Category: Brunei

bmobile Zoom! (+ E-Speed, DST Go!) Findings

Ever since bmobile and DST launched their mobile broadband offerings (Zoom! and Go!)I was interested to see which one offered the best deal. I’ve had a few weeks with the bmobile’s Zoom! service using the older modem with 3.6Mbps max speeds and did some speed tests and real world tests. In the real world tests it got frustrating at times with quite a few timeouts and YouTube videos loading only to stop loading half way. Real world download tests weren’t fantastic, typically under 512kbps which is even slower than the lowest tier E-Speed plan. My regular locations were at home in Jalan Kebangsaan Lama, and at the old airport road which is basically just across Telbru Headquarters. After a while I found out that doing a regular speed test at Speedtest.net was not giving optimal results, I would get less than 300kbps (~40KB/s) download speeds but in actual fact when I download podcasts I would get over 500kbps (~60KB/s) easily.

I found that if I do multiple downloads/connections I would be able to get faster speeds. I was able to roughly max out the modem to the full 3.6Mbps connection (but that was close to Telbru, not at home). At home torrenting some music off Jamendo managed to get up to 100KB/s but it was not consistent. Below shows a torrent downloading at over 200KB/s.

Jollicloud torrent getting over 300KB/s download on bmobile's Zoom!

I know location and people/connection saturation are important factors for any mobile broadband connections and honestly I’m pretty jealous of David Cheok’s reports on his Go! getting good speeds in Subok

“actually.. have been getting avg 500KB daily.. last night was good coz it broke 700KB..”  (via Twitter)

He also went on to say the following statement which I totally agree with:

“if downloading is your thing, Go for GO. If good response time/less lag, Zoom. Even better, espd.” (via Twitter)

That also brings me to another important fact that Go! seems to have pretty bad upload speeds (up to 20x less than Zoom!). If you’re planning on uploading photos or doing some streaming video from your webcam or even Skype, Go! may not be the answer you’re looking for. For anything to do with uploads, stick to E-Speed or Zoom!

Zoom! speedtests: Behind MOE (Old Airport), Jalan Kebangsaan Lama, Desa Cafe (Delima), Aman Complex, MOF

Go! speedtests:  Behind MOE (Old Airport), Jalan Kebangsaan Lama, Giant

Bmobile’s iPhone Promotion

If you haven’t heard, b-mobile has subsidized iPhones 3GS’s with a b-mobile subscription contract of 18 months. This is one of the first subsidized mobile phone price plans I’ve seen in Brunei. The other would be DST‘s October promotion offerings that offered a Nokia E75, Nokia E52 and Sony Ericsson C901 with contracts of 6 months. With b-mobile having first introduced their mobile broadband Zoom! which was followed up by DST’s Go!, what I hope to see is more competition among the 2 mobile phone providers which in the end leads to the consumer winning. Recently in Singapore, M1 and StarHub released their iPhone plans which led SingTel to change their previous plans (most notably the increase of free data to 12GB, from a typical measly 500MB/1GB), so as consumers we have to love competition.

I went down to b-mobile to find out more about the iPhone and they mentioned that is it the never locked version and that they are handling the mobile phone service while AV Electronics handles all the other iPhone/Apple/iTunes/Applications related aspects of this deal. While talking to the guy at the bmobile counter he did mention that bmobile was getting the iPhone and DST was going to get the Blackberry. Rumour has it that the Blackberry will be reveal next year but timing is still not confirmed. If it does come to fruition people will be happy (especially the High Commissioner of Canada, who urged Brunei to set up a Blackberry Network).

Initially when asking about the HTC Touch Diamond Pro and Samsung Jet (which was a few weeks back) the guy told me that the details would be released later, but on further inquiry today I was told that both are available but you would have to custom order it and the personnel could not disclose the price plans as marketing was not present. I find that awkward that they are selling a product but have not disclosed the pricing. Anyway the price plans for the subsidized iPhone are as follows.

