Mobile Operator Internet Speed In Bangladesh

i've been using grameenphone unlimited edge service for last 1 year using
two sets motorola v3i(gprs class 1o)and nokia 5700(edge class 32).location
eskaton garden,near holy family hospital.the highest downloading speed i ever
got with motorola is 5.2 KBps and with nokia 14 KBps using opera browser as the
download manager.as now i use the nokia set most of the time,the average speed i
get this days is between 3-5KBps.i've used flashget too and the speed does not
differ much.it takes almost exact same time to download a thing by opera or
flashget
this speed seems too low as i pay a thousand excluding vat to
grameenphone every month and some people from different locations get even a lot
better speed.is there anything that can be done to increase the downloading
speed NOT changing my location?



Well, I should include few more general test reports here. You will get your answer from test3. Thanks for your question :-)

Test1:
Area: Rampura
Device: Sony Ericsson GC89
Connection: GP EDGE unlimited

I am now using Grameen phone unlimited internet. I use Sony Ericsson GC89 EDGE modem. And i live in Rampura. I get average 15-17 KBPS (kilobyte). It varies with time. Because in the day time I get 13-15 KBPS (kilobyte).


Test2:
Area: Rampura
Device: Nokia 3110 classic Made in Hungary
Connection: GP EDGE unlimited

We've used Nokia 3110 classic Made in Hungary at my home to test the internet speed. And it was as good as I usually get using GC89 (average ~17KBPS)

Test3:
Area: Boxibazar, Old Dhaka
Device: Nokia 3110 classic Made in Hungary
Connection: GP EDGE unlimited and Warid unlimited

I went to Boxibazaar (Behind Dhaka university and BUET area) and used Same Nokia 3110 classic made in Hungary. There both the download and upload speed using GP was terrible and shocking!!! I didn't believe my friend who told me that he didn't get more than 4 KBPS anytime.And the line was not stable. My friend contacted GP and they told him that they have huge number of GP internet user in that area. So, they can do nothing to increase the speed. It seems the total bandwidth for a tower or area is fixed. So, where internet users are more there you will get less speed.

This number of users are data service users, not the voice user. You know data service means GPRS or EDGE which no connection with the voice service (calling). So, we should calculate users based on who are using data service.

Warid:
And there Warid internet was same as ~5.5 KBPS and stable. It seems Warid internet is stable everywhere. Of course constant ~5.5 KBPS is not bad (at least for those among us who has very bad experience with dial up or ISP provided internet)

Test4:
Area: Uttara
Device: Nokia 3110 classic Made by Nokia
Connection: GP EDGE unlimited

My another friend is using unlimited internet by 3110 classic (Made by Nokia) in Uttara. He gets more than 15 KBPS. So, now it seems "Made by Nokia" and "Made in Finland" doesn't differ in quality. Only it differes in our brain :-)

Test5:
Area: Banani
Device: Nokia 3110 classic Made by Nokia
Connection: GP EDGE unlimited

We have used Nokia 3110 classic (Made by Nokia) in Banani area. There we also got more than ~15KBPS on average.


Now, I have told you before, my tests are from general users point of view. I didn't test in any professional lab using highly efficient equipments. And the data transfer over wireless depends on many many variables that I didn't have considered during my tests. If anyone did then please share your reports with us.

Have a nice day.

Another Full Test By My Friend

Burn in test 001: Mobile internet
We three friends (teen_goenda) were frustrated with so called Deshi broadband services. We thought to use unlimited internet provided by Mobile operators in our country. So, we were determined to compare the internet browsing speed and download speed and choose the perfect connection fo us. We have used Grameen phone and Warid Telecom unlimited connection to test and compare their internet speed.


Grameen vs. Warid:
At the very beginning we must say Warid never tried to convince us that they had EDGE in all over Dhaka city. Rather when we contacted Warid help desk, they told us that they had only testing version of EDGE in Gulshan and Bonani. One the other hand Grameen phone help desk told us that they had EDGE tower all over the Dhaka city.



GPRS vs. EDGE:
Now theoretically GPRS class 10 has download speed of 36-48 kbps (kilo bit per second) or 4-6 KBPS (kilo byte per second).

On the other hand EDGE class 10 has download speed of 236-247 kbps or (29.5 KBPS- 30.9 KBPS)


Tools:
We have used the following tools for this test-
Nokia 6230i (original Made in Finland) - EDGE class 10 supported

Sony ericsson GC89 EDGE modem -EDGE class 10 supported (price ~6,500 tk)

Warid post paid sim with unlimited internet connection. (1000/= monthly)

Grameen post paid sim with unlimited internet connection (1000/= monthly)

Downloader: Flashget 1.71 . We tried to download a 240MB file with resume support.

