Derrick
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- Joined
- Nov 22, 2010
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Neotel has finally come to the party with a more data centric offering. High speed uploads and downloads make for a great end user experience. The only advantage ADSL has over Neoflex is its lower latencies. Hopefully Neotel will announce some prices and launch Neoflex to the public sooner rather than later.
Neotel faced a number of criticisms when they launched their original NeoConnect product range. Two of the main criticisms were levelled at the original router which lacked Ethernet connectivity and was not Wi-Fi enabled.
There was also a strong call for a more Data-centric offering. The service was also widely criticised for inadequate service coverage.
The good news is that Neotel must be listening, because they have come back with a dedicated internet offering delivered by way of a far more competent router.
Coverage is also improving and Neotel CTO Dr Angus Hay announced at the recent Broadband conference that they would be updating their coverage map in the next two months.
Router
Neotel’s Neoflex makes use of an Axesstel MV400 series CDMA router.
The device supports CDMA2000 1xEV-DO Rev A with maximum theoretical downlink speeds of 3.1 Mbps and uplink speeds in excess of 1 Mbps.
The device features 4 Ethernet ports and 802.11b.g Wi-Fi. It’s easy set up process will have even the most ignorant technophobes up and running in minutes.
A very handy feature of the router is that it includes a battery which automatically kicks in in-case of power outages. This is obviously only really relevant if you’re using it with a Laptop. Still, it is a great feature.
The battery promises up to 2.5 hours. Our tests showed that the battery lasts between 3 and 3.5 hours under continuous load.
Neotel have promised to deliver an international average of between 450Kbps and 900Kbps on downloads and 300Kbps and 700Kbps on uploads.
Local Performance
Locally we were pinging Johannesburg to Cape Town at between 110ms and 130ms with an average of around 115ms. Local Johannesburg pings were higher sitting at between 140ms to 170ms with 150ms being a relative constant.
Download test speeds ranged between 1050Kb/s and 2200Kb/s with a very reasonable 1500Kb/s average.
Local web browsing was comparable to 4Mbp/s ADSL. Downloads were also very quick and often outstripped the offices 4Mbp/s ADSL line.
Unfortunately, Neotel’s 50ms promised latencies were just not there. This makes the Neoflex package unsuitable for high speed FPS gaming. Some Call of Duty Servers were able to deliver around 90ms quite consistently which is almost acceptable, but still not ideal with frequent lag spikes making matters worse.
International Performance
When testing the Neoflex unit on international traffic we were pleasantly surprised.
International web browsing was about as good as 4Mb/s ADSL. We found that streaming videos on sites like Youtube often buffered faster than on a regular 4Mb/s ADSL line. Furthermore, viewing pictures on pages like Facebook and Myspace was highly responsive.
Downloads constantly hit between 1Mb/s and 1900Kb/s averaging around 1400Kb/s with uploads of between 280Kb/s and 600Kb/s. Latencies sat at between 360ms and 560ms with occasional spikes. On average one can expect a relatively constant 400ms.
This is good news for World of Warcraft players as we were able to comfortably play with reasonable latency. Depending on the server, time of day and area population, we played on latencies between 300ms and 650ms with occasional spikes.
When it came to downloading torrents, the Neoflex system performed as well as any 4Mb/s ADSL line with speeds being bottle necked by seed counts long before the broadband service hit its limit. Individual torrent download speeds ranged between 10kb/s and 150kb/s and were completely dependent on the available resources.
Telkom ADSL killer?
Neotel’s new Neoflex offering is definitely a potential Telkom ADSL killer.
It beats ADSL for installation waiting periods, and is extremely reliable. We did not experience any connection loss over the three week trial period. This is more than we can say for the office ADSL line, which was supplanted by our Neoflex router for a day or two of Telkom down time.
The only criticisms I have at this stage is that Neoflex, like any other wireless service is not suitable for online high-speed gaming. If this is of no consequence to you, and you fall within Neotel’s coverage map then there is no reason to get anything else right now.
Our final reservation is regarding pricing. Neotel has yet to announce its pricing packages, which makes it difficult to recommend at this stage. Based on Neotel’s history however, we predict that they will launch at a competitive price point.
