Lowyat.NET: Latest topics by rajulkabir

1 megabit is "a legal right" in Finland

rajulkabir — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 23:11:22 +0800

http://www.yle.fi/uutiset/news/2009/10/1mb...ht_1080940.html

As of July 2010, everyone in Finland has the legal right to 1mbps internet access, set to increase to 100mbps in 2015. If your ISP can't get you 100mbps, no matter where in the country you live, then the police will make them do it.

When we will see something like this here in Malaysia?

Wifi on the bus

rajulkabir — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 15:55:16 +0800

I'm posting this using the free wifi on the Transtar bus from Singapore to KL. It seems to be a Huawei router connected to Maxis service (for this reason it only works on the Malaysian side of the border). Not too bad actually. I think there's another bus company that also provides wifi. Odyssey maybe?

Anyone else used wifi services provided on moving vehicles? I have used the internet on the Thalys train between Paris and Amsterdam many times; it's provided by satellite so the latency is quite high and interactive sessions (e.g, SSH) are frustrating. This cell-network service on the bus seems much more responsive.

Speed test follows (taken about 15km north of the Second Link border checkpoint):

The numbers are a little weird, but I've never used Maxis, maybe that's what it's like.

English -> Chinese translation required

rajulkabir — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 03:33:07 +0800

I need some text translated from English to Chinese for a web site. The translation needs to be of a quality that would look normal to someone in China.

It's about 100 words and phrases, most of them quite short. The longest ones are two or three sentences long. You can do the work online, all you need is an internet connection.

I expect it'll take under two hours, and I'm willing to pay RM50 for it.

I can pay in cash if you can come to central KL, or I can bank directly into your account if your bank will let me do it from their ATM. Payment on completion. If this works out, I may have other similar projects in the future.

Getting closer to Google

rajulkabir — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 23:32:51 +0800

Anyone notice Google results have become much snappier recently? I think it might even have happened today.

CODE

% traceroute www.google.com
traceroute to www.l.google.com (216.239.61.104), 64 hops max, 40 byte packets
1 router (10.20.30.1) 1.174 ms 0.754 ms 0.579 ms
2 * 219.93.218.177 (219.93.218.177) 15.767 ms *
3 219.93.216.221 (219.93.216.221) 13.738 ms 13.812 ms 14.168 ms
4 58.27.124.46 (58.27.124.46) 15.898 ms 16.524 ms 16.483 ms
5 58.27.124.46 (58.27.124.46) 15.350 ms 15.312 ms 16.031 ms
6 219.93.173.37 (219.93.173.37) 15.232 ms 15.501 ms 15.698 ms
7 202.188.139.162 (202.188.139.162) 22.659 ms 23.288 ms 23.372 ms
8 74.125.50.229 (74.125.50.229) 53.572 ms 49.799 ms 50.229 ms
9 209.85.243.156 (209.85.243.156) 51.463 ms 55.562 ms 50.764 ms
10 * * *
11 sn-in-f104.google.com (216.239.61.104) 49.677 ms 50.781 ms 50.534 ms

Malaysia? India?

Malaysia ranks #75 in internet bandwidth per cap

rajulkabir — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 04:14:45 +0800

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/int_int_...mbps-per-capita

While it has its flaws, this is an interesting way of comparing a fundamental prerequisite of internet service quality.

Denmark, ranked #1, has 34kbps per person.

Malaysia, ranked #75, has just 128bps per person, placing her behind such powerhouses of development as Gabon, Uruguay, and Afghanistan.

Singapore, at 5kbps, has 45 times as much international connectivity per person as northern neighbour Malaysia.

At least we can feel better knowing we're not living in perennially war-torn West African nation Guinea-Bissau, where each person enjoys just 0.043bps (about 2.5 bits per minute, enough to download a 650MB CD image in as little as 4020 years).

Malaysian carriers to reduce ASEAN roaming rates?

rajulkabir — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 16:01:35 +0800

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=...4101&sec=nation

QUOTE

Roaming charges for mobile phone users in the Asean region may be cut by as much as half early next year.

Energy, Water and Communications Minister Datuk Shaziman Abu Mansor said a reduction was necessary as the present charges were ex cep tionally high for users in developing countries.

“We plan to reduce roaming charges with Singapore first. In fact, I told the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) two weeks ago to proceed with this,” he said in Kampung Tanjung Rantau near here yesterday.

...

Asked what was the acceptable rate for roaming charges, Shaziman declined to say but added: “If you ask me, anyone making a call from JB to Singapore should be charged a local rate. But let the MCMC and the telcos come up with an acceptable structure.”

TMnet blocking sites?

rajulkabir — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 15:47:26 +0800

I noticed today that TMnet is not serving up DNS for malaysia-today.net. Works fine if using non-TM DNS server.

