Wateen Telecom Launches its Wi-Max Services For Home Users: Confusions and Cool things!

Wateen finally  launched its WI-FI broadband for home users on 16 December 2007.

This service was awaited so much with a lot of expectations. But the question is: is this what we waited for?

Wateen's web site has enough ajax to impress Pakistanis but still its pretty unclear about the services it provides. Most of stuff there is confusing! CEO is taking about about 'tadaaaa!' and 'wow' of his own company and a cluster of mixture of packages enough to confuse an average Pakistani reader. Plus there is written at end "All prices are exclusive of all taxes!". Come on Wateen guys, where are you standing? Why you want all people to call you? or visit you office? Why you have a website? is to display CEOs enthusiasm about its own company?  ...Few pages are still under construction even after 4 months of delay.

Ok enough criticism. Coolest thing is "yeayyy we have WI-MAX in Pakistan!" and now we have one of the largest hotspot in the world-Thanks to Wateen :) ...And its as affordable as other Broadband Services  

Wateen's WI-Max: delayed

Wateen is still not able to launch its WI-max service that was promised this month.

According Wateen's costumer support, main reason behind this delay is not laziness of the company but some legal issues that are pending to be resolved by the Govt. of Pakistan. As country is under state of emergency, many major issues are hanging in between and waiting to get resolved.

So there is no expected date for the launch of this service and no details of the tariff.

 

Wateen Telecom's Wi-Max still pending to launch :@

I called Wateen Telecom today (They said last month that they will launch Wi-Max after 30 October) and still they say it is delayed due to some technical reasons! :@ man! what are they doing? They are putting thier advertisements everywhere for a service that is being delayed and delayed. Since last 4 months, they are saying "we are expecting to launch it in this month!" And today they did same when I called them.

Thier website is showing off all the time
"With more than 10,000 registered customers in 20 days and the count still going strong ..."

But guyz where is the Service?... I am waiting for this service from last 4 months and using a slow internet connection hoping that I will upgrade soon with it!...its a frustration for highly intrested costumers of Wateen and some friends of mine ended up thier patience with an alternative broadband connection and they say they are not going to shift to Wateen's (even if it offers better) for next 6 Months.

Expectations for Wateen is to bring cheaper broadband rates with mobility. They are not revealing the Tariff to anyone...don't know wht they have in mind! I don't think so people will prefer an expensive wireless broadband connection over less expensive landline broadband

PTCL Introduces "Phone n Net": Dialup internet for everyone!

PTCL has introduced "Phone n Net" services that has started offering dialup internet to all costumers

PTCL says

"Phone’n’Net offers lot more convenience and efficient services with no hassle of opening an account or buying scratch card forced usage, Prepaid services and so much other hassles.Whereas Phone’n’Net offers convenience at its best. If you want to use Internet just dial 13177777 and get connected. The usage will be billed through your telephone bill. It will be charged on per minute basis"

Following are features of this service

*Direct internet Access

*No scratch card needed

*Balance never finishes

*No Expiry or forced usage

*Don't have to pay up-front

*Flat rate of Rs. 0.10/min. (conditions apply). Hourly charges are Rs. 6/hour

*Code barring to restrict internet access

*Available on all landlines. Currently available in Khi, Lhr, Isb and coming soon across Pakistan.

*You will be able to connect from any PTCL landline number. The only difference is that the charges will be billed to that number from which you connected to internet.

*Only one call will be charged as per PTCL rules for 131 number.(Thats cool :D)


Settings:

Phone number: 13177777
Login: ptcl

Password:ptcl

For more details:
PTCL Phone n net

Waiting for Wateen

Its so much delayed. First they said it would be in start of September, then they said in the end of September and now they are saying in end of October.

I really want Wi-Max! I am using dialup from last month because I am waiting for Wateen and its delaying!... People hope Wateen will bring great price cuts in broadboand. They are not reavealing their tariff but hopes are with them as they said about it.

And I think comming of Wateen in market has made other broadband companies to drop thier rates. As PTCL is showing off thier DSL and claiming amazing rates.

