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Thread: Backup to ADSL

  1. #1
    Moderator IanF's Avatar
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    Question Backup to ADSL

    Now with a more active online business we are looking at backup if our ADSL goes down. What scares me is this article M&G Article
    Last Thursday, January 13, at 5pm a man was driving near the town of Phokeng, the capital of the Royal Bafokeng Nation, which lies near Rustenberg.

    He spotted a Telkom bakkie on the side of the road and a man in a Telkom uniform hacksawing a copper cable.

    The concerned citizen was suspicious because the area had been hit by "massive" amounts of cable theft, so he pulled off the road and sat and watched the Telkom employee at work.

    The Telkom employee attached the sawn off end to the back of the bakkie and towed it for about 1.5km to 2km, dragging the copper cable from under the ground.

    Then he stopped the bakkie and returned to saw off the other exposed end of the cable, which he cut into smaller pieces and loaded into the Telkom bakkie.

    The observer was convinced that the Telkom employee was stealing copper cables from his own employer and called the police, who promptly pounced on the suspect and arrested him.

    Whether the employee was acting alone or is part of a wider syndicate within Telkom stealing copper cables remains unknown.
    This scares me as now we have employees sabotaging Telkom. Just think what they could do in an exchange.

    So my plan I am formulating is to get a cellphone modem which is not tied to a network and get prepaid data sim. Then buy bundles when needed.
    What is everyone else doing?

    Just it looks like data bundles are only valid for 30 days so how do you handle that part. I should be able to get good coverage in both the shop and home as at home I am 400 meters from the telephone exchange.

    When I have gone down in the past I have just used my cell phone as a modem maybe just stick with that.
    Only stress when you can change the outcome!

  2. #2
    Platinum Member SilverNodashi's Avatar
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    Ian,

    Get a 3G router (not modem) with a 2nd WAN port, which then connects to your ADSL modem. The router will then use your ADSL modem as active internet, and fallback to 3G when needed. CellC's 3G bundles cost R140/pm OR R1400 per year, includes 2GB bandwidth per month for 12 months and includes a modem. This is much cheaper than your ADSL line. In fact, the 3G will cost more than the ADSL line, only if you use more than 8GB per month on the ADSL line.

    So, the 3G is much cheaper for anyone who uses 1GB or 2GB per month
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    Gold Member irneb's Avatar
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    Just make sure of your router, there's a few which do provide these functions - but not all. The main hassle is that the ADSL / iBurst uses a modem connected through an RJ45 (network) cable, while these 3G modems use a USB connection. Not all routers have both options, and not all have the automatic fail-over function either. See my thread for some samples.

    Of course if you don't mind swapping every time the ADSL to-and-from the 3G, then you're not a whole lot better off than using your cell phone as at present. The nice thing about the router is that you won't need to do this and you can share the connection between various PCs at once (whichever connection is running at the time), without needing to touch a single thing on any of them to switch from ADSL to 3G.

    About them not carrying over your cap, that's true in most cases. Vodacom does carry it for a maximum of 2 months (depending on when you bought the bundle) - end of 2nd month after you bought. CellC's looks as if there's no carry-over, but then they're a lot cheaper (even the prepaid option). MTN does not provide a prepaid as such, you have to have a contracted sim to which you can buy extra bandwidth (they're also the most expensive of the 3). Coverage and actual speeds is also not necessarily correlated, I've had very good success with Vodacom here in JHB though.

    Otherwise, have you looked at iBurst / NeoTel perhaps? Their modems use the same connection as the ADSL stuff, and usually works on the same routers. Neotel's rates are somewhere between CellC and Vodacom's prices, slightly less than the ADSL pricing if you include the line rental. There is a optimum however (as Rudi's stated). The 3G seems to be most effective around the 2 to 3 GB mark, while NeoTel seems a lot more constant, and ADSL is just silly if your usage is not above 4GB/month (unless you have the slow as molasses line and not the 4MB/s line).
    Last edited by irneb; 25-Jan-11 at 11:47 AM.
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    Gold Member Martinco's Avatar
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    Billion makes a ADSL router with a USB port and will use the ADSL as long as it works and switch over to 3G automatically if needed. I have gone the Cell C route and on the 2 gig package is R +-R84 / month.
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    Moderator IanF's Avatar
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    Wow thanks for the input, will definitely look at the router option. The ADSL modem at work only has 2 ports 1 for the ADSL line and a lan connection which connects to the switch. So will look at the adsl/3g router.
    Only stress when you can change the outcome!

