anandjm

Tata Indicom Tatazone internet packs are updated for prepaid: PACK VALIDITY USAGE CAP CHARGE AFTER CAP AUTO-RENEWAL Rs.5 1 Day 50 MB 50 Paise/ MB Yes Rs.12 3 Days 200 MB 50 Paise/ MB Yes Rs.23 7 Days 500 MB 50 Paise/ MB Yes Rs.33 15 Days 1 GB 50 Paise/ MB Yes Rs.43 30 Days 2 GB 50 Paise/ MB Yes Rs.94 30 Days 5 GB 50 Paise/ MB Yes postpaid packs are not updated

Got Spice Mi-310 for a friend of mine for Rs. 7399 from flipkart. He is quite happy with it. I find it has a better display (higher resolution), build quality and is also more responsive than Samsung Galaxy POP GSM version. The only thing he does not like about it is that its speaker phone is not that loud. The closest you will get to that specification is the HTC Wildfire-S which is much more expensive.

I do not see Madurai in the list.

Samsung Galaxy Pop CDMA

My math agrees that there is a problem with the math. According to my math, if 6 billion people are talking together, they would consume 2.79TB per second. Assume an average of 8kbps (kilobits per second or 1kBps) as the data rate for mobiles. If 6 billion people are talking with each other and assuming discontinuous transmission (DTX) with minimum bitrate in DTX mode, we can assume that that there are 3 billion pairs of people talking. So 6billion/2 * 1 = 3000000000 kbps. This is 2.79TB per second assuming 1MB=1024KB and so on (not the hard disk non-standard of MB, GB and TB). Also according to my math if one person speaks for 300 minutes, the consumption is 17.57MB. Should be around 20MB if two people are talking with each other, making it on average 10MB per person. (This is assuming DTX).

I have discovered that after converting one of my postpaid connection to prepaid and then doing an OTA programming through *228 once, any further attempts at dialing *228 and selecting prepaid option fails with the message "The reference number for this call is 149. Sorry your phone has been blocked ...". Could someone clarify on this.

Most "high-end phones" have better voice quality than even pricier "non-high-end phones". I experienced this when I was visited by a Tata-Indicom junior engineer to address some signal issues. He said "sir the voice quality of your phone is very good. This is the first time I am listening to such a quality on CDMA network". This was on an HTC Mogul.

The quoted article is technically deficient. While megapixels is a myth just like MHz for CPU's, many things mentioned in the articled are inaccurate. For example you cannot get anywhere close to a decent 4"x5" picture with a VGA camera. In CCD/CMOS sensors, there are separate sensors for red, green and blue colors. Most cameras tend to use more number of green sensors (due to studies that have shown eyes are more sensitive to variations in green). The pattern most often used is the Bayer filter with sensors arranged as RGBG. This results in nearly twice the number of green sensors. Now when one says some 'N' megapixels, it refers to the total sum of all red, green and blue pixels. Now for a decent print one would require atleast 150dpi. This in the case of a grayscale image would be 4*5*150*150. This would turn out to be 0.45MP for a gray scale image. Now consider the case when a color image is printed. This would be 1.8MP. The equivalent of 35mm film quality works out to be 6MP. You can get decent quality blowups of color upto A4 size with this. More megapixels matter if you are going to edit the images and doing some postprocessing/photoshopping on them.

I checked it out at a mobile store. The sale price was 25990 after 1000 cashback. I was deciding between a HTC Desire S, Incredible S and this one for an IVR system demo. The speakers of the Optimus 2X are of poor quality. My HTC Imagio was far better in terms of sound quality.

After suffering billing issues with TI Postpaid, I converted it into a prepaid connection. Took a PPS plan along with STV of Special ONNET Plan of Rs. 34, which charges 1p/4s on PPS and 15p/m on all other per minute plans. I discover now that while my calls to non-Tata numbers are billed per second, calls to Tata numbers are billed at 15p/m and not 1p/4s. My call to Tata Indicom resulted in "Sir please visit our Tata Indicom outlet". TI is learning from a GSM operator I think. Let me see how tomorrow pans out.

Nope was 20minutes with CC on line, 1 minute with nodal another 10minutes with CC. And 45 minutes at the Tata Indicom Exclusive store. Plus 30 minutes to and fro travel time.