Note: Contract is for 18 months and the total costs listed are based on the prices for locals that included 1 annual license fee of $25 and a deposit of $50. For foreigners add another $50 to the total cost (as deposits for foreigners is $100 vs $50 for locals).

iPhone 3GS 16GB

Phone Cost (B$) Monthly Cost (B$) Total Cost (B$)
Smart $35 Package 999 35 1704
Smart $45 Package 799 45 1684
Smart $55 Package 599 55 1664
Smart $65 Package 399 65 1644

iPhone 3GS 32GB

Phone Cost (B$) Monthly Cost (B$) Total Cost (B$)
Smart $35 Package 1199 35 1904
Smart $45 Package 999 45 1884
Smart $55 Package 799 55 1864
Smart $65 Package 599 65 1844

Price Plan Details:

Free Voice minutes Free SMS Free MMS Free Data
Smart $35 Package 300 100 20 1.5GB
Smart $45 Package 500 200 30 3GB
Smart $55 Package 1000 300 40 10GB
Smart $65 Package 1200 500 50 Unlimited

Note: Beyond the free data, the user is chargeable at 20c/MB up to $40 at which the user can use unlimited data

If you are planning to take b-mobile up on this subsidized iPhone I would recommend subscribing using the Smart $65 Package as it has the lowest up-front payment, the cheapest in the long run and provides the best in terms of perks (especially the unlimited data). With the iPhone you use it as a broadband modem at it would be easy to exceed the 1.5GB/3GB of the 2 lower priced plans and considering that $40 corresponds to 200MB which isn’t much at all. If you take the $65 package, the iPhone can be considered as a Zoom! subscription ($65/month for iPhone vs $60/month for Zoom!) but has so much more benefits.

If you’re looking for a iPhone or even if you’re just looking to get a mobile broadband subscription (Zoom! from b-mobile or Go! from DST) I would recommend the Smart $65 Package bundled with the iPhone of your choice. You get an unlimited broadband connection which can be tethered to your computer wherever you are and the highly coveted iPhone which is currently the best smartphone platform at the moment.

Brunei eGovernment Citizen Survey

Do take some time out out fill in the eGovernment Citizen Survey

What is the purpose?

With the input from the community this survey will help the Prime Minister Office to identify which e-Government services are important to the citizens.

The survey is 28 pages in total and can get pretty time consuming. A compiled version is available here if you want to peruse the questions or even if you want to prepare your answers before answering the real survey.

This is organized by the Prime Minister’s Office, Infocom Federation Brunei in collaboration with E-Government National Centre and BAG Networks. I have to say kudos to the people in charge for taking the initiative for getting the public’s stand and input on something as important is this. I hope other organizations will take an example and try to communicate with the public to understand what is desired. This will help save time and resources of implementing a system only to find out that it is not wanted, thus not used and thus goes to waste.

Participants stand a chance to win prizes such as:

If you are inclined to meet the people in charge and ask further questions there are two more roadshows this coming Tuesday (15th December in Seria) and Sunday (20th December in Temburong)

Fixing BruDirect’s Grey Container of Emptiness

If you have a problem with BruDirect website showing a grey box instead of showing the content, read on for have several workarounds/fixes

The problem:
Grey box instead of content as shown in the screenshot below:

Workaround (temporary fix that needs to be repeated)

  • For any browser (though doesn’t seem to work in Opera): Click the small “Decrease Font Size” button at the top of the screen

  • For Opera:
  • Shift + G to disable styles

Fix (once configured will be fixed even if browser/computer is restarted)

  • For Firefox:
    • Add a userContent.css in your profile/chrome directory
      • OS X: ~/Library/Application Support/Firefox/Profiles/[random 8 characters].default/chrome/
      • Windows: %appdata%MozillaFirefoxProfiles[random 8 characters].defaultchrome
      • Linux: ~/.mozilla/firefox/[random 8 characters].default/chrome
    • Add the following code into the file
    • @-moz-document domain(brudirect.com) {
      a.link span {
      font-size: 11px;
      }
      }
    • Restart Firefox and the menu bar text should be smaller and fit on a single line
  • For Opera:
    • Create a “brudirect.css” file
    • Add the following code into the file
      a.link span {
      font-size: 11px;
      }
    • Right click the page > Edit Site Preferences > Display Tab > My Style Sheet
    • Select the “brudirect.css” file that was created
    • Refresh the page