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    Gold Member irneb's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Martinco View Post
    Billion makes a ADSL router with a USB port and will use the ADSL as long as it works and switch over to 3G automatically if needed.
    Yep look for any of their 3G/ADSL BiPAC range should do.

    If you want the fastest possible network connection as well, go for their 7402NX. I.e. 300MB/s wireless & 1000MB/s wired, with ADSL and 3G. Just unfortunately it doesn't have storage / printer sharing like the others, but if you don't need that ... what the heck?
    Gold is the money of kings; silver is the money of gentlemen; barter is the money of peasants; but debt is the money of slaves. - Norm Franz
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    Full Member popayetwo's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by SoftDux-Rudi View Post
    Ian,

    Get a 3G router (not modem) with a 2nd WAN port, which then connects to your ADSL modem. The router will then use your ADSL modem as active internet, and fallback to 3G when needed. CellC's 3G bundles cost R140/pm OR R1400 per year, includes 2GB bandwidth per month for 12 months and includes a modem. This is much cheaper than your ADSL line. In fact, the 3G will cost more than the ADSL line, only if you use more than 8GB per month on the ADSL line.

    So, the 3G is much cheaper for anyone who uses 1GB or 2GB per month
    Please excuse my ignorance (due to my age!) but what does this mean: "The inclusive in and out of bundle tariffs only apply to local traffic. International roaming is excluded." This is one the cell c site quoted above.

    Does it mean you can only do LOCAL surfing at speeds UP TO 7.2 Mhz/s?

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    Platinum Member SilverNodashi's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by popayetwo View Post
    Please excuse my ignorance (due to my age!) but what does this mean: "The inclusive in and out of bundle tariffs only apply to local traffic. International roaming is excluded." This is one the cell c site quoted above.

    Does it mean you can only do LOCAL surfing at speeds UP TO 7.2 Mhz/s?
    No, it means that when you take the modem to Bostwana or Mozambique you'll have to fork our a lot of money to pay for international roaming
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    Gold Member irneb's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by SoftDux-Rudi View Post
    No, it means that when you take the modem to Bostwana or Mozambique you'll have to fork our a lot of money to pay for international roaming
    Yep, in which case you'd be a lot better off buying a prepaid sim over there (if such exists).

    It's actually a good question, there are ISP's which give cut-down prices for local browsing only. But the CellC's exclusion of international roaming means as Rudi's mentioned, you'd still be able to browse a web page in Russia while sitting in your home in SA ... at the theoretical "maximum" speed.

    And international connection speed (that is while inside SA) means you're also prone to the SA <--> International data links' ups & downs, so that theoretical speed becomes more of a hope than a theory. But that would be true for any and all ISP's.
    Gold is the money of kings; silver is the money of gentlemen; barter is the money of peasants; but debt is the money of slaves. - Norm Franz
    And central banks are the slave clearing houses

  11. #10
    Gold Member Martinco's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by irneb View Post
    Yep, in which case you'd be a lot better off buying a prepaid sim over there (if such exists).




    .
    Yes, they do exist. One can buy sim cards at the border but not sure if it for data as well, but at the major centers ( Huh ! ) one can get data cards. I used my laptop while I was there last year and it worked fine for data however not as cheap as local.
    Martin Coetzee
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    We solve your fastening problems.
    www.straptite.com

    You may never know what results will come from your actions, but if you do nothing, there will be no results... Rudy Malan 05/03/2011

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