Speed of 1kb/s, when I'm lucky

R

realbigdreamer

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Hey guys,

I have recently bought a 2GB per month data contract. The speed is 1kb/s, when the connection is not freezing (it freezes most of the time).

I use it at home where we only have EDGE coverage. The sim is used in a Nokia phone. I've tried 3 different phones on two different computers, but no luck on any improvement. I would be happy with 10kb/s, but I can't even call it a connection. The tower is about 200m from my house and with MTN and Vodacom I can get speeds of 25kb/s to 30kb/s.

The funny thing is that when I tried downloading a small torrent file yesterday I actually got a speed of 3kb/s to 5kb/s.

Any ideas on what I'm supposed to do? I'm really frustrated.

Thanks
 
I doubt CellC are paying much attention to their EDGE network at the moment, seeing as their primary focus is HSPA+. I suppose you can try logging a support ticket, but I'm not sure how much help that will do. When I try to browse using EDGE on Virgin Mobile (CellC), I also experience extremely slow speeds, and it takes ages to start loading a page.

Have you tried using the connection during 'off-peak' times (between 2 and 5AM, for example), when the tower is most likely experiencing minimal load? Also, some indication as to the signal strength would be helpful. Being 200m from the tower wouldn't help much if you were stuck in an underground bunker (for example).
 
Is cell C on that tower.
Can this nokia phones handle fast internet.
Go somewhere in town and try it there.
Might be, that that cell CC signal is running over your house to see very far and and you miss it. You can look at the cell c panel and see if it looks up or down. I know of a town where the tower missed the town because of high.
Mtn ericsson antenna's [3g] got a motor inside that tilt it for the best signal.
 
Thanks, but I have very good signal and I don't think that I'm being missed by the tower. When I first got the sim, I could at least browse at very low speed, now I can't. I get about 40 kilobytes and the connection just freezes.

I also notice that the cellphones say something like "service not supported" when I connect. I have tried my HTC Dream, Nokia 6085, Nokia 6234 and Nokia 6300. The HTC Dream doesn't say "service not supported".

I have no idea what could be wrong. No matter what gprs settings (mtn, vodacom, cell c) I use, the gprs connections gets made and freezes after about 40 kilobytes.

*Sent from my HTC Dream using MyBroadband Android App
 
Cell C 3G works on UMTS 900
HTC Dream - doesn't support that frequency - http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_dream-2665.php.
Nokia 6085 - is only 2G capable - http://www.gsmarena.com/nokia_6085-1705.php
Nokia 6234 - doesn't support that frequency - http://www.gsmarena.com/nokia_6234-1388.php
Nokia 6300 - is only 2G capable - http://www.gsmarena.com/nokia_6300-1800.php

So the best your going to do with any of those phones is GPRS / Dialup speeds using Cell C.

You need to buy a modem or a ph that will support UMTS 900
Try finding someone that has a UMTS 900 capable ph that you can put your sim into & test - maybe you have 3G/maybe you don't but your not going to get it with those phones.
Good Luck
 
Last edited:
Thanks Tun@, I'll try some other phones and my data stick. I'll also check out a 3G zone tomorrow to see if it's different .
If I can just know what is limiting my internet speed...
 
Hi there realbigdreamer.

I am with Virgin Mobile and had the same problem as you, I got 2kbps at most and since Virgin Mobile works though Cellc I called cellc and they told me that the tower near my house doesn't fully support EDGE because of the 3G upgrades.

So all you have to do to get full EDGE speeds is to go to your Nokia phone Network settings and search for mobile networks, then choose Vodacom from the list, now you will be roaming on the vodacom network and have full EDGE speeds, you wont be charged more for roaming on vodacom.
And remember to set the mobile network to Manual and not Automatic.

I really hope this work for you because it did for me and i'm getting download speeds of 25kbps.
 
werny said:
Hi there realbigdreamer.

I am with Virgin Mobile and had the same problem as you, I got 2kbps at most and since Virgin Mobile works though Cellc I called cellc and they told me that the tower near my house doesn't fully support EDGE because of the 3G upgrades.

So all you have to do to get full EDGE speeds is to go to your Nokia phone Network settings and search for mobile networks, then choose Vodacom from the list, now you will be roaming on the vodacom network and have full EDGE speeds, you wont be charged more for roaming on vodacom.
And remember to set the mobile network to Manual and not Automatic.

I really hope this work for you because it did for me and i'm getting download speeds of 25kbps.
Click to expand...

Thank you so much. Roaming works way better!

RBD

*Sent from my HTC Dream using MyBroadband Android App
 
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