3g ?

[indothai]

Does anyone know if 3G will be available in Bangkok, Thailand ?

[Amethyst]

yes .. and to get more answer use the search link .. lots of previous discussion being made

[monty]

Not anytime soon!

The best we currently have is:

GPRS speed a bit slower then dial-up and not very stable, available pretty much all over Thailand.

GPRS EDGEStill not very stable, but due to the higher topspeed (over 100kbps) the average surfing experience is better. Still lots of latency and package loss, so almost unusable for VOIP. Available in Bangkok and some big cities.

CDMA (Hutch) The best of the lot, I actually have had pretty good skype conversations with people using Hutch. Still not close to 3G but already quite a bit better the dial-up. Available in greater Bangkok, Eastern Seaboard and a bit Southward.

Although Hutch is the best at the moment, it needs a special cdma modem or an aircard, whereas GPRS and Edge connections can be made with pretty much all mobile phones, although EDGe only with the later models.

Hutch is supposedly also a bit difficult to subscribe to, need workpermit or put on Thai name. GPRS is availble on the pre-paid cards and is dirtcheap (I pay 450 Baht/month for 350 hours of access with an AIS post paid package)

[Guest Reimar]

According to NTC (National Telecommunications Comission) G3 will be on service in the 1. or latest the 2. quarter of 2007.

CAT and CS-Loxinfo installed the Infrastructure already according to NTC!

[monty]

Not too sure about it! According to a press release (less then 2 months ago) CAT is installing the CDMA 1X network in 51 provinces. Should be indeed ready early next yeay. Parts of it will be operational early october.

CAT Telecom to launch CDMA service in 51 provinces next year

BANGKOK: -- CAT Telecom Plc will kick off the Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) 2000 1x cellular service in 51 provinces in next January and will rely on the lowcost handsets to quickly nab subscribers.

CAT's chief finance officer in charge of the project, Jirayuth Rungsrithong, said Thursday that CAT would partially launch the CDMA service in October and go fully commercial in January when 1,600 CDMA base stations in 51 provinces are expected to be completely rolled out.

-- The Nation 2006-07-27

In my (and others) opinion this technology is mistakingly called 3G. It should more correctly be called 2.5G or maybe 2.75G.

This is the technology currently used by Hutch, giving speeds of up to 144kbps

Only the newer CDMA2000 1xEV-DO can be considered 3G, and this is currently used in the USA by Verizon and I guess others but not in Thailand...

[Khutan]

The only licenses for 3G are for network and carrier testing. I doubt much will happen for the public in Q1 or Q2 2007.

My guess will be Q3, Q4 rollout in BKK and selected provinces. From what I understand the carriers are only expecting a take-up of 1 Million for the entire country in the first 12 months, thus making the investment in the networks for 1 million prople very large.