More Brunei Recycling Bins

More recycling bins spotted at University Brunei Darussalam (UBD). Recycling Bins in Brunei page updated. Spotted some at BEDB and Maktab Sains / Science College but alas no pictures yet.

Concepts Computers is not Recycling

So I finally managed to talk to Mr Vincent Pao, the General Manager of Concepts Computer regarding the recycling issue that I had, resulting in my “Concepts Computer Lying to Us?” post. In my talk with him about a few things but most important to me at the this time was the recycling issue. He stated that people from the recycling place came and picked up the equipment and that he did not have the contact number of the place or of the person in charge. He mentioned the place was at “Sungai Akar” which I believed to be the Sungai Akar rubbish dump. He said there is a little building/section where they recycle the equipment.

Today I went to the rubbish dump to try and find this recycling place that was supposed to be there. After some walking around and talking to the workers there, I was directed to “Ah Huat” who told me that they did pick up the equipment from Concepts but they are not recycling it. They are merely taking the equipment apart and dumping them in the dump. As shown below you can see the remains of some of the monitors and some PCB (printed circuit board) remains.

I admit, in my last post I was a bit harsh on Concepts, but after some thinking it could be a misunderstanding or miscommunication. It could have been that the person misled Mr Pao to think they were recycling or it could have been a misunderstanding on Mr Pao’s side. Whatever the story may be, I believe everybody should just know that at the end of the day the items being traded-in are not being recycled

Brunei Times

It seems that my Brunei Times E-Paper Lite Edition seems to be having issues that Brunei Times is blocking direct access to the images. The Brunei Times downloader still works however so in the meantime that should be used to download and view the images.

A fix will be worked on when I can find the time to fit it in. Life’s pretty busy at the moment =)

Concepts Computer Lying to Us?

concepts misleading ad

After my post of Concepts Monitor Trade-In where I found out from the owner that they were intending to throw the monitors away, I was pretty happy to see the their ad in the paper that is seen on their handout brochure shown above. “SAVE THE EARTH WE LIVE IN” it says and shows a green bin with a recycling symbol on it. I thought it was great that they are recycling all the monitors and other devices they received from the trade-in offer so I wanted to find out which recycler they were sending the stuff to. So I went to both the Kiulap and Gadong branches to find out more and I was told (at the Gadong branch last Friday) that they were sending it to a recycler in Sungai Akar. However at the Kiulap branch, I was told outrightly today that they were just dumping them and throwing it away. I asked the sales assistant to confirm that they weren’t doing any recycling at all and that they were just throwing them away and she said without hesitation that they were throwing them away.

I was totally appalled! Is the brochure false and/or misleading advertising? I know it doesn’t say that they are recycling the products in black and white but from looking at the ad above how can you not say that they are pushing the message of recycling? Are they just trying to garner public support by supposedly ‘being green’? I personally like that Concepts is differentiating itself from other computer shops in Brunei by organizing seminars, events and promotions but this is severely damaging Concepts’ image in my mind and am personally thinking of even boycotting the company. Now what is the recourse to file a complaint with regards to this false advertising Brunei?

Update: Follow up post to confirm that Concepts is Not Recycling

Windows 7 Home Premium Retail Version Promotion

So there’s a Windows 7 Home Premium Retail Version Promotion for B$168 that Concepts and Netcom seems to be offering. Today is Concepts last day while Netcom is only for order, you can’t pick it up now so you’ll have to wait if you do order. The following is one of these Home Premium retail pack. Notice that it is valid for Distribution and Activation in Southeast Asia only.