Broadband slow lane reality in Thailand

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Broadband slow lane reality in Thailand 
Bangkok Post: 4 Sep 2009
www.BangkokPost.com

SLOW LANE ON THE SUPERHIGHWAY

As ISPs crank up the numbers of their broadband speeds, users should read the fine print and look where it leads them.

This is too good to be true. "Broadband must be at least 3Mbps. Blast through the internet at 10Mbps for only 1,490 baht a month," screams a bus-stop ad as one crawls through the crowded Bangkok streets.

It is indeed a relief to know there is at least one superhighway that is not crowded here. But is it?

Months after the stepped-up high-speed ADSL internet was introduced - from three to eight and now 10 Mbps compared to 2 Mbps at most for general consumers a few years ago - complaints are mounting about broadband speeds that are much lower than advertised, and not speeds worthy of the multimedia age.

Many consumers blame the operators for raising their hopes only to have them dashed in real-world use. "This is totally unfair for me as I pay for a premium package but get a speed on par with the cheaper one," said Tak, who signed up for a 3-megabit-per-second (Mbps) service package.

However, a broadband technical expert who asked not to be named said internet service providers (ISPs) needed to impose limits on the speeds a customer can achieve for certain applications such as FTP and peer-to-peer downloading because international links are still very expensive even though the prices have drastically decreased since the market was liberalised in 2006.

Apart from price, technology plays a role in determining the speeds Thai users can get. He explained that ADSL 1 was capable of up to 1.5 Mbps, while ADSL2 offers 8-24 Mbps and ADSL2+ offers download speeds of up to 24 Mbps, depending on the distances from the serving equipment to the points of use.

For very high-speed digital subscriber line 2 (VDSL2), the theoretical maximum speed is 250 Mbps.

Technically, the expert said it is possible to have 8Mbps or higher asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) bandwidth as the equipment is available to support it.

But as their peers do elsewhere in the world, operators in Thailand look to maximise profits by trying to squeeze the most ADSL speed out of the plain old telephone service (POTS) backbone.

The source said the POTS copper wire was designed for a voice-grade telephone service. It was not until the late 1980s that a new development in technology allowed people to use the copper wire to transfer data.

"What the operators are doing now is making the best use of their copper wire network investment that was laid out 15 years ago. ADSL to these companies is like a new lease of life for the aging network," he said.

In addition, the distances from the distribution points or DSLAM to users' homes, the quality of the users' telephone lines, the noise level in the DSL line and the number of users online at the same time can all affect the speeds, as do the ISPs' traffic and the local and international speeds.

He also warned that consumers should carefully read the fine print in the advertisements, especially lines that say the maximum speed depends on the number of users logging on at that time.

An executive of TT&T, the operator of the MaxNet broadband service, also urged customers to pay attention to the difference between local and international speeds of a package before subscribing. Most operators today provide high bandwidth only for local access or websites located in Thailand because it costs them less to buy the bandwidth to connect to Thailand Internet Exchange or among ISPs.

In any case, the executive acknowledged that ADSL bandwidth cannot be guaranteed as it is shared based on the packages that customers purchase.

For their part, users can do little to deal with the blocked or "throttled" speeds for certain applications by the ISPs. But recently they have gained access to another option.

The limitation of international speeds by ISPs has popularised the "Co-Lo" (Co-location) service under which users "rent" hard disk space by the gigabyte or by an entire physical disk from operators, most of whom have their offices in the same buildings as CAT Telecom or the ISPs to take advantage of the top speeds provided directly by the international gateway operator.

A user can then connect to his allocated hard disk space using the Windows Remote Desktop feature from home. He can then use some programs installed in that space to do his bidding, most of which his ISP does not make it easy for him, such as FTP or peer-to-peer connections, at speeds up to 1Gbps.

In the meantime, he can log off and even shut down his home computer. Once the downloads at his co-location are completed, he can reconnect and download the files to his PC at top speeds because it is a local-to-local connection.

Service fees range from 400 to 500 baht a month for 80 GB of space and a download speed of around 32 Mbps.

According to OECD broadband statistics as of September 2008, Japan had the world's highest average advertised download speed of 90.667 Mbps, followed by South Korea (78.91 Mbps), and France (49.80 Mbps) while the US ranked 19th at 9.41 Mbps.

In terms of the average broadband monthly price per advertised Mbps as of October last year, South Korea enjoyed the cheapest rate among the 31 countries surveyed, at US$0.85, followed by France ($3.30), United Kingdom ($4.08) and Japan ($4.79).

To test your speed online:

Local: http://www.speedtest.or.th/

International: http://www.speedtest.net/