So Wateen, we are waiting for you. Hope you are not further delayed

Link:
Wateen Telecom

PTCL applying call charges after every 15 minutes on dialup internet

PTCL has anounced to apply call charges after every 15 minutes once dialup is connected. Previously just one call was charged on every dialup connnection.

People all over Pakistan are protesting against this decision. Minimam dialup charges are now Rs 10 per hour that were previously Rs 2 per hour.

According to my opinion, this decision is made to discourage massive dialup users and diverting them to get a broadband connection (which is still nto affordable by all users)

ITCN Asia aftermath

The biggest IT event of South Asia, the ITCN Asia was held in Karachi, Pakistan from 9-11 August. I was there on last two days in the exhibition but I missed the very important conferences because of my university classes in morning. I had the corporate passes for conferences on first two days but the thing i didn't like was they weren't allowing visitors without National Identity Cards even if they have corporate passes. Visitor's without NIC were allowed only on 3rd day I also didn't had my NIC (I am 18! and will be 19 INSHAHALLAH after 9 days, m too lazy to get an NIC :P) but i got in because of my friend who was in the reception team. Three halls were full but there wasn't much crowd as compared to last ITCN in 2006. It had nothing much to offer a person at student level or just a home user but it had allot for businessmen. Following is a smal review of the ITCN Asia

Dany discount coupons:

Dany (www.dany1.com ), makers of peripherals distributed free coupon cards, each card with many coupons was offering discount for Rs 6,700/- with at least discount of Rs 300/- to Rs 500/- on 15 different products. The cupons are valid for 30 authorized dealer shops across city!
Discount at AGN computers stall: AGN computers were offering discounts on all their products (I don't remember the exact percentage). They weren't selling the products there, the discount was applicable from 9th August to 13 August on the AGN outlet. So I thought it was the good time to get a WMC compatible TV tuner card that I was planing to buy so I got it on discount! I may also write the review of that TV tuner card

Wateen Telecom's wi-max From the day I visited Wateen's telecom's stall, my MSN PM is "I want wi-max" :p . Wateen Telecom, a Warid company has made Karachi one of the World's Largest wireless hot spot city. Its first time in Pakistan that w-max internet connection, upto speed of 2MBPS has started. They have plans to launch it for public this month. And what I expect is the affordable, cehaper than Land line DSL. I talked to the sales agent about rates, he said they haven't revealed them yet. While talking to two different sales persons on Wateen Telecom's stall, I asked both of them about their expectation of rates. One said "I think the price of 256K connection will start from Rs 500 with unlimited volume" (its so cheap!) and the other said "The technology is wi-max! so it will be expensive that landlines DSL" (I hope he's wrong). Lets see whats the tariff when its available to public.

BusyPak infotech:
A small software house was selling an accounting software for Rs 99/- I purchased it because it looked a little attractive there, I was in hurry so I didn't saw the demonstration of that on the stall. It seemed to be developed in Visual Basic, it isn't compatible with my Windows Vista Ultimate...I tried it on Windows XP Professional. The interface was dull, unattractive and understandable to use. It had so many development and designing flaws that even a student developer like me takes care of them while programming. The worse was the background picture of the MDI application was not vector edged and was just designed for 14'' display, and on my 19'' display it was just like a 640X480 image in upper left corner of screen .The about section of that application says its developed in India, don't know why they were selling such a low quality software in Pakistan.

No attractive internet hours packages for dial up users:
I didn't found any attractive packages for dial up users. In last ITCN exhibitions, there were many.

PTCL DSL:

PTCL dropped rates of their DSL connection by 30 percent. So the PTCL stall was an attractive spot for DSL subscribers as their lowest package starts from Rs 1000/- per month

Board of Information Technology Sindh:
Board of Information Technology Sindh was offering call center training course in Rs 5000/- who's real cost is (as they say) about Rs 45,000/-. So its a very good call center agent training program for promotion of outsourcing of telemarketing

-------------------------

Event was good but not as much attractive as it was expected

Links
http://www.itcnasia.com/

Warid Free 50 minutes are not free actualy

I received an sms on my Warid number that was

"Special offer! Now get daily 50 FREE MINUTES! This offer is on ALL Warid Numbers from 9am-5pm. To activate sms "Zem2a" to 5060. Daily Charges 15+tax"

