Dialog HomeNet - is it REALLY good?

Ok, Let me start this really simple...
just got connected to my home with a Dialog Homenet (WiMax to not so faint hearted) after calls after calls to the hot-line number. Looks like I'm among the few who jumped in to this whole new package while completely setting aside a whole lot of risk factors that come with it. Now that I'm in the water, I've done some testing and thought to share my experiences with all those who are still in two minds... just so that you don't make the wrong decessions. (huh.... social service?)

well to start with.. Dialog promised to hook me up with a connection within seven (7) WORKING DAYS. But I had to push them very hard to get this done(and today being the 8th working day after I paid the money) whole last week, I've been calling their hotline and asking when I would get the connection and in most of the case I ended up hearing it's going to take another week or two :( just because they've received too many connection requests. Very unprofessional I would say.

ok... so far not so good . . is it? But thats what one can expect from telcos here. (though one would have expected a better service from dialog)

AW.. now to the next big question - SPEED
I got registered for the Homenet package
- 512kbps Download speed
- 128kbps Upload speed

I've run some tests in a www.speedtest.net and here are my results



basically the speed looks good. But a several important issues I picked here
1.) I've noticed that the speed drastically drops when it is raining (down to less that 100kbps) This is to be expected as WiMax uses radio signals to communicate with the base-station unlike adsl which uses physical copper wire. Major plus point to adsl here.

2.) though there seems to be no volume limit (this is a major step ahead from dialog which convinced me to buy it now after rejecting it earlier due to the volume limit that was there then) dialog seems to be limiting my p2p bandwidth. This seems very probable when you think of the business case here for dialog, and also the equipment that they have . . . But not sure here yet... let me verify this after a day or two. If it is the case...well . . you are in trouble baby..


OOOh and one more important thing. This perhaps is some thing that most people will forget untill they get the connection set up. The WiMax connection comes with a wireless antenna. Now this needs to connect to the basestation (which could be as much as 2km away) This requires a considerable amount of electrical power. When the connection is set up, you are required to plug in an indoor unit to an AC power outlet, and this will ADD up to your monthly electricity bill !!!!!!!!


Future - Dialog does seem to be looking very keenly on IP TV and gaming. But no one knows whether these market segments will pick up. SLT (after their mega (supposed to be) launch of IP TV have still not deployed IP TV commercially). There is also the question whether the current WiMax connection dialog offering can support IP TV bandwidth requirements.


head to head comparison - I was considering SLT adsl (another attractive package) against Dialog WiMax some two weeks back and suddenly decided to go ahead with the wireless version for no good reason (probably coz I desperately needed the connection ASAP and was also broke at that time) But, sit back and relax and . . having second thoughts now...

wired connection - no speed drop when raining !!!!!!!!
wired connection - carries a voice line also !!!!!!
wired connection - easier for SLT to upgrade and give more services
wired connection - last mile not shared !!!!!!!!!!!!!
wired connection - consumes lot less power from end users house

wireless connection - less (bandwidth competing) users at this moment
wireless connection - quicker setup (though this was exactly not the case for me)
wireless connection - no adsl modem or router required to be up and running!!!!!!!!!!!!!



There you have it.