I called up customer care first time and the response is "Sir I think there is a problem with the SIM. Did you try powering off and powering on your phone" --- Aaaaaaaarggggggg. I called up the Nodal office, and they tell me "Go to the nearest Tata Indicom store or please file a complaint online". I told the lady at the nodal office that I have already filed a complaint but not received any confirmation mail. She says "Try again, they may not have received it" Next time I call the customer care, The person says "Sir there is no such tariff voucher.". I tell them this is there for last few months and he replies "Sir, it is not updated in my system". I then go to the TI Exclusive store and the persons says "Sir, they do not provide us with any of the info on the web". He then calls up some Tata Indicom number and then the lady tells me "Sir this is only applicable on per minute tariff and not PPS. If you take it you will be billed on per minute basis". I then tell her that it is mentioned on the website, and then she replies "Sir, I will check and call back within 15minutes.". I am starting to enjoy (in a sarcastic way) the entire proceedings. After 15minutes no reply. The the TI store personal call up again and this time (finally) they get a person who knows how the tariff works. I explain the problem to him and then he says "Sir 15p/minute is the same as 1p/4s no sir. It still works out to 1p/4s". Then I ask him "what if I make a call for only 10s, what should I be charged". Finally Dimak-ki-batti jali and he says "Sir I have taken a complaint. Will be resolved by May 19th". Scandalous waste of 60minutes from my side. I think we should have a subsection for complaints, where we can all list our stories in a lighter vein.

Thanks for the updated info. FUP used to be 30GB earlier for B-MAX 600 @768Kbps. Still post FUP speeds is much better than the earlier FUP speeds of 256Kbps post FUP for the same plan. No idea. They have been operating in Hyderabad since 2004-2005.

I did not mix up the two plans. I am being billed 15p/m for onnet calls even though I am on a PPS plan. TI has mixed it up.

30GB is for the 1Mbps (was 768Kbps earlier) tariff, should be 40-50GB for their 10Mbps tariff. Post FUP, 1Mbps becomes 512Kbps. @dipanlahiri, I too have heard that they buy bandwidth from Tata I have been using it since last 1 year (used to be using BSNL EvDO earlier). Never got speeds less than what they quoted when I was downloading from websites. Also found that their usage billing is quite accurate. The only issue is if some idiot agency digs up and the cables get cut, you could lose a day or two of connectivity in some areas. Plus what I really like about them is that their tariff is inclusive of taxes.

This is the current official response of TTSL on ESN/MEID registrations on Tata Indicom

Replace the Asus E35M1-M Pro with a AMD Phenom II 555BE ( Rs. 4400) and Asus M4A88T M LE MB ( Rs. 4000) and with just an increase of Rs. 400 you will have a good desktop. Also you can replace the ACER monitor with LG 2260V which supports HDMI as well and with better looks at Rs. 9400. Total price is Rs. 27700.

Corporates are desperate to get their technologies approved as standards, after which they have no intention of any interoperability. Take the case of Microsoft's OOXML a version of which was standardized even though no software can/does implement the standardized version fully. The manner in which i got its non standard OOXML standardized was by bribing the representing members/organizations of the countries(most of them from Europe). India, South Africa and Brazil opposed OOXML. Even in India, Microsoft along with many Indian IT companies (Infosys, TCS, Wipro, Nasscom and others) wanted it to be approved as BIS standard and voted along with Microsoft. But fortunately academic institutions with IIT Mumbai taking the lead, government organizations and some other companies opposed it and instead preferred OpenDocument. ( For more details please read the BIS Documents on OOXML.) Thanks to their efforts, we have a truly open standard for all documents in India. To see to what lengths a companies like Microsoft could go in getting their standards approved you should read Prof Deepak B Phatak's Open Letter. I believe in not reinventing the wheel. But if the wheel fits only one car, then one is left with no other choice but to reinvent it. This is exactly the situation with using the European report for India. It may or may not fit India. We cannot be sure of the lobbying that has taken place in many European countries by corporates. It is therefore necessary that all the stakeholders in India be involved in drafting a policy document for India.

