When Neotel first approached me about upgrading my connection to a 2Mbps line, for free, I wondered what the catch was. I was offered their WiMAX solution because a) I lived in an area with capability and b) my 24-month contract was up for renewal in a few months.

I was told that I didn’t have to pay for the installation of the new antenna and that the current EVDO device I was using would be of no use anymore. So they came and installed and after a week, my Internet was finally up and running. As soon as I configured my new “internet”, I checked the speed, and low and behold, this was the result:

I know this has been rolled out to a certain amount of users, which will explain the speed I am currently getting. While I am very happy about it [okay, majorly thrilled], time will tell if these speeds will last.

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A lot of people have been asking me about Neotel in the last fews months. The most important piece of advice I can give on the subject is this: do not sign a 24 month contract if you haven’t tested signal in your house. Or you just might get screwed. When I signed up a year ago, Sunninghill was an area with “excellent” coverage. You will soon learn what that really means. Bottom line, do not trust their website coverage map.

After many ups and downs, I eventually purchased an external antennae from Poynting. It has boosted my signal – which is now permanently on 4 bars. While the download speeds have improved, the upload is still poor. And several times a day, the connection just drops. I’m not sure if Neotel is doing this intentionally because before the antennae, my connection was fine. I suppose you could say it’s a small price to pay for good signal. Not at all impressed with the upload speeds. This is my speed test results after setting up the antennae:

If you’re thinking of signing up wih Neotel, know this:
1. You can’t monitor / check your bandwidth usage.
2. Network isn’t established properly, yet. You will experience down time now and then.
3. You might have to invest in an external antennae for better signal (roughly an additional R 1,500)
4. You might find that when your connection drops, you have to manually reconnect (even though you set the device to redial automatically). I’m bringing this up because when I access the internet from upstairs and it disconnects, I have to trek all the way down to reconnect. It’s annoying.
5. I can’t vouch for the reliability of P2P, I’m not a pirate

Excuse the poorly taken image, it was such a rarity to pick up 4 bars of signal on Neotel that I had to take a picture immediately. Not a chance of a re-take.

Just fyi I pick up 3 bars usually.