Internet links in Pakistan

‘SEAMEWE-3’:http://www.smw3.com/ is Pakistan’s main pipe to the global internet. Pakistan’s total internet bandwidth from this cable is about 600 mbps[1]. PTCL has 3 satellite links of about 34mbps each. So, Pakistan has a grand total of 700 mbps. ISPAK says that Pakistan was getting 600mbps of connectivity from the currently broken fibre optic cable, which sounds about correct, but PTCL says that SMW3 provides 155mbits. Now, PTCL might be controlling the bandwidth, but I don’t think their cheif executive knows what he was talking about when he said the cable provided only 155mbits. 600mbps or 155mpbs, both numbers are extremely low.


This one fibre optic cable provides Pakistan’s major outer communication means – so everytime something goes wrong with it almost all communications with the rest of the world are disrupted.

From the ‘Daily Times’:http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_11-11-2004_pg7_50

bq.. …the biggest technology issue facing Pakistan is its reliance on a single undersea telecommunications cable running from the port city of Karachi to the Fujairah Landing Station on the eastern coast of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), where it initially splits into two routes on its way to Europe and the Americas.

The Fujairah-Karachi undersea cable provides high-quality voice and data transmissions but is not 100 percent reliable, leading to the use of satellite backup systems. Pakistan’s satellite telecommunications systems have limited capacity and delays of 400 to 500 milliseconds to and from the US, down from 450 to 550 milliseconds in 2002. Delays in excess of 500 milliseconds are considered unacceptable for commercial call centre traffic. This situation does not disqualify the placement of mission-critical work in Pakistan, but it might make Pakistan appear less competitive than more expensive and lower quality IT service providers elsewhere in the region.

p. As happens all to often, Pakistan went through another Internet blackout on June 26 to July 3, 2005. PTCL, as usual, could be least bothered. The repair ship they hired never sailed from Dubai, and Etisalt (PTCL’s new owner) finally sent its own repair ship. While this was happening, PTCL executives kept saying the ship was on its way, when the ship had never left Dubai in the first place. From the public anouncements PTCL made, even days after the accident, they either kept lying about the repair ship – or they had no clue as to what was going on. This really paints PTCL in a bad light.

PTCL – the less said the better. For decades, they charged an arm and a leg for basic telephone service � up till a few years ago calling rates were many times higher that other developing nations. PTCL long ago amortized the cost of their copper network, as they hardly added new connections over the years, and spend barely nothing on maintaining it. PTCL was never in the telecoms business – it was solely in the money making business, and they utilized their monopoly status to the hilt, raping the consumer at every turn. In the 90’s, Pakistan passed on two _(or is it three)_ submarine cables which were being laid, as those cables were also connecting to India. Despite the fact that for practically no cost to Pakistan there could have been multiple redundant links, the Pakistan govt. mindlessly did not sign up. ‘The Price of Paranoia:’:http://opinion.paifamily.com/?p=1510

bq. The simple fact is that Pakistan�s military establishment, which ran the government and PTCL for the last several years, did not plan for such an eventuality. It compounded that mistake by regulating the satellite gateway business � making it illegal for private providers to operate their own gateways.

While the Pakistan govt. and PTCL executives are still grappling to understand what this internet thing is, and it’s importance, the IT sector is up in flames. To make matters worse, PTCL continues to cover up the severity of the problem, claiming it has put ‘adequate’ backup systems in place.

bq. Falsifying PTCL’s claim that a back-up Internet link was being provided through the V-SAT satellite with enhanced bandwidth, Furrukh Aslam, another call centre operator, said, “they are simply lying……we have had complete link down for the first three days while today on fourth day we are only having 10 per cent of the connectivity with a bad quality.”

Companies like AirBlue, rely on the internet for much of its bookings. PTCL is claiming that it is now providing full bandwidth to such companies over ‘backup’ satellite links. They are trumpeting this like they deserve a cookie or something. This is just a minor incident in the larger scheme of things, but it really shows how little PTCL comprehends the internet. When AirBlue’s customers can’t use the internet, what does it matter if PTCL is providing full bandwidth to AirBlue? It’s not like people in Canada are booking flights on a domestic only Pakistani airline. What about banks? Many people have come to depend on the internet banking facilities local banks have started offering. Pakistan’s export oriented industries, like the textile sector, have also come to depend on the internet, for everything from email to sending specifications, order updates etc.