The service should be up any day now, and we will publish a full article including their pricing and packages as soon as they are available.
Neotel faced a number of criticisms when they launched their original NeoConnect product range. Two of the main criticisms were levelled at the original router which lacked Ethernet connectivity and was not Wi-Fi enabled.
There was also a strong call for a more Data-centric offering. The service was also widely criticised for inadequate service coverage.
The good news is that Neotel must be listening, because they have come back with a dedicated internet offering delivered by way of a far more competent router.
Coverage is also improving and Neotel CTO Dr Angus Hay announced at the recent Broadband conference that they would be updating their coverage map in the next two months.
Router
Neotel’s Neoflex makes use of an Axesstel MV400 series CDMA router.
The device supports CDMA2000 1xEV-DO Rev A with maximum theoretical downlink speeds of 3.1 Mbps and uplink speeds in excess of 1 Mbps.
The device features 4 Ethernet ports and 802.11b.g Wi-Fi. It’s easy set up process will have even the most ignorant technophobes up and running in minutes.
A very handy feature of the router is that it includes a battery which automatically kicks in in-case of power outages. This is obviously only really relevant if you’re using it with a Laptop. Still, it is a great feature.
The battery promises up to 2.5 hours. Our tests showed that the battery lasts between 3 and 3.5 hours under continuous load.
Neotel have promised to deliver an international average of between 450Kbps and 900Kbps on downloads and 300Kbps and 700Kbps on uploads.
Local Performance
Locally we were pinging Johannesburg to Cape Town at between 110ms and 130ms with an average of around 115ms. Local Johannesburg pings were higher sitting at between 140ms to 170ms with 150ms being a relative constant.
Download test speeds ranged between 1050Kb/s and 2200Kb/s with a very reasonable 1500Kb/s average.
Local web browsing was comparable to 4Mbp/s ADSL. Downloads were also very quick and often outstripped the offices 4Mbp/s ADSL line.
Unfortunately, Neotel’s 50ms promised latencies were just not there. This makes the Neoflex package unsuitable for high speed FPS gaming. Some Call of Duty Servers were able to deliver around 90ms quite consistently which is almost acceptable, but still not ideal with frequent lag spikes making matters worse.
International Performance
When testing the Neoflex unit on international traffic we were pleasantly surprised.
International web browsing was about as good as 4Mb/s ADSL. We found that streaming videos on sites like Youtube often buffered faster than on a regular 4Mb/s ADSL line. Furthermore, viewing pictures on pages like Facebook and Myspace was highly responsive.
Downloads constantly hit between 1Mb/s and 1900Kb/s averaging around 1400Kb/s with uploads of between 280Kb/s and 600Kb/s. Latencies sat at between 360ms and 560ms with occasional spikes. On average one can expect a relatively constant 400ms.
This is good news for World of Warcraft players as we were able to comfortably play with reasonable latency. Depending on the server, time of day and area population, we played on latencies between 300ms and 650ms with occasional spikes.
When it came to downloading torrents, the Neoflex system performed as well as any 4Mb/s ADSL line with speeds being bottle necked by seed counts long before the broadband service hit its limit. Individual torrent download speeds ranged between 10kb/s and 150kb/s and were completely dependent on the available resources.
Telkom ADSL killer?
Neotel’s new Neoflex offering is definitely a potential Telkom ADSL killer.
It beats ADSL for installation waiting periods, and is extremely reliable. We did not experience any connection loss over the three week trial period. This is more than we can say for the office ADSL line, which was supplanted by our Neoflex router for a day or two of Telkom down time.
The only criticisms I have at this stage is that Neoflex, like any other wireless service is not suitable for online high-speed gaming. If this is of no consequence to you, and you fall within Neotel’s coverage map then there is no reason to get anything else right now.
Our final reservation is regarding pricing. Neotel has yet to announce its pricing packages, which makes it difficult to recommend at this stage. Based on Neotel’s history however, we predict that they will launch at a competitive price point.
The service should be up any day now, and we will publish a full article including their pricing and packages as soon as they are available.