Browser: Firefox and Internet Explorer 7 (IE7) to measure the browsing speed.

Location:Rampura.

Measurement unit:
For simplicity we have used kbps or kilobit per second as standard unit of measurement. We know that 8 kilo bit = 1 Kilo byte.



Test reports from others:
We took it our friends tests and opinions under consideration who had experience using mobile internet of all the mobile companies.

Friend1:
Mobile phone: Nokia N73 "Made by Nokia"

Operator: Grameen phone unlimited internet connection.
Location: Bonani

Data rate: Maximum 88 kbps , minimum 24kbps and average 56-60 kbps.


Friend2:

Mobile phone: Chinese GPRS USB modem bought from IDB by 6,000 tk one and half years ago.
Operator: Grameen phone Unlimited conneciton.
Location: Mohammodpur
Data rate: Maximum 24kbps , minimum 500bit per second and average 12 kbps.


Friend3:


Mobile phone: Chinese USB EDGE modem. Bought from IDB by 11,000 tk one years ago.
Operator: Grameen phone EDGE connection.
Location: Bashabo
Data rate: Maximum 227 kbps, minimum 120 kbps and average 160 kbps.


Report & calculation:
Form the experiment we observe that-
Grameen phone download speed is faster than Warid telecom .

Grameen phone Browsing is same or sometimes a bit poorer than Warid telecom.

Nokia original Made in Finland provides the best performance among all the mobile phones.

"Made by Nokia" (India and China made and sold by Nokia center) phones shows poorer internet performance in the same test.

Nokia (Made in Finland) also shows better performance in download (download speed almost double) than dedicated PCMCIA DGE modem Sony Ericsson GC89.

Conclusion:
Nokia (Made in Finland) is the best for internet:
If you want to buy a cell phone for internet and want to browse smoothly and download Gigabytes of data, then try your best to get a Nokia "made in Finland" EDGE class 10 or higher supported phone. We know from our market survey that "Made in Finland sets" are very rare in the market. If you fail to get a Finland set then go for the Hungary set. We can tell you for sure that Hungary sets shows better performance than "Made by Nokia" India or China made sets.



Dedicated modem only for your laptop:
Better not to go for Sony Ericsson GC89 or other Chinese modems if you seek highest download speed. However you may not like to carry a phone connected to a laptop for internet. Also if you are on move then The phones power will go down very quickly. So, in that case you can use GC89 or Sony ericsson PC300 (if available in the market). Let me remind you, GC89 has no voice. So, you can't call or receive call using that modem. But you can send and receive sms though.


Avoid Chinese modems:
Chinese modems have very unstable and poorer performance of all. Only exceptional one Chinese USB modem that one of our friends bought from IDB shows the top performance equivalent to the original finland Nokia mobiles. But we can't tell you for sure exactly which one that modem is. Because we didn't get that modem in the market few months later. However we never recommend those fancy modems. Also you can buy an EDGE class 10 Hungary made Nokia in the same price of those Chinese EDGE modems.


DANGER:NEVER EVER BUY A GPRS MODEM OF ANY BRAND OR NON BRAND. BECAUSE GPRS MODEMS ARE CAPABLE OF PROVIDING HIGHEST 48 KILOBIT PER SECOND. PRCATICALLY WE GOT 24-32 KBPS.


Finally, we say in this way- if you are download freak and/or need 10GB or more data per month and use internet in a fixed place (at home or office etc) then always better to buy a Nokia Made in Finland or Hungary sets with EDGE class 10 support. If you have a laptop and want to use internet on move then go for the PCMCIA sony ericsson GC89 EDGE modem. Avoid buying "Made by Nokia" sets for hardcore internet use. No to any GPRS modem or Chinese EDGE modem.

Disclaimer:
Our research was not influenced by anyone or any company. We did these tests for choosing the best setup to use internet. We thought the test result may help others, so we publish this result in the net. Our test was very limited, because we had only used 4/5 types of mobiles phones and only two mobile phone companies. But people use lots of different mobile phones from different companies. Also there are 5 mobile operators in our country. More over the internet speed varies time to time and place to place. We alone can not test all those setups since we are not any commercial survey company.

So we hope and encourage you all to test your internet speed in different places in different times and using different mobile phones. Publish your own test results in here in this blog comment. Your feedback and sharing experiences will help others to choose the right stuff for themselves.