The ongoing Internet breakdown in Pakistan has hit the country’s dream of matching India’s standards in the Information Technology (IT) and ‘call centre’:http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_5-7-2005_pg1_10 business, as it damaged Pakistan’s credibility with the international IT community, IT experts in the country say. No duh.

One official looked at the bright side: _”Pakistan does not have a place on the global map of out-sourcing so the impact has not been that great”._ What he cannot understand is that this sort of approach is one of the reasons Pakistan doesn’t have a place on the global out-sourcing map. While the govt. was looking at the bright side of things, business leaders were ‘saying’:http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item_no=42756&version=1&template_id=41&parent_id=23 that _the disruption of Internet services in Pakistan due to a fault in the undersea cable has badly affected shipping, aviation, import and export activities and other sectors of the economy._

Will any of the companies and users badly affected by this disruption get any ‘compensation?’:http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_2-7-2005_pg7_6 No. As is the norm with govt. agencies, PTCL is going around complaining: “We are already bearing an extra cost to arrange alternatives,” said Mashkoor Hussain, senior executive vice president PTCL. Well no duh – but what does that have to do with compensating PTCL customers suffering due to PTCL’s fault?

In more backwardness, if I try to connect to a Pakistani website, hosted in Pakistan, then most times the request is routed around the world first – one of the reasons locally hosted sites are slow to open in Pakistan is because the data packets first leave the country and enter back in.

It doesn’t end here. One would think there are just so many things PTCL could do wrong, but they keep proving otherwise. PTCL spokesman Anwar Bhatti attributed the delay in the arrival of the repair ship to the *lack of insurance cover, because of which it could not sail in rain or bad weather.* This really boggles the mind. Here is an entire country disconnected from the rest of the world, and PTCL can’t even pay insurance charges for the repair ship? Murphy famously said: “If anything can go wrong, it will”, but he hadn’t seen PTCL at work otherwise he would have added “If things can be fucked up further, then fucked they shall be”.

h4. enough of the bad news

I am going to stop listing all the things done wrong now, as it is getting tiring. Some people will no doubt say that I am painting PTCL in a overly bad light, but I have actually left out -some- a lot of the more moronic things they’ve done. The famous quote goes “Truth is stranger than fiction”, and Pakistani govt. agencies regularly prove it by doing things so badly that no person who hasn’t seem them at work can readily believe it – they keep saying that things can’t actually be that bad. Sadly, events prove otherwise. Still, one has to give PTCL some credit – some people think this last fuckup was a ‘cable tap’:http://www.globalsecurity.org/org/news/2005/050218-uss-carter.htm by the USA ‘gone wrong’:http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/06/28/1740216. Anyways, on to the good news:

There is one more undersea fibreoptic cable in the works: ‘SEAMEWE4’:http://www.seamewe4.com/, which -should be operation by Dec 2005- has become ‘operational as of January 2006’:http://www.brecorder.com/index.php?id=372570&currPageNo=1&query=&search=&term=&supDate=.

bq. The South East Asia-Middle East-West Europe 4 (SEA-ME-WE 4) project is the fourth project in the SEA-ME-WE series. On 27th March 2004, a consortium of 16 international telecommunications companies signed construction and maintenance agreements for the new optical fibre submarine cable system linking South East Asia to Europe via the Indian Sub-Continent and Middle East with Terminal Stations in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, *Pakistan,* United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Italy, Tunisia, Algeria and France. The contract is being awarded jointly to Alcatel Submarine Networks, France and Fujitsu Ltd., Japan and the estimated project cost is of the order of US$ 500 million.

There is hope yet for Pakistani internet. Construction is ‘nearing completion’:http://www.ameinfo.com/62470.html, and the Karachi landing point has already been established. SEAMEWE3 has a capacity of 70gbps, and Pakistan only has a 600 mbps link from that – it remains to be seen how much bandwidth Pakistan will get from SEAMEWE4. Considering it has a terabit plus capacity, Pakistan should get at least a 100gbps link. It will most likely be between 1 to 10bgps – which is a vast increase over the current link. One has to keep in mind though, that this one link will not be ‘enough’:http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/4.12/ffglass_pr.html:

bq. …These numbers really knock ’em dead in the phone industry. To anyone who spends much time messing around with computer networks, they seem distinctly underwhelming. All this trouble and expense for a measly 8 Gbps? You’ve got to be kidding! Again, it comes down to a radical difference in perspective between telephony people and internet people.

