,490 baht / month

Premium - 2/1Mbps - 1990 baht / month

Either service is charged with 1500 baht installation fee and a 2500 baht modem fee(unless pay year in advance and get modem free).

They say premium is very fast, they have already brought the cable to my house (which was unexpected as i didnt officially order it) but they say its ready to connect and i can have it running tomorrow if i want.

Just wanted to know has anyone used Sophon broadband and what are the speeds like? i googled it and it says sophon joined part of a korean company or something...

p.s miss typed sophon in the heading if a mod can edit it.

regards

Make sure it has one month money back grantee in case do not perform as they advertise

[SurfRider]

.

"Sophon cable TV in conjuction with CAT are offering a new fiber optic service."

Does anyone know the source of this information and/or the flier?

We talked with CAT/Pattaya and they know nothing about it. They handed it off to CAT/Bangkok and so far, no response.

A call to the number on the flier results in the normal clueless person answering who has no idea what you're asking about.

Has anyone checked this out or been able to get any specific verifiable information? Preferably a technical person from Sophon who really knows the details?

Do they have a demo set up somewhere in Pattaya where it would be possible to do some speed tests, and other tests on the quality of the service?

.

[Kadafi]

I have just had sophon internet installed in my house yesterday, so far im happy with it but its only been 24 hours so fingers crossed. I live in small housing village on Pattaya Tai, i had big problems with ttnt and everyone here has slow lines with them. TOT cant install in this area so i stumbled across this sophon and they had the cable to my house within couple days.

I went for the Premium service, maybe i could have started on standard first and upgraded after to see the difference but i didnt. My neighbour is going to get the 10Mbps and try and see if theres much difference.

At moment web browsing is fast and hasn't been any drops in the line, also ive had a constant 250k download speed which is fast enough for me and movie downloads take about an hour...

[SurfRider]

.

Any chance you'd be willing to run these two tests and report back with the results?

Unfortunately, they both default their destination to Bangkok, which won't tell you very much, but would be better than nothing.

If you can do a slight adjustment to the destination to something like New York or Los Angeles it would be much more revealing.

On the first test, you would need to drag the small box in the lower window to the region that you want, then click on the specific city/server to be tested.

On the second test, you need to click and drag the map itself to the region of the world that you want to test, and then click on the specific city/server.

http://speedtest.net

http://www.pingtest.net

.

[Kadafi]

Speed Test results

BANGKOK

BANGKOK-LONDON TEST

BANGKOK-NEW YORK TEST

Edited November 1, 2009 by Kadafi

[Kadafi]

The thing i dont understand is premium is 2Mbps and standard is 10Mbps.

The way it was explained that many people share the standard line where as premium should have a steady 2Mbps.

Not sure if i would get similar speeds whatever package i choose.

However i would say my connection has been solid up to date, better than ttnt connection everyone has here. Whatever time of day or night the speeds have been the same and i havent be losing connection or anything. All i want is a reliable service, not something fast one minute and then totally doesnt work at another...

Edited November 1, 2009 by Kadafi

[johng]

Kadafi,

what type of modem did you get ?

make and model would be nice if you don't mind.

[SurfRider]

.

Very interesting results!

The first two indicate that you're getting the same speeds as CAT's 2/1 DSL, which myself and a few others that I know have. It rarely exceeds 1.7, even though it's advertised at 2 Mbps -- They've recently reduced the cost of that service to around 1820 Baht/ month on a one year contract.

Your third test is slightly faster, which probably indicates that Sophon's Cable connection is capable of higher speeds than CAT's DSL if and when CAT's infrastructure can support it.

Unfortunately, your upload speeds are adequate, but far less than the advertised 1 Mbps. That same problem exists with DSL also. DSL is normally around the .39 that you got on your Bangkok-London test, so it appears that Sophon-Cable beats CAT's 2/1 DSL slightly on average on uploads.

Since Sophon's flyer advertises 4 Mbps and 10 Mbps as their lower tier services, it's obvious that they should have stated .4 Mbps and 1 Mbps ( TiT ) and anyone considering Sophon should be aware of that.