It's one thing to keep your money in a bank locker. But a completely another thing to keep it in a locker in a public place. For example I do not have a Facebook account for this particular reason, lack of privacy. Cloud computing is optional, just like Gmail is. Corporates can have their own private cloud, completely isolated from the outside, even if necessary physically. For example, Google is providing a private cloud specifically for the US govt. It is called Google apps for the Government. Most corporates are extremely secretive about their work. This is primarily to keep things away from the competition. And they would go to great lengths to do so in addition to maintaining multiple layers of hierarchy. Even keeping one project group isolated from the other. What they normally outsource is less sensitive stuff. More sensitive ones are almost never outsourced. For example how many corporates use "Google apps for Businesses" to handle sensitive information? Just using cloud computing does not necessarily mean security is compromised. Security could be compromised. I would like to give an analogy of defending ones house versus defending a fort. It is less easy to defend a house. Much easier to defend a fort, for the primary reason that there are more people and well trained staff to do so and the risk of failing to do so is much higher. On the other hand, it is less easy to defend your house a house against a small army or even a single strong man. Yes loopholes can be exploited in cloud computing, but the possibilities of doing so are extremely thin. A more real example would be to indicate the number of times my employers website was hacked (no thanks to the not so qualified sysads who do very little work and the one qualified sysad is busy handling too many things). But my blogspot page has never been hacked. As have some of the sites of some non-profits I have hosted on Google apps. They are actually quite happy with it, never even bothered to call me, till the domain name provider forgot to renew the domain, and I had it fixed. Thus in the past 4 years they never faced any problem. On the other hand cannot say the same about my employer. In my former workplace, we generally use NFS/NIS for filesharing/authentication. When I had to handle some defence projects I intentionally disabled the NFS/NIS on my system knowing that it was insecure. It was more difficult for me to use the resources at my workplace, but it was worth it. ps: Please do not consider this as an argument for the sake of argument. The purpose of this argument is for me to become more clear on how the nature of the security threat when using cloud computing is any more different than the current set of security threats.

I can understand how terrorism is a threat to national security but I fail to see how cloud computing poses a major threat to national security and individual's privacy. The moment any of your data resides on someone else's server, there is every possibility of your privacy being invaded. Whether Facebook or Gmail (oops this is already on a cloud) this is the case. Furthermore, any organization or group of individuals can setup their own private cloud employing any suitable security measures. Currently this does happen to a limited extent through means of VPNs where employees can access resources of their company from anywhere in the world. The primary advantage of a cloud is reduced costs and better resource management. If people are concerned about military installations and defence labs, in most cases, the internal networks are physically isolated from the outside world. A few standalone systems however are connected to the internet, through which people can gain access to outside resources. Sensitive information is never kept on these systems. And for most parts employees are not even allowed to carry in or carry out pen drives. Visitors and consultants are not even allowed to carry their mobiles inside.

ISP: Beam Tele (formerly Beam fiber) Plan: 600pm (inclusive of taxes) or 3300 for 6months (inclusive of taxes) or 6000/year (inclusive of taxes) Quoted speed: 768kbps Actual speed: 1mbps (for last three months) FUP: 30GB (downloads only, uploads not metered, unfortunately I am not a p2p/torrent guy but I do use skype), post quota speed is 256kbps for the rest of the month Comments: Trouble free except when some agency/miscreant digs up the cables, and occasional DHCP downtime.

Could you be more detailed about this statement. Because I too think the same thing. (Some people in the local gray market were able to get ESN's registered with Tata Indicom when TI refused the same to some of my friends.)

This may offend some people. But I have to be frank and honest here. Just buying products from China and screen-printing their company's name on it does not make them designers/innovators of a product. At the very best they can be termed entrepreneurs. While they have managed to hoodwink the media, they could not do the same with the Govt. It has nothing to do with their being from a backward state. When it comes to manufacturing of hardware, India is not anywhere near the top. The closest it came to doing as far as I remember was BEL manufacturing motherboards for IBM/Cyrix x86 processors in Bangalore and a company called JVC manufacturing Harddisks in MEPZ, Chennai. They both stopped doing it. Currently in the IT/Electronics sector, mostly assembling work goes on. Even companies like Philips have cut down their manufacturing in India, and instead procuring the components from China. The founders of iWebLeaf have got their two minutes of fame. Knowing they could not deliver, they closed down their shop. One can get Chinese made tablets for around 6K in Ebay India. If you buying sufficient quantities you should be able to further reduce the price to 75% of it.

My rating of Tata Indicom would have been identical to yours, if the recent billing related problem would not have cropped up. It was a nightmare dealing with customer care, for the first time in 4 years. So my current rating of customer service which till last month was 5/5, is now 1/5 as is the case for "following ethics and not being cheats". I have specified the DEPTH of voice network coverage as 2.5 and DEPTH of 1x coverage as 3.0... For me 1x need NOT work in some very remote areas, where TATA has poor coverage, so that EXTRA 0.5 point weightage for 1x coverage DEPTH...

After the email, I am being chased by Tata Indicom regarding the signal issue which I had raised last May. While earlier I had to chase them and take a day off from work and yet find no one turning up, the tables seem reversed. Currently I am to busy to be at home except for sleeping (working late night due to deadlines) and they do not find me at home. Earlier they would just call up without doing anything and would want to close the complaint. Now even though I do not want to pursue the complaint and am asking them to close it, they are not ready to.