I was very excited so i immediately subscribed to the promotion. Its worthy but the fact is its not free. Its just way of marketing! i say the worst way! Its like same as if a greengrocer says that "Special offer! Give me Rs 15 and get 1 KG potatoes for free!" ha! man its the most worse way of marketing! I called Warid helpline and asked why they said its free and didn't enclosed the details is the SMS they said about...that I cant make a call or send an SMS if I don't have Rs 20 or more in my account, and why i was hanged up for 6 minutes (it was very early actually, there are times when we are hanged up for 15 minutes). She showed some rudeness, I became a little rude to because of her reaction...then she said "Sorry sir I can't help you! Thankyou for calling Warid costumer service, ALLAH HAFIZ! Bye " and line off!

After a survey, among the lowest call rates offered by three companies Jazz, Telenor and Warid, Warid stands as the most expensive who says "Free 50 minutes!".

Check out the following list of lowest call rates offered by three competitors.

Warid Zem: Rs 0.30* per minute (Form 8am to 5pm,50 minutes only! and balance must be atleast Rs 20 or you wont be able to call or even sms )

Jazz Ladies First: Rs 0.08* per minute (Form 11pm to 7am)

Telenor djuice: Rs 0.07* per minute (From 12am to 5am)

*Excluding Tax that is 20%

Clearly Warid Zem is the most expensive and most limited, Telenor djuice is the most affordable and Jazz ladies First just behind.

Call for Rs 4 per hour from your djuice!

More heat on! more cheaper call rates! the low down of call rates is also
adapted now by Telenor.

Man! these days we have the lowest call rates!

djuice offers call rates as low as Rs 4 per hour, its valid for all friends and family numbers from 12 am to 8 am everyday.



Visit djuice website for further details: www.djuice.com.pk

Free 50 minutes everyday From Warid

As heat is on in competition that was started by Jazz Ladies First offering Rs 5 per hour air time. Waridtel and Telenor also have very attractive packages

Warid presents an attractive promotion customers. Now Warid ZEM customers can get daily 50 FREE MINUTES on all Warid Numbers.

• With a daily charge of Rs 15 + tax‚ customers can avail 50 free minutes between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m.
• Subscribers can also enjoy 250 free SMS/MMS in addition to the 50 free on-net minutes at a daily charge of Rs. 20 + tax

Visit : www.waridtel.com

The Imagine cup 2007 heat is on! someone is also there from Pakistan!

The most awaited and my favorite event is finally to be held in Korea. Thats Microsoft Imagine Cup 2007 South Korea that will be commenced from August 5-11 2007. 111 teams and 372 finalists from all over the world are expected to travel to Seoul to compete.

This year Pakistan is also participating in the Software development category and the team thats participating is "AVRiL"(That sounds like Avril Lavigne :p), it stands for Automatic Video Recording for Lectures, and this team is from LUMS (Lahore University of Management Sciences). AVRiL are winners of Imagine cup Pakistan 2007, Lets see what they can do at world level.

They say about their project:

"Do you believe that quality education is a privilege of only a few at the top universities? What do you do when you miss classes? Do you value the power of instruction? Do you think distance learning programs are over-priced? What about being able to review only a particular topic right before the exam without having to replay the whole lecture. --- Ever thought of the most effective and ready method to reproduce the classroom experience for the masses? Are you sick of boring static lecture videos? Or do you get distracted when they hire a professional crew instead? ...The aim of the project is to fully automate the video recording of lectures so there is no need to hire special camera men or a direction crew. Due to its extremely low day-to-day costs it finds many applications in the area of video archiving, lecture review, and in distance learning programmes."

Wish you Best of luck AVRiL!

Watch their project promo:


Links:
Microsoft Imagine cup
Team AVRiL on Imagine Cup
AVRiL Homepage

Jazz Ladies First : call as low as Rs 5 per hour! but not for ever!