Since you're in South Pattaya near Pattaya Tai, you're almost on CAT's door-step, so that may have some effect compared to someone living out in east-podunk-ville.

I'm curious if you had Sophon's TV Cable running to your house before you ordered their Internet? One variable that is still unknown is whether or not Sophon can deliver Internet over their existing Cable-TV infrastructure, as most other providers around the world can-- or if they need to install a dedicated cable.

I assume they didn't charge you extra for the cable installation and hopefully not for the modem either.

Thanks very much for running and reporting the tests! This is VERY valuable information.

.

[Kadafi]

Not sure where to find the make and modem, here is a pic i just took.

Sorry if picture quailty isnt too great...

[johng]

By the power of Google... I found your modem..well it looks exactly like your modem.

www.ls-sbg.com/PDF/HFC_eng.pdf

looks like this is a Hybrid fibre-coaxial (HFC) service.

Edited November 1, 2009 by johng

[Kadafi]

Thats the modem johng, well found and some good info on it there.

It certainly seems a well made modem and its running fine...

[aguy30]

Please run the test from Numion. It give a reasonable indication to multiple connections for actual website surf speeds outside of Thailand. Exactly which Sophon service and speed are you subscribed to?

http://www.numion.com/YourSpeed3/Run.php?Q...=SelectDefaults

[frenchFARANGbkk]

Hi,

Is it possible to use your own modem ? Is this one a cable modem (not dsl) ?

What about Wifi ?

Thanks.

[monty]

Hi,

Is it possible to use your own modem ? Is this one a cable modem (not dsl) ?

What about Wifi ?

Thanks.

No, can't use your own modem.

It's not a "cable" network as we are used to in the West, over here they just use LAN over Coax adapters, basically they just deploy a router with a very big network.

For many people the biggest drawback will be the fact that you get a private IP address assigned, so you will never be able to do port forwarding, meaning many applications will not work properly, or not at all. Your PC will forever remain unreachable from the outside world!

[JSixpack]

Tried any torrent downloads yet?

[SurfRider]

.

"Tried any torrent downloads yet?"

YES! - I'd also be very interested in learning about results with Torrents.

Monty, I assume you can forward ports through the Sophon Modem, but if you can't do that directly, there MUST be some way to use another Modem or E-Switch on the client side of the rig to allow distributing the feed to a LAN. That would enable private LAN IP addressing, NAT, etc.

Without some such provision, it would be extremely unsafe for a Sophon user to expose their PC to the Internet without a NAT firewall.

If anyone knows the details concerning these issues with the Sophon Modem, please post it.

.

[frenchFARANGbkk]

Is it possible to connect this broadband modem to a wireless router to share the connection between different computers ?

And do you know if "normal" DSL using telephone line and number is available at Pattaya / Jomtien or the only internet there is the same at 3BB system ?

Thanks.

[monty]

Monty, I assume you can forward ports through the Sophon Modem, but if you can't do that directly, there MUST be some way to use another Modem or E-Switch on the client side of the rig to allow distributing the feed to a LAN. That would enable private LAN IP addressing, NAT, etc.

.

Not possible. Sophon is not an ISP and as such does not own a public IP range. You at your home do not have a modem, it's basically just a network port!

The actual modem/router, which gets a public IP address from CAT, sits in the Sophon office. From there on that modem will assign dynamic private IP addresses to all sophon subscribers.

Only Sophon's modem/router is visible on the internet, all sophon subscribers are hidden behind it on a private network.

So the only way would be for somebody at sophon to put you on a fixed private IP address and set the proper port forwarding to your PC in their modem. Doubt this is going to happen with maybe a few hundred subscribers all going to ask the same thing!

The way to look at their set up is that the modem/router sits at the sophon office, gets one public IP address from CAT, and all sophon subscribers are hooked into that modem by a very long LAN cable.

[SurfRider]

.

