Home internet: True or AIS?

[Esterhazy]

I know True has the better reputation in Thailand for internet access in general, but I'm looking at plans for my new flat in Bangkok and True is 3x more than AIS for the same home internet package (50/10 mbps). Is True so much better than AIS for home internet that it justifies being three times more expensive?

[thai3]

I have True signal up and down in strength all the time

[impulse]

Ask your new neighbors. They'll have better information about service in your location.

I have True ADSL and it sucks. Goes down for hours, sometimes days at a time. Call them up, go through the menu, "press X for English" and get another Thai message. Have one of our Thai people call them, and it's go home and have an argument with the guy they send, who says my brand new router is "obsolete", need a new one.

Slows to a crawl whenever it rains, leading me to suspect crappy wiring down my sub-soi around Asoke. (Or everyone gets on the Interweb when the weather sucks)

But some of my workmates have True and it works great in their locations around BKK. And if you don't have problems with the signal, the field service frustrations don't really factor in.

Edited May 6, 2016 by impulse

[KhunBENQ]

I can only give you my personal impression from reading here in the forum and I read about everything on internet access.

True gets endless complaints about being ridiculously slow, having erratic performane.

They are big in marketing/advertising, overselling like mad.

As said this is just an impression from what I read here.

Things can differ from district to district.

I have ToT fibre, ToT being the most cursed ISP in the forum, particularly in Pattaya (where most reports come from).

I live remotely in upcountry and being very satisfied with them.

As written above: local experience counts.

Edited May 6, 2016 by KhunBENQ

[lopburi3]

True 50meg is not what most would get - if they want higher speed the 30meg as offered here would be what most people would buy and that is much more competitive with AIS price wise.

http://trueonline.truecorp.co.th/product-service/super-fiber/entry/5349

[patyh]

IMHO, if I only need internet and do not need cable TV from True, I would go for AIS.

As AIS is a new player, their network is not as congested as True. furthermore, they have more bandwidth than True.

AIS is also indirectly controlled by Singtel so the people handling the network is pretty knowledgeable..

My experience with their customer service so far has been top notch. Fast and helpful response. With True, it's always a 24 hours wait.

It may be because AIS is still new, but hey so far they are doing a pretty good job.. And for their price? Why not give them a go?!

[bkkcanuck8]

True 50meg is not what most would get - if they want higher speed the 30meg as offered here would be what most people would buy and that is much more competitive with AIS price wise.

http://trueonline.truecorp.co.th/product-service/super-fiber/entry/5349

The data will go over international lines so the "per connection" speed will be limited (improved over the last few years) to a maximum of 1 Mbps (slower during prime hours). In country speed will of course be much much higher. Most services use one connection and thus will be limited, but for things like Torrenting (assuming it is not artificially limited) you would likely be able to use a much higher bandwidth (each seeder that you are connected to is a separate connection).

[grahambkk]

In my building we have D-SLAM, a variant of ADSL whereby True have effectively brought in the node from their telephone exchange. I do not, therefore, share capacity with the local neighbourhood, only with others connected in my building. It has been rock steady for the whole period since it qas installed early last year with no spikes at all in upload or download performance 24x7. If you can obtain such a connection it is well worthwhile. BTW, It is sreets ahead of anything I experienced last week when visiting the UK,and cheaper.

[lopburi3]

Current test

Thailand

Download Speed: 31999 kbps (3999.9 KB/sec transfer rate)

Upload Speed: 3474 kbps (434.3 KB/sec transfer rate)

Latency: 3 ms

Jitter: 1 ms

5/6/2016, 2:40:20 PM

USA:

Download Speed: 4677 kbps (584.6 KB/sec transfer rate)
Upload Speed: 4246 kbps (530.8 KB/sec transfer rate)
Latency: 213 ms
5/6/2016, 2:42:42 PM

Singapore:

Download Speed: 31753 kbps (3969.1 KB/sec transfer rate)

Upload Speed: 3513 kbps (439.1 KB/sec transfer rate)
Latency: 32 ms
Jitter: 2 ms
5/6/2016, 2:45:14 PM

[spambot]

In my building we have D-SLAM, a variant of ADSL whereby True have effectively brought in the node from their telephone exchange. I do not, therefore, share capacity with the local neighbourhood, only with others connected in my building. It has been rock steady for the whole period since it qas installed early last year with no spikes at all in upload or download performance 24x7. If you can obtain such a connection it is well worthwhile. BTW, It is sreets ahead of anything I experienced last week when visiting the UK,and cheaper.

Where are you located grahambkk? - which building?

I have given notice on my apartment in BKK so as to get Internet that works - I'm going to rent an apartment in Hua Hin and sign up on a short contract for a months and test their connection, but they still only have shared wifi routers and importantly share local connections back to ADSL / D-Slam, I can not find apartment here in BK that offers anything consistent and reasonably fast - Hence prepared to travel away from BKK to get what you got i.e D-Slam in the basement and hence no contention battles with the local subs in the general metro area - just share bandwidth with occupants in the building.

