I have put this here upon discovering a copy of it in 2010 having forgotten about the incident it even amazed me at how helpful it was, I have not experienced anything like since.
Dear Clinton,
Thank you for your email dated 03/07/07 regarding your concerns
There are a number of things that could impact the speed you are receiving. Unfortunately, we cannot control some external events that may affect our provision of the Service to you.
As with any radio system (i.e. mobile broadband card, mobile phone, TV signals, radio etc), there are places inside the marked coverage areas where the service may not work due to a variety of environmental factors we may not have any control over. For example, radio reception can be degraded or non-existent in certain places, basements, lifts, underground car parks and large buildings. Reception can also be affected by mountains, tunnels and sources of radio interference like television, microwave and radio transmission towers.
I would suggest you try and use a manual dialer. To do this please use the following instructions:
* Go to Control Panel -> Network Connections
* Click on Create a new connection form the left-hand menu to open the New Connection Wizard and click Next
* Select Connect to the Internet and click Next
* Select Set up my connection manually and click Next
* Select Connect using a dial-up modem and click Next
* If you have multiple dial-up modems, you will get a screen with a modem list. Untick the unused modem/s and place a tick in the Next G / HSDPA Modem:
PC Mobile Card (PCMCIA Card) Option - Globetrotter HSDPA Modem Interface
PC Mobile Card (PCMCIA Card) Sierra - Sierra Wireless Aircard HSDPA Modem
USB Mobile Card (USB Dongle) - Data Modem @ 3GPP
USB Modem - Data Modem @ 3GPP
* Enter a BigPond Wireless Manual and click Next
* Enter the phone number as *99***1# and click Next
* Enter the username and/or password and click Next
* Place a tick in Add a shortcut to this connection to my desktop and click Finish. To start the connection, double-click the new shortcut on the desktop.
I suggest you complete the following speed test. This will let us know what speeds you are actually getting.
open Internet Explorer and go to www.bigpond.com
Put your mouse over Help and then select "Downloads"
Under "Need the BigPond Online Storage application?" click "Download it (19.8MB)"
wait 2 minutes and take a note of the transfer rate. This will tell you what speed you are receiving.
The G Fast plans will have an average download speed of up to 256kbps and an upload speed of up to 128kbps.
When BigPond specifies a speed such as 256Kbps, this represents 256,000 bits per second. To work out the maximum download speed achievable with your connection (as reported through programs such as Internet Explorer) you must divide this number by 8. In this example, this equates to 32,000 Bytes per second (32 KBps with a capital B).
As a general rule, Download speeds are quoted in Bytes per second, and connection speeds are quoted in bits per second. Each byte contains 8 bits of binary inform
So based on the plan you are on, you can receive up to 32KBps.
If you still find you are receiving slow speeds, I suggest you contact the Helpdesk directly on 133 933 (selecting option 1, and then option 3) and talk to one of our support staff for further assistance.
We may need to go through a number of troubleshooting steps with you to try to identify and solve the problem.
In regards to your concerns with your usage, I can see that you do have free usage on your account (this accumulating from unmetered websites), However, BigPond® does not monitor the individual sites or programs that our members access. This means that I am unable to give you an itemised breakdown of your account usage. Usage is simply the amount of data that flows between your computer and the Internet. It includes everything from the tiny signal that travels between your mouse to a link on a website in the U.S. to the streaming movie promo that you watch as a result.
There are a number of different things that can cause usage on your account when you leave your computer unattended, such as:
- Data being sent to your computer - Email can be automatically downloaded at the frequency you have set. The normal default is dependent on the e-mail client. For Outlook Express v.6 it is every 30 minutes.
- Data being sent from your computer - If you have file-sharing programs such as Napster or Kazaa, you may be sharing your files with other users, which will result in uploads on your account.
- Personal Security Programs that are set to automatically update, this also includes Windows Automatic Updates.
- Other automatic programs which poll or receive push information - For instance ftp servers, web servers, game servers etc.
- Large mail attachments that are above the acceptable size limit can bounce back and forward between the sender and the intended recipient. Each time the attachment is resent it registers as more data.
- Worms or Viruses that result in data being sent to or from your computer. Your firewall or anti-virus software can stop this type of data entering your computer, but does not stop it coming through your connection, and therefore your account.
- Leaving your computer logged onto a site that continuously sends data - If there is advertising on the site which changes, or if the site refreshes regularly, it may register as new data sent to your computer.
If the computer is not left on, then the usage could be due to the following:
- Usage that occurred the previous evening being carried forward. This only happens when the usage bridges the two days. For example, if you start downloading a 100 Mb file at 11.50pm and the download finishes at 12.05am, the unrated usage meter will treat all of this usage as having occurred on the day the download finished.
- Usage is treated as occurring in Melbourne time. (Note: Usage is recorded on our Victorian servers which record local time for all usage transactions)
We do however offer a number of tools to assist you to monitor and manage your usage. To find out more go to:
http://bigpond.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/bigpond.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?&p_faqid=5629
If you have any other questions, please visit our Help Centre at www.bigpond.com/help.
The Help Centre is a handy resource for our members which includes things such as our Frequently Asked Questions and our new Email Troubleshooter which has been set up to help you solve all your email problems.
Thank you for choosing BigPond.
Kind regards,
Susan Wightwick
The BigPond Team
Although I was already setting up my connections manually at the time (I'm a divers only sort of guy when I can get away with it) I applaud Susan for taking the time to write out the steps involved, my problem however was they had just turned off the CDMA network and made us all change to something they were calling 3G with a promise that it was faster and at the time it just did not seem to be.
