Thursday, February 26, 2009

DUbai internet and mobiles...how thee sux

Quite frequently at Dubai Helping Hand, we bitch a great deal about internet speeds and quality. It is almost a weekly event. Anyhoos...a couple of funny things transpired last night with regards to this. I picked up a DU sim card last night from the local mobile shop, after CSI didn't pay the bill on my Etisalat bill. Switching to the 055...we'll see how it goes...more on that later.

So I gets me manual out and it says to go to the www.du.ae website to check out activation, rates, etc. I go to do that and am greeted with this:

How ironic...I need their shitty internet service to activate my new mobile phone with them. Great. It seems every few weeks, I am not able to access certain sites for no reason other than you see above. These are not "morally blocked" sites like pr0n or anything, just noramal "workin' Joe" sites. I try 3 different browsers, nothing. Mac, PC..nothing. I even have to punch in some wacky codes to see my own frigging blog sometimes! Thanks Naseem (fellow blogger/IT guru) for bailing me out. Being an "average" net user, I don't speak "code", so have no clue how this shit works. I would still be phone-less if not for "my little friend":After going "sheilds up" I activate my phone and all is good. But I have to ask...why is the server not found for DU.ae when I live a couple of KM from the server? Are you coming for me? I need to use the VPN through White Plains, NY to get access to my mobile phone in Dubai. You guys rock!
The net is pitifully slow here. We pay a fortune and you get about a third of what you pay for, and you are lucky if it performs reasonably....ergo DU is akin to semi-retarded, overpriced prostitute who MAY be tired. Seriously, it is frigging bad. We pay about 5-10 times for half the service that other countries get. I saw this speed test posted on a blog from Amsterdam:





Are you kidding me? I've never seen numbers that high. As per usual I have to do a million clandestine things to access the Speedtest site, as it never loads. It is not blocked, just doesn't load. *ahem*.And if it loads, it doesn't work. And for the record, going "shields up" and pinging the furthest place away from Dubai, I get better results. I have a 2 meg connection and pay 300 AED per month for it. Websites are scrubbed through the DU proxy, however downloads are not (weird). I guess you can download all the "immoral" material you want at a fast rate, just don't look at it online. I can't think of any other reason why it is so slow. Results just pinging with DU:

Anyway, DU, you suck as usual. But I will say, I have been able to make a phone call in my house for the first time in 15 months. It seems Etisalat did not deem Arabian Ranches (where I live) as worthy of a cellular/mobile repeater, so we have never had cell service IN our houses (most places in the Ranches). Our phones live in the back yard hoping for that last wisp of a bar to get that all-important call. I am surprised that when switching to the 055 (DU) I have full service all over the house. I made a call today inside the house...this has never been done before and was happy (thank God for the little things). If you could just speed up my internet and get your shit together in that department I would be grateful. Happy even. Isn't it funny that living in Dubai makes you grateful for overpriced services that you paid for? I mean seriously, I was soooo stoked that my phone worked inside my house. How stupid is that? I mean of all the cities I have lived in, I always had mobile service without having to go to the back gate to get a call. At this point I guess I am grateful to have a functional mobile in my house at the expense of crap internet. Not normal.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

you make me laugh-out-loud when reading your posts...

and OMG 55754 KB/s download speed!!!!

I want one of those :(((( now I feel down :((((

Reality Check said...

cool man, that's what I'm here for! That speed I posted is insane! Can you imagine what that would cost here?

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