[bangkapi]

I've had TRUE in my condo for about 14 years with almost no complaints.

[gandalf12]

We have 3BB and we have never had a problem with it. The speed varies but that is going to happen no matter what internet service you have unless you have an agreement for a fixed bandwidth. Some companies have that but individually very rarely have it

[bkkcanuck8]

We have 3BB and we have never had a problem with it. The speed varies but that is going to happen no matter what internet service you have unless you have an agreement for a fixed bandwidth. Some companies have that but individually very rarely have it

3BB has been solid for me. I recently downgraded to 13/1 (2 lines) from 16/1 I think (I was getting charged for a package that no longer existed and was since reduced in price so I took the opportunity to downgrade).

I have been known to download a couple of terabytes over the period of a month (over 2 lines).

If you are a heavy user during the day -- your overall speed will be reduced to about 50% between 6:30ish to 12 midnight, but full bandwidth is available during the rest of the day (years back it was ramped down much more but overall bandwidth available internationally has allowed for improvements).

As I mentioned earlier the international lines (Cogent, GTT, NTT, AAG etc.) that your traffic get rerouted through (independent of ISP) each have their own per connection speeds which are typically limited to at most 1 Mbps (time of day dependent). When I mention "per connection" speeds... if you are downloading a file from one server using a standard FTP/HTTP download protocol you are using "one connection". If you are torrenting and downloading from 5 computers at the same time you are using 5 connections.

[Mark T]

3BB

[Mark T]

JAS, the owner of 3BB, being new kid on the block had everything to prove to gain market share

[Beats56]

3bb 15mb 965b

[choudens]

try the new AIS Fiber if possible, it is fast, reliable, no up and down, never any problem 50/15 for 590 Baht!

pdc

[inbangkok]

Internet quality is location dependent in Thailand. You should definitely ask your neighbors what they are using and how it works.

[khomlong1]

We have 3BB and we have never had a problem with it. The speed varies but that is going to happen no matter what internet service you have unless you have an agreement for a fixed bandwidth. Some companies have that but individually very rarely have it

[khomlong1]

We have had 3bb for some years now (Khoksamrong Lopburi). Very helpful with any line problems and always return my calls with good spoken English.

[user82374298374]

As I mentioned earlier the international lines (Cogent, GTT, NTT, AAG etc.) that your traffic get rerouted through (independent of ISP) each have their own per connection speeds which are typically limited to at most 1 Mbps (time of day dependent).

This is completely untrue. You really ought to be sure you know what you're talking about before making pronouncements of this nature.

For reference, I have True's Small Business aDSL service, 3,000ThB/month. It's 8mb/sec down and 512kb/sec up.

Due to TCP RTTs, I get ~6mb/sec downloads transpacific for TCP-based stuff, irrespective of time-of-day. There is no inter-provider QoS; there is no 1mb/sec throttling for either the Small Business aDSL I have, or the normal consumer-grade product.

I would be on True fibre, but they don't have it built out in my area, yet. The reason I use the Small Business service is because the local loop is separated from the consumer side, so I'm not competing with a lot of BitTorrent.

[bkkcanuck8]

As I mentioned earlier the international lines (Cogent, GTT, NTT, AAG etc.) that your traffic get rerouted through (independent of ISP) each have their own per connection speeds which are typically limited to at most 1 Mbps (time of day dependent).

This is completely untrue. You really ought to be sure you know what you're talking about before making pronouncements of this nature.

For reference, I have True's Small Business aDSL service, 3,000ThB/month. It's 8mb/sec down and 512kb/sec up.

Due to TCP RTTs, I get ~6mb/sec downloads transpacific for TCP-based stuff, irrespective of time-of-day. There is no inter-provider QoS; there is no 1mb/sec throttling for either the Small Business aDSL I have, or the normal consumer-grade product.

I would be on True fibre, but they don't have it built out in my area, yet. The reason I use the Small Business service is because the local loop is separated from the consumer side, so I'm not competing with a lot of BitTorrent.

Sorry, you are correct - I should have said 1 MBps (Megabytes) - around 8 Megabits.

[Estrada]

I have had True for many years. Sometimes the speed slows to a crawl but if you unplug the router and plug it in again it will make a new connection to a node on True's server. Then the speed is OK. Also I had a lot of problems with firstly the True Router provided and then the TP-Link Routers with 7 going faulty. I switched to Belkin 4 years ago and now have no problems. True service centre were always helpful even though most of the time the problem was the defective TP-Link Routers.

[impulse]

Also I had a lot of problems with firstly the True Router provided and then the TP-Link Routers with 7 going faulty. I switched to Belkin 4 years ago and now have no problems. True service centre were always helpful even though most of the time the problem was the defective TP-Link Routers.

