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Airport gets Thailand's fastest internet
KOMSAN TORTERMVASANA
10/07/2009

CAT Telecom will install 126 high-speed internet kiosks at Suvarnabhumi Airport in a joint venture with airport authorities.

The kiosks will feature terminals with a 10 Mbps internet service, free of charge for tourists.

The project would help the airport achieve its goal of ranking among the world's top 10 airports by the end of the year, said Sereerat Prasutanont, the president of Airports of Thailand Plc.

The kiosks will be available for both international and domestic travellers. Four terminals have already been installed since last month.

Each of the internet kiosks comes with two screens. The upper screen will show news and announcements from CAT and AoT. The lower display will be for users, who will be limited to a 15-minute session before being automatically logged off.

Mr Sereerat said that AoT was also making other improvements at the airport, including the rollout of free WiFi internet throughout, and improving seats in waiting areas.

AOT has also installed free mobile phone battery chargers within the terminal and automatic check-in terminals for travellers.

bangkokpost.com

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blackgang

Very good, one of the worlds top 10 airports, with no one coming in and no tourists at all.

crazy dog

Improving seating could be actually having enough at the gate for the number of passengers. Acres of space and the departure lounges seem smaller than at DM

Lum Khaan

The "usual" Thailand wide "Net Filters" will most likley still be in place for these Suvarnabhumi terminals.

However you could always jump on a plane and leave Thialand before the "Thought Police" arrive to take you off the the cells if you choose to access some of the banned sites listedhttp://wikileaks.org/wiki/Mict-blocklist-28-05-07csv.txt

mobs00

crippen

I just sit on the floor,like the rest of Isaen.

Fuzzy Bob

Free for tourists? My arse!

zubber

Nigerians will be using them fulltime to send out scamming emails ,better to have free wifi everywhere

zubber

the airport is a horror ,you dont want to hang around that place especially with the new breed of scammers operating ,they could plant anything on you and have you arrested ,watch your bags like a hawk

Spin

10 megs, pathetic really. My mums house back home has 30 megs. Seeing as Thais seem quite sure that they are better at everything than everybody else, why are they still farting around with what is practically dial up?

Mid

I got nothing ..............

Bung

Tried one the other day, pretty useless and have to stand up in front of it. Ok for a quick email check but until they install wifi they are kidding themselves. Better to sit in a restaurant and eat overpriced food.

I like to walk around and count how many broken tiles there are on the floor while searching in vain for a bangkok post. Can't be letting people read anything bad about Thailand, just sell a very watered down Nation with just business news in it to give people the impression that this place is actually a dynamic regional economic powerhouse.

They do sell them at the arrivals area but all access to that area are blocked by security once you are in departures area. I would love to find a way down there and walk around departures with my Bangkok Post held like a trophy.

Watching tourists getting scammed by "security" while sipping my 100 B coffee sounds like a nice way to wait for my flight.

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Rural Surin

Does this include the 40% of internet content that is censored and blocked?

BobR

Maybe the scammers need quicker e-mail access to coordinate their efforts to "set up" new victims.

mordred

Sweet, next time the airport is taken over by some color shirt group we'll all be able to surf the internet faster.

DaffyDuck

Oh yeah, that will for sure rank high in customer satisfaction ratings - classic that they didn't think of doing WiFi first -- no surprise that the 'advertising/marketing', internet kiosks are there first, with the all important advertising space to bombard the 'customers'/travelers....

blackgang

They are listing on Thai internet that 10 MG is available for 3550 baht install fee and 1495 a month.
They checked my lines from support and I can only get 7 MG here but I pay for 2 and only DL 25 KB/sec. so if I pay for 10, maybe I could get a DL speed of 50KB/sec.

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mordred

Don't you love how they say a download speed is "available" or they tell you that you you'll get "up to" a certain speed? Legalese.

Of course it is "available", but can you provide it on a consistent basis?
"Up to" 10, but most days you'll get 1. Maybe on Christmas you'll get 10, but only for 12 minutes.

The business world is filled with turds just like the political world.

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DaffyDuck

The term you are looking for is 'MBps' to describe DSL or internet speed.

If you actually understood the technology, you would understand that these specifications have little to do with business turds -- DSL speeds are dependent entirely on distance from the switching office. Thus, the closer to the switching office, the better your speed. Since DSL can be sent reliably up to a bit under 20,000 ft (6,100 m), you will get the bare minimum at the maximum distance (i.e. usually 250kbps or 512kps).

Considering the 'quality' of wiring in Thailand, I wouldn't even commit that far by providing an 'up to' value. Besides, that verbage is the same in every country.

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crocodilexp

Perhaps it's just me, but wouldn't free WiFi (30 wireless routers at 1500 baht each) be more desirable and more effective than 126 high-speed kiosks (probably 15,000 baht+ each) limited to 15-minute usage?

It's yet another scheme to fill someone's pockets...

I imagine most travellers would rather use unlimited internet from their laptop at the gate than wait around for a 15-min of use on a kiosk which is likely not to be where they want it (i.e. past security). Kiosks are notorious for being compromised (keyloggers, viruses), contaminated (swine flu, anyone -- why did they close internet cafes?), and inconvenient for not having the programs you need at the time.

As for those who don't carry a laptop, perhaps they don't need internet too badly.