BajaNomad

San Felipe Internet Telnor or Telcel?

CortezBlue - 5-6-2010 at 10:06 AM

Ok, my long time neighbors, who have been nice enough to let me hijack their Hughes Sat internet, are moving and I willmost likely loose my internet.
I am in the IT industry and I can work pretty much from anywhere that has internet.
From a technical stand point, can anyone tell me there opinion of going with Telnor or Telcel

Telnor, in SF, is an over the air phone service. And from what I can tell is about $40 a month

Telcel, is a usb cellular 3g system. It can be either monthly fee or pay as you go.

Tell me what you think

Riom - 5-6-2010 at 11:34 AM

I've been using prepaid Telcel Amigo 3G as my main connection in San Felipe since last November. I've written about it on my site (link below).

It's a great deal faster than Telnor (generally 1 to 2 Mb/s, compared to 128 kb/s) and not much more expensive. In fact pay-as-you-go (Amigo) Telcel works out cheaper for a part-timer, if you don't need the "landline" phone line you get with the Telnor system.

Having said that, Telcel does have a download cap (3GB/mo) - if you've put up with a shared satellite system you'll be used to that. It's not perfect all the time - today for example the 3G seems to be down (for maintenance?) so it's fallen back to slower speeds.

There are about one to four days a month when the Telcel speed is unacceptable. Still, the rest of the time it's MUCH more usable than Telnor. You'll also see a good improvement in ping times / latency compared to satellite.

If you're starting from scratch I'd certainly recommend Telcel over Telnor, much easier to install as well.

Since I already had Telnor, I've kept it as a backup and I use it for low-priority but bulky dowloads, to keep the Telcel download limit for interactive stuff.

Rob

South Campos

Borregoman - 3-10-2011 at 11:03 AM

Hi Rob,

Has 3G gotten down to the South Campos yet? Telcel cellular is there.....sure would be better than getting Hughes Net.
Quote:
Originally posted by Riom
I've been using prepaid Telcel Amigo 3G as my main connection in San Felipe since last November. I've written about it on my site (link below).

It's a great deal faster than Telnor (generally 1 to 2 Mb/s, compared to 128 kb/s) and not much more expensive. In fact pay-as-you-go (Amigo) Telcel works out cheaper for a part-timer, if you don't need the "landline" phone line you get with the Telnor system.

Having said that, Telcel does have a download cap (3GB/mo) - if you've put up with a shared satellite system you'll be used to that. It's not perfect all the time - today for example the 3G seems to be down (for maintenance?) so it's fallen back to slower speeds.

There are about one to four days a month when the Telcel speed is unacceptable. Still, the rest of the time it's MUCH more usable than Telnor. You'll also see a good improvement in ping times / latency compared to satellite.

If you're starting from scratch I'd certainly recommend Telcel over Telnor, much easier to install as well.

Since I already had Telnor, I've kept it as a backup and I use it for low-priority but bulky dowloads, to keep the Telcel download limit for interactive stuff.

Rob

grace59 - 3-11-2011 at 07:59 AM

I, too, have a home in San Felipe and have been told that the Telnor system is full and no additional internet is available through them. Since I don't have internet there, I haven't personally checked into this. Does anyone else know anything about this??

bajatravelergeorge - 3-11-2011 at 09:49 AM

Does anyone know what bandwidth the telcel amigo 3G is running on? i.e. 850 megahertz, 1800, 1900 etc. I can't seem to get a straight answer off of the web or from telcel. Thanks

Bajajorge - 3-11-2011 at 11:48 AM

I live in San Felipe and I have the Telnor over air service. The $40 a month listed above also includes Telnor phone service. It gets pretty spotty at times when alot of people are using it. This race weekend will be a real headache for Internet users. Can't give any opine on Telcel.

Riom - 3-11-2011 at 06:41 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by bajatravelergeorge
Does anyone know what bandwidth the telcel amigo 3G is running on? i.e. 850 megahertz, 1800, 1900 etc. I can't seem to get a straight answer off of the web or from telcel. Thanks


Telcel Amigo 3G is an UMTS/HSDPA signal on 850 Mhz.

I've written a lot about the Telcel 3G on my website:
http://www.sanfelipelife.com/category/Phone-Internet

I'm not in San Felipe at the moment, but I've heard from several people that Telcel 3G has been extremely slow, virtually unusable, in the El Dorado area for the past couple of weeks. Is anybody else there having trouble (or not) using it?

Borregoman, you need the 3G signal, as well as Telcel's older GSM signal on 1900 MHz. If you have a phone with 3G 850 on it and it tells you you're using 3G, you should be OK.

Rob

Bajajorge - 3-12-2011 at 11:55 AM

I'm not in San Felipe at the moment, but I've heard from several people that Telcel 3G has been extremely slow, virtually unusable, in the El Dorado area for the past couple of weeks. Is anybody else there having trouble (or not) using it?

The Baja 250 crowd has been coming in over the past couple of weeks, and of course everyone of them brings at least one laptop with them.
The race is presently in progress, so nobody is on their computers. My Telnor Internet service is working great at the moment.