Can anyone else corroborate the TP Link router issues? Not that I don't believe Estrada, but more than one data point could be helpful. Also, it's possible that the default factory setting on the TP Link's were different than the default setting on the Belkin's and that's the difference. I'm always gobsmacked at the number of optional settings available. And I don't have a PhD in networkology.

Anyone? (I'll be buying a Belkin regardless, just to try it out) Thanks, Estrada!

[gandalf12]

We have had 3bb for some years now (Khoksamrong Lopburi). Very helpful with any line problems and always return my calls with good spoken English.

I agree with you. We had a router go faulty. I could have put a new one and programmed it but as we are paying for the service we caled them and within hours they came and changed it for a new one. I have no complaints with 3BB. People here seem to think their download speed will remain constant, it wont for a number of reasons I wont go into here. Shannon provides all the answers if anyone knows of that theory and understands it

[bkkcanuck8]

Also I had a lot of problems with firstly the True Router provided and then the TP-Link Routers with 7 going faulty. I switched to Belkin 4 years ago and now have no problems. True service centre were always helpful even though most of the time the problem was the defective TP-Link Routers.

Can anyone else corroborate the TP Link router issues? Not that I don't believe Estrada, but more than one data point could be helpful. Also, it's possible that the default factory setting on the TP Link's were different than the default setting on the Belkin's and that's the difference. I'm always gobsmacked at the number of optional settings available. And I don't have a PhD in networkology.

Anyone? (I'll be buying a Belkin regardless, just to try it out) Thanks, Estrada!

I cannot corroborate Estrada, but it is a common issue with consumer grade routers..... especially if you torrent alot. The more connections you open, the more memory used -- and quite a few don't do the best job of cleaning up their memory.... they will then slow down to a crawl because of the lack of memory. Turning them off and on cleans up the memory and they are back to their old self. Because of the volume / activity I could put through a modem I found them already beginning to degrade after 24 hours....

I do have a TP-Link Router, but not one of the cheap ones (cheaper, but not cheap). I use a TL-ER5120 router which allows me to load balance across multiple lines (in my case 2). I still use the consumer grade "routers" but they are turned to bridge mode (meaning I just use them as modems - no other functionality) - no software, no memory issues on the modems. I have no problems with slowdowns, but then it cost me probably around 10K to 12K baht in Thailand (overpriced, but not many options for them here).

P.S. Most consumer grade "routers" are pretty much crap, memory problems and lots of security issues across quite a number of them.

[MyFrenU]

I had a True Internet DOCSIS connection for 3 years and it was the most stable internet connection I've ever come across,just amazing never needed rebooting for months at a time I can highly recommend it.I think the router was a Thompson one which was ok and did the job adequetely but obviously a third-party Cisco should do a better job speed wise,the only thing I had a nightmare with was trying to connect a WiFi printer to it.

[gandalf12]

Ask your new neighbors. They'll have better information about service in your location.

I have True ADSL and it sucks. Goes down for hours, sometimes days at a time. Call them up, go through the menu, "press X for English" and get another Thai message. Have one of our Thai people call them, and it's go home and have an argument with the guy they send, who says my brand new router is "obsolete", need a new one.

Slows to a crawl whenever it rains, leading me to suspect crappy wiring down my sub-soi around Asoke. (Or everyone gets on the Interweb when the weather sucks)

But some of my workmates have True and it works great in their locations around BKK. And if you don't have problems with the signal, the field service frustrations don't really factor in.

If you are not connected by wire or fiber then expect the speed to vary with rain. Normally the attenuation over 300MHz is very significant in radio based systems

[impulse]

Slows to a crawl whenever it rains, leading me to suspect crappy wiring down my sub-soi around Asoke. (Or everyone gets on the Interweb when the weather sucks)

If you are not connected by wire or fiber then expect the speed to vary with rain. Normally the attenuation over 300MHz is very significant in radio based systems

Sadly, I have to confess that I have 2 wires coming into a junction box on my balcony and nary a clue where those 2 wires lead on their side. I thought I was connected by wire... I guess for all I know, those wires may lead to a satellite dish on the roof, though I figured I was somehow connected to that ungodly rat's nest of cables on the poles at the street in front of my apartment building.

Which begs the question, is there a resource (link) that explains in English the different connection schemes for the internet options here in Thailand? Cable, fiber, frequencies, bandwidth, limitations, idiosyncrasies, caveats, etc?

[lopburi3]

If you have a pair of wires it is a normal phone line so an ADSL connection (with or without an actual landline phone/number). This is normal and what most people have used until that last year or two. There has been limited coax access for internet as an addition to cable TV in a few locations - but this has been very limited and only in major cities AFAIK - this allowed always on higher speed connections than most ADSL. New option is Fiber Optic directly to home and this allows very high speeds and other services (such as phone/CATV) to also be provided.

Edit: today even ADSL can be quite good as backbone becomes more fiber optic cable the distance that signal must travel on bare wire is being greatly decreased - allowing much higher reliable speeds.

Edited May 7, 2016 by lopburi3