Recently I was trapped by the largest internet companies to buy a data card which promised me a speed of 6.1 mbps. With all the online content available and all the number of gadgets that one needs to connect, I thought that data card held great promise. I could finally download stuff in a jiffy and watch videos in HD without buffering. Between my wife, daughter and myself we have more than 10 gadgets connected to the internet at any time (All thanks to my DLink DIR 825 wireless router). My wife listens to online music all the time, my daughter is addicted to Strawberry Shortcake videos on youtube and I work out of home and am perennially doing more than one thing on the internet. Now before I go any further, I already have a home connection of 2 mbps from Airtel which had failed to quench my desire for higher bandwidth. Airtel does not provide more speed in my area due to some infrastructural bottlenecks which have persisted for the last two years. So when I saw this advertisements of speeds of 6.1 mbps, I had already made up my mind and ran across to the neighborhood shop and picked up a brand new Tata Photon Max.
The installation was fairly easy and simple even on my windows 8 pro machine. I was up and running in no time. The simless Tata Photon Max USB stick however was activated by the Tata guys only after 24 hours. The first thing I did post activation was to disable my home WiFi connection and connect my Photon Max and connect to the internet. I could see all bars in the connection and was very happy to get a strong network. The first thing post connection was to open speedtest.net and check my speed. All my happiness died when I saw my max download speeds of 512 kbps. I hoped and prayed that there is some issue and the call centre guys in Tata will be able to help me. After all how does a promised 6.1 mbps compare with the actual 512 kbps. I hoped I made some kind of configuration mistake. Post several calls to the Photon Max helpdesk I am no better. I was told by the Call Center guys “Since you agree that you get a speed of 512 kbps which is the minimum guaranteed speed, we are going to close your complaint.” The stubborn being I am, complained again and this time they send someone home. So nice!! The engineer did exactly what I did. He opened speedtest.net and showed me …”See 512 kbps” and told me that I should be happy that I get 512 kbps. I think I should say in favor of Tata Photon Max is that I do get consistent 512 kbps speed. In 2001, 512 kbps was the bandwidth of the entire office.
So here I am still using the Photon Max and still at 512 kbps. I had worse experiences with Airtel, vodafone, Reliance and MTS datacards. Looks like all the telecom players have formed a cartel and together they are ripping users like us.
I think the regulator should form a special cell which overseas that the service providers deliver what they promise.