To paraphrase from this wonderfully detailed ‘Wired magazine article on submarine cables’:http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/4.12/ffglass_pr.html: *outfits like PTCL don’t really grok the Internet. The undersized cables they are running reflect their myopic outlook.* PTCL sat on its ass for 10 years till the shit hit the fan. Etisilat has already said it’s going to be providing hi-speed internet access throughout the country. PTCL has been saying that for many years already, but what PTCL means is ‘only for those able to pay ten thousand times the going international rate, and that too only if you beg nicely’. Etisalat has entered at a nice time, with a lot more bandwidth coming online in the near future, so hopefully things should increase greatly in the next few months.

A ‘thirdfibre optic link’:http://tech.one.com.pk/?q=node/47 is in the planning stages, and will run from Lahore, Pakistan to Amritsar, India. PTCL claims it has already begun laying the cable up to the border with India. Pakistan is commited to completing this cable, as the govt. keeps making moise about it. ‘Orascom Telecom’:http://www.orascomtelecom.com/, the parent company of Mobilink, which is infamous for its amazingly bad cellphone service, is also laying a 1,200 kilometer 20 Gigabit per second fibreoptic cable from Karachi to Fujairah.

h4. TWA-1 Undersea Cable Network

Tyco Telecommunications has completed its multi-million dollar turnkey contract with Transworld Associates for the TWA-1 Undersea Cable Network. The system, the first privatised cable network to land in Pakistan, will link Karachi in Pakistan, Fujairah in the UAE and Al Seeb Muscat in Oman. The initial implementation of the network includes two fibre pairs connecting the three landings in a trunk and branch arrangement, with each fibre pair initially commissioned to carry 10gbits/sec. This dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) undersea fibre optic cable system is more than 1,200km long and capable of carrying up to 1.28tbits/sec of transmission capacity when fully upgraded.

The other good news is by the time all this bandwidth available, ‘WiMax’:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WiMax should be a viable technology. Already a few providers are talking about implementing WiMax. This is important because the copper networks throughout the country are completly messed up, thus the crying need for any good wireless tech for the last mile.

h4. further reading

* ‘NYTimes: New Undersea Cable Projects Face Some Old Problems’:http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/10/business/10cable.html?ei=5007&en=4917b284ed84e9ed&ex=1399608000&partner=USERLAND&pagewanted=all&position= * ‘Wired: Mother Earth Mother Board’:http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/4.12/ffglass_pr.html :: The hacker tourist ventures forth across the wide and wondrous meatspace of three continents, chronicling the laying of the longest wire on Earth.

fn1. It’s hard to get exact numbers. The government and PTCL give different numbers at different times.

43 thoughts on “Internet links in Pakistan”

  1. “Pakistan does not have a place on the global map of out-sourcing so the impact has not been that great”

    dont you just love how the ‘bright side’ is actually our own incompetence? so the next time you wish to achieve anything just lay back and settle for mediocrity… then when you fuck up no one will really be surprised.

    “A thirdfibre optic link is in the planning stages, and will run from Lahore, Pakistan to Amritsar, India.”

    and when things go politically sour again with india again someone will consider it unpartiotic to keep it functioning.

    i hope eitisalat know what they’re getting into.

    off-topic here but i actually read something along the lines of this on one of the news channels tickers ‘musharraff cannot remain president for more than 12 years because it says so in the consitution – soandso’ … now, why on earth would any human being living in state that so proudly calls itself democratic even contemplate the idea of being under the rule of the same human being for that long?

    can coups be couped?

  2. and when things go politically sour again with india again someone will consider it unpartiotic to keep it functioning.

    Most of Pakistan’s internet bandwidth is through ‘FLAG Telecom’:http://www.flagtelecom.com/, which is owned by the Reliance Group – an Indian company. Your point is moot.

