Bringing Laptop To Chiang Mai

[Pearlgirl]

We are going to Chiang Mai early December for a month and plan on bringing our wireless laptop. While we are there we'll be renting a house for the month and its outside of chiang Mai city. First question, does Chiang Mai have 3G service yet for internet, and if they do, will it work on our laptop there? Next question, if there isn't 3G service yet, can we go wireless setup in our holiday home without having to purchase a full year's service with the local service provider, or, will we have to travel to some of the local internet cafes to use our laptop? The home does not have internet connections.

[nikster]

For 3G you can get a CAT CDMA stick from CAT. Unfortunately you'll have to buy the hardware, about bht 7000, plus 800 baht / month. But you can cancel after 1 month. The stick doesn't have a SIM card so it's not universally usable, it would I guess be a write-off. Then again if you get the Novatel 727 (the cheaper of the two options), I might give you some money for it at the end I have the other one, CCU-680 but would rather have the 727 because it's natively supported in OS X.

AIS 3G doesn't work around Chiang Mai, it's only down-town.

Getting DSL installed should work too but you would have to pay for the line if its more than 300m from the nearest DSLAM (a little box that spreads DSL). All the "promotions" come with a 1 year contract but I think you'd be able to get a contract for 1 month provided you pay for installation and so on. It really depends on where you are and what provider you use how much this all costs.

[gotlost]

For 3G you can get a CAT CDMA stick from CAT. Unfortunately you'll have to buy the hardware, about bht 7000, plus 800 baht / month. But you can cancel after 1 month. The stick doesn't have a SIM card so it's not universally usable, it would I guess be a write-off. Then again if you get the Novatel 727 (the cheaper of the two options), I might give you some money for it at the end I have the other one, CCU-680 but would rather have the 727 because it's natively supported in OS X.

AIS 3G doesn't work around Chiang Mai, it's only down-town.

Getting DSL installed should work too but you would have to pay for the line if its more than 300m from the nearest DSLAM (a little box that spreads DSL). All the "promotions" come with a 1 year contract but I think you'd be able to get a contract for 1 month provided you pay for installation and so on. It really depends on where you are and what provider you use how much this all costs.

The above is totally incorrect on 3G every thing else I agree with. AIS 3G is available in Chiang Mai. They are the only provider to offer this service in Chiang Mai, Cat is not 3G. The above is incorrect on the reception of 3G I live in Doi Saket 20Klicks outside of town and I'm on AIS 3G. Go to their office on Tha Phae Rd and it will cost you 3900 baht one time and for 30GB 1500 baht or 15GB 900 baht per month. The 15GB is probably your best option. You pay your monthly fee by using AIS(12call) top up cards .

[pjclark1]

If you don't need broadband why not just buy a EDGE/GPRS dongle.

I have one and it's great from email and web browsing (using it now).

Cost

1900bht for the dongle (Vodafone MD950 from 1st floor of Pantrip Plaza)

100bht for a DTAC SIM (DTAC shop at Gat Sang Gow aka Centrum)

200bht a month for 100hrs connection

I use this everywhere in Thailand, works perfectly in my home outside CM.

Why do you need broadband?

Much cheaper to buy pirate movies and games if you are into that sort of stuff.

[SM7WGP]

But what not anybody has told you here, if you hae 3g modem from US or Europe it will not work on 3G Thailand different freqz.

But for use with Edge GPRS its okay.

[nikster]

For 3G you can get a CAT CDMA stick from CAT. Unfortunately you'll have to buy the hardware, about bht 7000, plus 800 baht / month. But you can cancel after 1 month. The stick doesn't have a SIM card so it's not universally usable, it would I guess be a write-off. Then again if you get the Novatel 727 (the cheaper of the two options), I might give you some money for it at the end I have the other one, CCU-680 but would rather have the 727 because it's natively supported in OS X.

AIS 3G doesn't work around Chiang Mai, it's only down-town.

Getting DSL installed should work too but you would have to pay for the line if its more than 300m from the nearest DSLAM (a little box that spreads DSL). All the "promotions" come with a 1 year contract but I think you'd be able to get a contract for 1 month provided you pay for installation and so on. It really depends on where you are and what provider you use how much this all costs.

The above is totally incorrect on 3G every thing else I agree with. AIS 3G is available in Chiang Mai. They are the only provider to offer this service in Chiang Mai, Cat is not 3G. The above is incorrect on the reception of 3G I live in Doi Saket 20Klicks outside of town and I'm on AIS 3G. Go to their office on Tha Phae Rd and it will cost you 3900 baht one time and for 30GB 1500 baht or 15GB 900 baht per month. The 15GB is probably your best option. You pay your monthly fee by using AIS(12call) top up cards .

That's cool about AIS - didn't know it's widely available in CM now.

CAT CDMA is 3G - they're using CDMA EVDO Rev. A which allows for maximum download of 3.1Mbit/s. CAT limits this to 1.5Mbit down and 512Kb/s up, and they deliver on it. It's been faster than my TOT DSL line on many occasions. => See here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution-Dat...#TIA-856_Rev._A

In real world use UMTS 3G standards have a max. speed of 7Mbit, but they usually have some restrictions to avoid network congestion. I had a 3G card in Europe - it felt pretty fast, but download was restricted to 1Mbit/s.

What kind of speeds do you get on AIS 3G? Speedtest.net and so on? I'd like to know how much they deliver....

I have an EDGE backup connection - it's OK for emails in an emergency, but too slow for normal use. Example, I am downloading an OS update that weighs in at 470MB just now. Good luck downloading that on EDGE...

[Pearlgirl]

Great Stuff, but I am confused now more than ever. I'm totally, almost totally, computer illiterate, but once I sit down and sift thru this info., I'm sure I'll be able to figure it out. Anyway, it sounds totally possible for what we want to do and now I know that I can bring our laptop and get something going. You guys are great - thanks.

[Jiu-Jitsu]

But what not anybody has told you here, if you hae 3g modem from US or Europe it will not work on 3G Thailand different freqz.

But for use with Edge GPRS its okay.

That's not correct.

[pjclark1]

I have an EDGE backup connection - it's OK for emails in an emergency, but too slow for normal use. Example, I am downloading an OS update that weighs in at 470MB just now. Good luck downloading that on EDGE...

Someone on holiday doesn't need to do this. ..... in fact pretty much nobody needs to do this, usually the updates are a complete waste of space.

[monty]

But what not anybody has told you here, if you hae 3g modem from US or Europe it will not work on 3G Thailand different freqz.

But for use with Edge GPRS its okay.

That's not correct.

Actually more then likely it will be correct! AIS 3G is offered on 900 Mhz, which virtually no device supports.

Pretty much all devices will do 850, 1900 and 2100 Mhz...