Turns out to be a CNAME for mt.harapanmalaysia.com. And that IP is not blocked.

But this makes me wonder. Are they deliberately doing a bad job of blocking? Or are they just incompetent. I mean, I know they're incompetent, but are they THAT incompetent? I would assume they'd at least force them to start hopping IPs. So maybe it's deliberate, in which case I'd finally have to give TM some credit.

Universities giving iPhones to students

rajulkabir — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 05:27:37 +0800

Thought this was amusing: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/technolo...1iphone.html?em

Some excerpts, for people who are too lazy to sign up or go to http://www.bugmenot.com for a password...

QUOTE

Taking a step that professors may view as a bit counterproductive, some universities are doling out Apple iPhones and Internet-capable iPods to students.

The always-on Internet devices raise some novel possibilities, like tracking where students congregate. With far less controversy, colleges could send messages about canceled classes, delayed buses, campus crises or just the cafeteria menu.

While schools emphasize its usefulness — online research in class and instant polling of students, for example — a big part of the attraction is, undoubtedly, that the iPhone is cool and a hit with students. Basking in the aura of a cutting-edge product could just help a university foster a cutting-edge reputation.

...

“We think this is the way the future is going to work,” said Kyle Dickson, co-director of research and the mobile learning initiative at Abilene Christian University in Texas, which has bought more than 600 iPhones and 300 iPods for students entering this fall.

Although plenty of students take their laptops to class, they don’t take them everywhere and would prefer something lighter. Abilene Christian settled on the devices after surveying students and finding that they did not like hauling around laptops, but that most always carried a cellular phone, Dr. Dickson said.

Australian wimax provider shuts down network

rajulkabir — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 01:36:45 +0800

Interesting article. After his company built out a Wimax network, they discovered that coverage indoors was very poor and the latency was too variable to support VoIP. He calls the technology hype and says it has failed to provide what it promised.

http://www.commsday.com/node/228

Of course it's possible that his staff or his supplier was incompetent, but the article's author was unable to come up with anyone making that claim.

I wonder if this will be of interest to MCMC, which seems to be pushing wimax as a way to avoid facing the number one problem with Malaysian broadband policy: TMnet's monopolisation of the copper infrastructure that all Malaysians have paid for.

Many people seem to feel that wireless is some sort of magic solution to access problems, without understanding that it will always be slower and less reliable than wired.

Moving house... how long to move Streamyx?

rajulkabir — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 17:26:10 +0800

Moving house soon.

I stopped by TM Point an hour ago and asked them what the process is for moving my fixed line and Streamyx to the new place.

She told me it would take two weeks!!!

In other countries where I've lived (Asia, Middle East, Africa), the cutover has taken a few hours at most. In some countries they provide service at BOTH locations for 24 hours on the day you switch - number rings in two locations at once - so you are never out of contact.

And TM needs two weeks? What kind of insanity is that? Why would they deactivate the old service two weeks before activating the new one? It makes no sense.

It took only a few days to get it activated in the first place. Yes, she said, it's much faster to cancel and order new service than to move existing service.

Is this really true? Does anyone have experience with moving their line - how long did it take? I'm in central KL if it makes a difference.

Asterisk/Telekom terminology question

rajulkabir — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 15:57:41 +0800

I'm trying to set up an Asterisk system. It worked perfectly in KL, but when installed at its final location in Subang, there is a problem because the Telekom switch is not properly signalling the end of incoming calls.

Normally, after the end of an incoming call, the Telekom should switch drop the current for a fraction of a second so that the customer's equipment knows the call is over.

But this doesn't seem to be happening on these lines in Subang. The only indication that the calls is over is a busy tone, which of course is a very unreliable way to detect a hangup.

I have spoken with many people from Telekom but none of them even understand what I am talking about. I think there is a language problem at play.

So I wonder if anyone can tell me the technical term that Telekom uses for this (normally I would refer to it as "disconnect supervision" or "calling party control" or "open loop disconnect").

Or if anyone could point me to a forum where telecoms in Malaysia are discussed in technical detail, that would also be great. I haven't been able to find anything online, but then again I am only searching in English.

Co-location: Where

rajulkabir — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 01:49:09 +0800

I need to find a place to put a server. It has to be in the region because I need low latency to Malaysian IPs.

Right now seems to be a good time to look into this, since at the moment Streamyx is pharked and is getting 800ms+ to everywhere outside of Asia and Australia. This means I can see how things work under all-too-common bad conditions.

So I looked up a bunch of Malaysian colocation providers in Google and tried pinging their web servers, on the theory that they would be eating their own dogfood.

Every single one that I tried gave me EITHER bad pings from Streamyx (45ms one ping, 130ms next ping), OR bad pings from USA (500ms+).