"The way to look at their set up is that the modem/router sits at the sophon office, gets one public IP address from CAT, and all sophon subscribers are hooked into that modem by a very long LAN cable."

Thanks for the clarification. Sophon should be required to make that information available in writing to all potential customers before they sign a contract. It immediately takes Sophon out of the running for anyone doing much beyond basic web browsing and eMail. I can't imagine that Torrent would work very well, if at all, since you can't dedicate a forwarded port to your Torrent client.

"Is it possible to connect this broadband modem to a wireless router to share the connection between different computers?"

In the early days of DSL before personal Routers became popular, there was software called WinGate that somehow allowed you to share one IP among multiple PCs -- I can't recall how it worked, but if it's still around, that might be a possibility.

"And do you know if "normal" DSL using telephone line and number is available at Pattaya / Jomtien"

As far as I know there are three possibilities using a standard copper-pair phone line. TT&T, TOT, and CAT. The first two use regular phone lines and CAT requires a dedicated line that has no phone number with it. TT&T and TOT vary in availability depending on where you're located. In my opinion CAT is the best of those possible options. TRUE Cable is new and apparently much faster, but availability in different areas is uncertain and I've received varying answers every time I've asked.

.

[jcowle]

Has any one recently installed Sophon internet, if so what is it like compared to the competition. Sophon can now serve my home on the 3rd road soi6, but I would like some feed back before making the change.

Thanking you in advance

JOHN

[Forkinhades]

I had this modem before. I plugged in the RJ45 cable from my wireless router (output side) into the cable modem, and the wireless worked backwards!

[TOQ]

Has any one recently installed Sophon internet, if so what is it like compared to the competition. Sophon can now serve my home on the 3rd road soi6, but I would like some feed back before making the change.

Thanking you in advance

JOHN

I have had the 4mb service installed for about 3 weeks now and have no trouble with it what so ever. I called the office around 1PM on a Friday afternoon and it was up and running by 5:30. I am in the Tukcom area of town

[jcowle]

Has any one recently installed Sophon internet, if so what is it like compared to the competition. Sophon can now serve my home on the 3rd road soi6, but I would like some feed back before making the change.

Thanking you in advance

JOHN

I have had the 4mb service installed for about 3 weeks now and have no trouble with it what so ever. I called the office around 1PM on a Friday afternoon and it was up and running by 5:30. I am in the Tukcom area of town

Many thanks for the feedback.

JC

[mahjongguy]

I have had Sophon 10Mb service in Jomtien since the beginning of 2010. This test to San Francisco was a few minutes ago.

[NomadicGuru]

That's pretty good. However, I require at least 1 mbps upstream to a server in Seattle. I had CAT's 2mbps up/down service when I lived there 3 years ago but it would disconnect many times a day. Can anyone suggest the best way to get a reliable 1mbps or more upstream to a US server in Pattaya/Jomtien?

[chuckrivera]

Can anybody verify that Skype works on Sophon with their shared connection?

[tropo]

The thing i dont understand is premium is 2Mbps and standard is 10Mbps.

The way it was explained that many people share the standard line where as premium should have a steady 2Mbps.

Not sure if i would get similar speeds whatever package i choose.

However i would say my connection has been solid up to date, better than ttnt connection everyone has here. Whatever time of day or night the speeds have been the same and i havent be losing connection or anything. All i want is a reliable service, not something fast one minute and then totally doesnt work at another...

Went in there today and this is what they said:

Premium is shared between a maximum of 5 customers.

Standard is shared between up to 30 customers.

Also... All of the standard packages are 512 upload speeds whereas the premium is 1Mb.

Edited February 23, 2011 by tropo

[tropo]

That's pretty good. However, I require at least 1 mbps upstream to a server in Seattle. I had CAT's 2mbps up/down service when I lived there 3 years ago but it would disconnect many times a day. Can anyone suggest the best way to get a reliable 1mbps or more upstream to a US server in Pattaya/Jomtien?

You could try the CAT 2Mb/2Mb SDSL service. I think CAT is your only option if you're looking for better upload speeds, but expect to pay a lot more.