I’ve been living in Bali since 2001. As you can guess from reading my past columns that go back to 2004, I’m an Internet NUT! But being on the internet in Bali can be both very expensive and very frustrating. I’ve spent all my time in Ubud and at first I was using my 56k modem and dialing into Telkom. Well, 56k is the fastest the modem could go. But, sometimes, when I dialed into TelKom I would only be connected at 48k, sometimes 36k, and way too many times at 8k. Of course, anything less that 36k and you can’t really send or receive email, so what’s the point?
Over the years things have gotten a little better in Bali. In Ubud, we’ve been waiting for Speedy; and waiting; and waiting. We never could get it. We were finally told that, unfortunately, our phone line wasn’t good enough. This is too bad because we had heard the Speedy wasn’t particularly ‘speedy’, but that is was cheap and pretty steady!
So, last Fall I did some more research. I contacted some of the ads in Bali Advertiser that promised fast internet connections at cheap prices and contacted them to get quotes. Either their prices were way too high; or the service wasn’t available where we were; or they had some maximum download amount per month; or we had to buy expensive equipment. None of these options were acceptable to me.
Finally, I noticed an ad from BaliMediaNet (Balimedianet.com). I contacted them and they were so nice. Yes, they said, they would come out and test to see if they could connect me. They came out the very next day and climbed on our roof to see if there was line-of-sight to their antennae in Ubud. It was, so they said they could connect us. Then they patiently explained their different plans. Each plan depends only on how fast the connection is. No monthly maximum download amounts! We only had to pay a small installation fee and the only equipment we needed to buy or rent from them was a Linksys router. (If you already have a router, you can use that). We didn’t have to pay for the dish antennae or the connecting wires, just the modem.
So we signed up. They came out the next day and installed the small receiver dish on our roof and ran the wires to the Linksys router and tested everything. One thing to note: no phone line is used! It all comes through the air to the dish and then to the Linksys router. Then each of our computers (my desktop - Vista) and my wife’s laptop (XP) was connected through a Wifi (wireless) connection. Each computer can ‘see’ the other, so we can share data and we can even share our printer without moving computers or the printer! All wirelessly. What a joy. I can even connect my iPhone to the internet through the Wifi!
The price is well worth it. We pay 330,000 per month and it gives us a pretty fast connection. If we want or need a faster connection we can simply and easily upgrade. So far we haven’t needed to do that.
So how about support from BaliMediaNet you may ask. They are a phone call away and can have a tech guy out to our house, at no charge, within a few hours. We only had to do this a few times over the last year when my desktop started acting ‘funny’.
I hope that the other ISPs in Bali will start competing with BaliMediaNet and, perhaps, we can have an Internet price war. Wouldn’t that be nice. Imagine an internet that was 10 times faster than now AND half the price.
BaliMediaNet.com
Telp +62361 7800299, 7421099
Hint: Do you ever need to access your computer from another computer when you are away from your office or home? Try LogMeIn (www.logmein.com), it’s free for personal use. There are two other services but they cost money: GotoMyPC (www.gotomypc.com) at US$20/mo or pcAnywhere (http://www.symantec.com/norton/products/index.jsp) at US$199.99/year. I have used LogMeIn in the past when I needed to do this sort of thing and it worked great! So, if you need a free version try LogMeIn, or try the free trials for the other two packages. Either way, you can now, easily, access your PC from anywhere.
Have a question or problem? Write me at BaliPCAdvisor@Gmail.com. I’ll try and answer as soon as I can.
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