Mobilink-Jazz is famous for being among the first GSM mobile services provider in Pakistan. Mobilink Jazz is favorite connection for those who want maximum coverage all over Pakistan as it covers 5000+ cities, towns, and villages across country but many don't prefer it because of considering their rates for prepaid packages unsuitable for them. But they are offering something special for women now. Its Jazz- Ladies First connection. the coolest thing in it is the lowest call rates ever offered! yes its as low as Rs 5/- per hour! (0.083$ per hour). (The package is for ladies but men can also get it! )

They say

"Women around the globe love to talk for hours on end, and Jazz understands this need to the fullest, thus introducing its brand new revolutionary offer, where you can talk for as low as Rs. 5 / hour! This enticing new offer is surely every woman's dream come true, bringing forth a product that will now satiate their desire to talk more and more for hours."

They are attracting women to talk more and more, without worrying of call rates, and its their market strategy to temporarily fulfill the women's desire to talk more on phone and stick to phone for long hours. It must not be forgotten its a limited time offer. So we can say that its an attraction to grab users and most advertisement readers are skimmers; they don't notice the detail of this offer as it is not clearly mentioned in advertisements and remained unaware its a limited time offer. But its good in a sense that the new Jazz-ladies First SIM's cost is very little, so very much affordable and one afford to throw away the SIM after taking advantage of this limited time offer.

Mobilink Pakistan revenue for the last year was 250.2 million USD. The company has lost revenue in past few years as the competition has increased in the telecom market.

For details of package visit:
Jazz Ladies first homepage

Jazz Ladies first TV advertisement:

Website of President of Pakistan - Useless for me!

Note: This Article is a report on a website, it doesn't mean to attempt criticism on Government of Pakistan or any other respective higher Authorities.

I had something to tell the President of Pakistan. Really!

I had problem with Admission policy of a well known semi-government university of Pakistan thats also under Pakistan Navy, the university staff was bringing rules in front of me and were saying the application was inconsiderable because they just follow the rules already made, so the last thing remaining was if a higher authority , that was Government of Pakistan and Pakistan Navy, recommends the application then it can get approved. I forwarded my application to a higher authority that is Naval Headquarters of Pakistan Navy (NHQ) that is situated in Islamabad (under which is that university). The Naval headquarters recommended my Application and forwarded it to university headquarters.

I was in Karachi and the university headquarter was in Islamabad, so I had lack of communication for knowing the status of my application. There is no proper system to check the status of application processing except making phone calls to the office whole day. My dad went to Islamabad to check the status of application because I was busy with the studies and can't miss the university classes. He stayed there and tried his best to make it finalize but they were making it late because the director had went out of city for a tour. My dad had business waiting in Karachi so he had to come back and gave the responsibility to a friend of him in Karachi.

The university didn't responded! as I never sent them an application! yes the application wasn't ordinary after it was recommended by Naval Headquarters so it was very important to be processed.

So the last hope was to tell my problem to government. I remembered the new report about this website (http://www.presidentofpakistan.gov.pk/) that claimed easiest way to interact with President of Pakistan! So had no choice, I had thought in mind what if the president doesn't responds? but then what made me up was when I thought about the Modern Vision of President Gen Musharaf that he claims all the time. So i submitted my whole details and worry to president thorough this website with great hopes. And I got the auto generated message immediately in my mail box that said "ur application has been submitted" and I was happy.

The truth is the President never replied! so all hopes were lost when the time was over for processing the application. I lost my admission as well as the idea that government listens online!.

So this website did nothing for me, try yourself, check if something happens!

President of Pakistan Website:

http://www.presidentofpakistan.gov.pk/

USB to SATA/IDE Magic Bridge

Tired of connecting and disconnecting Hard disk with ur PC? or you want to connect ur PC Hard disk to Laptop? Here is solution for those who have habit, need or profession of connecting/disconnecting hard disks to their systems without hassle of system restart and plugging/unpluggng SATA/IDE cable.

Magic bridge supports most types of ATA/ATAPI /SATA interface devices such as 2.5” HDD, 3.5” HDD and CD-ROM, CD R/W, DVD ROM and DVD R/W devices. and its plug and play


Price : Rs 1800/-

Availability in Pakistan:
Karachi : Galaxy Computers Technocity GC-07 09 Techno City Altaf Hussain Road
Lahore : Galaxy Computers 29, 2/F Hafeez Centre Main Blvrd Gulberg III