But then I noticed that all the Singapore colocation providers, no matter how homemade their web sites looked, have good pings from Streamyx (steady 55ms) and from USA (steady 260ms).

So does it make more sense to just go to Singapore? Does anyone have experience with Singapore colo houses? Or Malaysian ones for that matter?

Network reliability is my main concern here. Cost is secondary. If there is a monthly traffic limit I would prefer that it approach 1TB.

Asterisk skills

rajulkabir — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 02:46:40 +0800

I am considering setting up an Asterisk server as a favour to a friend here in KL. His company has esoteric telecom needs and the old Panasonic key system they have now isn't cutting the mustard.

However, I travel a lot, so if problems came up, I wouldn't always be around to help him out. Normally I avoid getting into these situations unless I can be sure I can offer backup support somehow.

So I wonder, is there a community of Asterisk users here in Malaysia? How to hook up with them? Has anyone had experience with any local Asterisk integrators or support providers?

Original xbox

rajulkabir — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 21:07:13 +0800

I want to buy an original (not 360) x-box. Where can I find one? Tried ebay and lelong.com.my, no luck. I figured there would be lots of them lying around in closets and storage rooms.

New benchmark for Wawasan 2020

rajulkabir — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 02:57:20 +0800

I know everyone loves these posts about super-duper broadband in other countries...

Here's the real 2020: Verizon in the USA is now offering 20/20 (20 megabit up, 20 megabit down) residential fiber for US$65 (RM225) per month.

http://newscenter.verizon.com/press-releas...-fast-with.html

I tried to check whether my address in KL was eligible, but the page here: http://www22.verizon.com/Residential/ didn't recognise my 03 number. On the other hand, the woman in the photo looks like she could be Malaysian (reload until you get the one sitting with a laptop on the couch).

I don't think they have that upload speed even in Japan (but I could be wrong).

Nokia ripping off Malaysians

rajulkabir — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 04:47:17 +0800

In the last few weeks I've been to Singapore and Thailand. In both countries I looked at the Nokia E61i.

And in both countries the price from reputable dealers was between RM1300 and RM1400. These are not shady grey-market parallel imports in Singapore and Thailand, it is the standard price that everyone there has, including Nokia shops.

But in Malaysia the wholesale price to dealers seems to be about RM1650, and the cheapest I can find retail is close to RM1700.

That's a difference of up to RM400.

But this difference does not apply to all models. Just some - and not all - premium ones. So it's not accounted for by SIRIM or other import fees. It's just Nokia, or their local distributor, gouging the Malaysian market.

Confusing warranties

rajulkabir — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 15:19:58 +0800

I am looking to buy a Nokia E65.

I went to the shop and they offered me RM1300 with store warranty, and RM1650 with Nokia warranty.

He told me that the store warranty was only good at their 5 branches in KL, so if something went wrong, I would bring it back to the shop, and I guess the stockboy would take the phone apart and bang on it with his shoe for a while.

The Nokia warranty, he said, would be good at any Nokia service centre, in Malaysia only.

Then I went to another shop, and the guy there said the price was RM1750, with Nokia warranty, good in all of Southeast Asia.

So now I have a bunch of questions:

- What is the source of phones without a manufacturer's warranty? Are they new? Grey-market imports? Stolen?

- Is the Nokia warranty really good in Malaysia only or in all of Southeast Asia? Does Nokia have two different warranties at different prices? Is there a worldwide warranty available? I travel a lot.

- What is the quality of service from shop warranties? He said the warranty was "AP"? Pacific something-or-other?

[addedon]August 29, 2007, 2:46 pm[/addedon]Really nobody knows the answers to these questions?

What do letters "AP" stand for?

Where do AP phones come from?

The vanishing internet

rajulkabir — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 01:51:17 +0800

Has anyone else experienced a sudden disappearance of huge swathes of the internet as seen via Streamyx today?

There are scores of IP addresses (I am finding more every few minutes) that I just can't reach. In some cases it's even different IP addresses on the same server - one will work and the other is unreachable.

If any one IP in a subnet is unreachable, then the entire subnet (as I see it via BGP) is, with the same symptoms.

If I try to ping or traceroute any of the problem addresses, I get a routing loop at 203.106.225.29, which is a TMNet router. Maybe they are using a ZTE ZXDSL for their backbone and its 64KB routing table is full.

Just for sport, I rang up 1300 88 9515 but of course they had no idea what I was talking about and were all into resetting my DSL circuit. I said, "no, it's a routing problem, has nothing to do with my DSL circuit", then he tracerouted my Streamyx IP and proudly announced that the routing was fine.

It's really very frustrating trying to deal with them. Is there no way to get someone on the phone who knows anything?