Bomberro
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Posts: 157
Registered: 7-19-2006
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Telcel Wireless Internet
Just read of a report of Telcel adding wireless internet to their cell towers! This was on the BPE! Would be great to get a report of band width up
and down. We are hooked up with a DSL line from Telcel, our up and down are as follows, about 104Kb/s up and 877 Kb/s down. Would be so great to
travel around with just a USB device and have internet and voip (we hope) at any spot were cell coverage is available. For Baja travelers this would
be so great! I used my Skype phone last year while in Panama, its the SMC wireless, and was making calls back to Baja for 3 cents a minute. Technology
has really changed here in Baja, not long ago we were making phone calls from an office in Buena Vista, she had the old plug in cords to connect
calls.
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Riom
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Posts: 492
Registered: 12-17-2004
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Yes, I wrote about this a little while back:
http://forums.bajanomad.com/viewthread.php?tid=35392
Since then, I've tested it (one day of unlimited data).
Some corrections to my first report: the one day is for 24 hours - you send the text message, get a reply back in about 10 seconds that says the
service is active, and that tells you the time it will end - 24 hours ahead. (the time it reports is Mexico City time, not local time).
Also, the amount comes out of your main Amigo balance - unlike texts and pay-as-you-go data is does not come from the "bonus" time, so you don't get a
reduction in the per day cost by using large refills (although you can use the bonus time for other things). The prices are marginally lower than the
prices on the website, because only 10% IVA is charged in Baja California, rather than the 15% mainland tax.
Works fine at 192 kbps down / 96 kbps up here in San Felipe. Some areas also have much faster speeds with 3G 850 (if you have a suitable phone) , and
the 3G area is expanding fast. There is a 100MB cap on faster speeds per day - after that it drops to 128kbps/day.
I tested it with just a phone (Nokia E51 but anything with GPRS would do in the slower speed areas), with that phone bluetooth connected to a Nokia
770 Internet tablet (a very portable solution), and with it bluetooth tethered to laptop running Linux (Win/Mac would also work). All work OK.
I also tried it with a mobile hotspot program (Joiku). This program runs on the phone, connects to Telcel with GPRS data, and creates a wi-fi hotspot
for multiple devices to connect. I had mixed results with these, got my Nokia 770's, and even my wifi printer, to connect to it fine but couldn't get
the laptops to find it. I ran out of time to sort out that out further, but it's not a Telcel problem, just my local phone-wifi network.
So, in summary, it seems to work fine. Best bit is you can test your setup first with the pay-as-you-go data, before buying time by the
day/week/month.
[Edit]
Just noticed you're talking about "adding wireless internet to their cell towers" as though it's new. It's been working for about a year in San
Felipe, much longer in big cities, but until recently has been very expensive (pay-as-you-go). What's new are the "unlimited" packages that make it
affordable to use.
[Edited on 2008-11-30 by Riom]
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