Mobile Internet in the Philippines - Smart BRO or Smart prepaid G3 via cellphone and laptop into Internet
Those among you who depend or enjoy or need a mobile communication, good news for all Philippine visitors or residents. With G3 more and more expanding across all islands, smart bro offers since a while a new Internet connection to its subscribers - a small USB connected device that uses smarts G3 network.
Coming from a communication high tech job many decades ago, I was wondering "if Smart Bro now no longer offers the small parabolic antenna to connect broadband to www, then this new USB connected device must use Smart's normal G3 network."
This setup uses the exactly same technology as the new Smart BRO prepaid - except that for that Smart BRO prepaid you would have to buy a package costing a total initial payment is P4500 one times fee. The additional usage is the same 10 PHP / 30 minutes. The mobile phone connection as tested and described in very detail in the below linked pages replaces the 4500 PHP hardware package / modem you'll get from Smart and uses your own cellphone built in technology and your bluetooth connection between PC or laptop to your smartphone. Most modern Nokia smart phones do have all the G3 technology and bluetooth needed to get the same connection and mobile benefits than the 4500 PHP HW package. Exactly the same speed and quality !!!
I persistently avoid any 1 or 2 year plans or other subscription contracts since years. I love freedom, including freedom of choice and freedom to change. Businesses which are sincerely working on quality never need to bind new customers by contracts, contracts only are needed - like marriage-contracts - when limited readiness to fully satisfy customers on an ongoing basis exists.
As a user / owner of a Nokia N95 I was testing to connect my openSuSE 10.x operated Acer ferrari 5000 via Bluetooth to my N95 and test the quality of smart bro without subscription plan and without additional USB device. The technology obviously MUST be the same. The price is slightly different.
Using my regular prepaid smart cellphone, I pay 10 PHP per 30 minutes unlimited bandwidth. As a smart bro subscriber I would benefit from a flat price below 1000 PHP / month but bound by a contract.
The Internet broadband connection via G3 Nokia N95 connected via Bluetooth to my laptop is excellent - about the same speed as I experienced during the past 2 years using regular ( parabolic antenna ) smart bro during various travel into remote provincial areas of the Philippines - such as Banaue, El Nido Palawan and La Union.
Here below you see a real life condition Internet speed test. The condition / location where my test was made was under MOST unfavorable situations. The N95 was directly in my door, placed on a chair. I have about 1 sqm of good strength signal at this precise location. All other areas have NO useful signal for regular SMS / texting. At this precise spot however the signal - while strong - is a signal mix of various signal reflections from the 4 walls around my inner open area of the building. A normal voice call usually always gets interrupted within seconds due to poor signal quality or more likely due to interference by reflecting signals. To fully understand the situation you have to understand that UHF signals of frequencies used in cellphone netoworks behave comparable to light. The higher the frequency the more comparable the radiation propagation to light. Nearby concrete walls or metal walls act as reflector / mirror. The result at the receiver is a mixture of signals coming from different directions at the same time - but with a phase shift due to minimal time differences between signals of same content arriving from different reflecting walls. May be for a NON-wireless technician this behavior is easiest understood when compared to "echo" of a human voice inside big/high buildings or in mountain valleys.
Similar electromagnetic interference may be experienced when attempting to mobile connect in streets with high buildings on 2 or more sides. UHF / mobile cellphone signals need a direct connection between cellphone network antenna and your mobile phone. Any object inbetween absorbs or blocks the signal or as in cases of walls around the cellphone unite - reflect the signal and may create a signal mix of multiple phase/time shifted signals arriving in your cellphone unit.
Under these most difficult electromagnetic propagation environment packet radio communication protocols are challenged. Errors in receiving / sending signals may occur and need to be corrected automatically.
Download test of a large file via G3 Nokia N95 using Smart and laptop connected via Bluetooth
Download test of a large file - a one day access_log file from my server, the Cyberspace Ashram:
- access_log-20080611.gz
- 12688020 100% 18.08kB/s
- Number of files transferred: 1
- Total file size: 12688020 bytes
During above download the maximum speed was repeatedly some 48kB/s with most of the time being 30+kB/s. the lower average resulted from a few many seconds lasting stalls or near stalls of the data flow.
Below you see a test result for upload and download as tested by http://testmy.net:
Summary
- Download :: 270 Kbps or 0.27 Mbps (33 kB/s)
- Upload :: 60 Kbps or 0.1 Mbps (7 kB/s)
:::.. testmy.net test results ..:::
Download Connection is:: 270 Kbps about 0.27 Mbps (tested with 512 kB)
Download Speed is:: 33 kB/s
Upload Connection is:: 60 Kbps about 0.1 Mbps (tested with 256 kB)
Upload Speed is:: 7 kB/s
Tested From:: http://testmy.net (Main)
Test Time:: 2008/06/11 - 6:32pm
D-Validation Link:: http://testmy.net/stats/id-DHTWUZLYM
U-Validation Link:: http://testmy.net/stats/id-9PDOIEMB5
User Agent:: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686 (x86_64); en-US; rv:1.8.1.14) Gecko/20080410 SUSE/2.0.0.14-0.1 Firefox/2.0.0.14 [!]
I may later add another test result when traveling again the beautiful Philippine islands later this summer to show you how the connection speed and quality is in a NON-city open air / natural environment.
Enjoy your freedom - enjoy mobile life and work and have fun where life is beautiful
God bless
hans