  3. Brilliant roundup, KO. Hats off to you. I am sure you’re aware of the request PTCL made to India for Internet. I didn’t expect camel’d go down so soon. But it’s interesting how the mindless horde in the govt and PTCL are coming up with “assurances and Good news” such as SEA-ME-WE4. But does that save us from answering about the vulnerability of another fibre-optic under-sea cable and not having a matching satellite backups as well as Pakistan’s absence from FALCON plan etc…

    And even more puzzling question is if we will get adequate and affordable bandwidth in any time soon? I doubt that unless Multinet’s ambitious plans get laid finely and they come up with sensible solutions. But wait a minute, did I tell that paying over 8000 a month to MultiNet still refuses to access Hotmail, Gmail, Secure pages including ecommerce sites and so on. Only yesterday, I got to know that to upload some data to a client’s web site, we are required to use SAT.NET’s own dialup service. The database and coding files were well over 30MB anyway and forcing users to use your own dialup service to upload to their hosting accounts.

    Isn’t it more of a cultural paradigm, KO, than a technological one? Of course, no one is saying PTCL is responsible for the cable fault but other important questions that the nation wasn’t prepared to plan…

  4. KO – an excellent analysis of the entire situation – your write-up deserves to be forwarded to our info minister Leghari to analyse the actual ground reality which he casually refuses to acknowledge. This incident is a stab in the back for the dream of a Pakistan being an Internet service provider hub along the lines of india. it has actually pushed us 10 years back into the dark ages

    I honestly hope that this incident actually teaches them a lesson but in my heart we all know that it will never happen.

  5. Ejaz, Pakistan was in the initial FALCON network, but after Reliance bought FLAG Telecom, Pakistan slowly disappeared from the picture. PTCL stopped talking about it also – they probaly thought that since SEMEWE4 is coming online soon they don’t need no third fibre optic cable. And yes, the problem is more ‘cultural’:http://www.dawn.com/2005/05/10/op.htm#2 then technological.

    Teeth Maestro: From the statements and interviews the sainted IT Minister has made over the years, he clearly doesn’t know anything about IT. He just gave an interview, in which he totally brushed of the fact that Pakistan’s only link to the world was broken, saying that it’s just a short-term incident. I only hope that his tenure as IT Minister is also short term – he has no qualifications whatsoever in any computer related field. Awais Leghari has been proudly beating his chest about SEMEWE4: _”internet capacity would be increased much beyond the country’s requirement.”_ It’s idiots like him who set the stage for future disasters. Not to long ago, another minister proudly said that our current fibre-optic link is much more than we need, and here we are today. Right now, the best thing the govt. can do is sack Leghari and the heads of PTA/PTCL – at least that will show the world the govt. is serious.

  6. Another interesting thing about this cable fault: There is nothing about it on PTCL’s website, or PTA’s, or the Ministry of IT’s site – the three agencies in charge of the submarine cable.

  7. Well done prick, why don’t you just advertise to the whole world how bad the governing of Pakistan’s telecommunications so that whatever little redemption could have been made from this incident is lost.

    It’s is not the mindless poeople in government that flaw the progress of Pakistan but it is pesemistics pricks like you that do it.

    Try and offer advice as to solution instead of complaining!!!!!

    The biggest pitty is that a British born Pakistani is having to tell you this, so much for patriotism.

  8. I think all this bashing on PTCL is not totally justified. All ISP’s and data operators knew since ages that SMW-3 is the only submarine cable into Pakistan and the only other alternative is Satellite. Yet, these ISP’s never obtained enough satellite bandwidth from PTCL for backups to maximize their profits since Satellite bandwidth is expansive.

    I work for a similar company in Pakistan but we had subscibed satellite bandwidth (about 70% of our SMW-3 capacity) from PTCL as backup. This has kept our business moving and our customers working.

    Seems to me that IT pros at the ISP’s working in Pakistan have never heard of terms like Business continuity planning and/or Disaster recovery.

  9. Kuya, you don’t make much sense here. ISPAK has been after PTCL and the PTA for years to let them implement their own connections, but PTA refused. It is illegal for Pakistani ISP’s to establish their own direct connections – they have to go through PTA/PTCL. ISPAK has been after the govt. for years about the need for a second fibre-optic cable. I don’t see how you can blame them for not having suitable backups in place, when there just isn’t any avaiable.

    Satellite bandwidth is not a viable subsitute for fibre – some business plans, like home broadband, are dependant on the availability of cheap bandwidth. Secondly, PTCL doesn’t have enough satellite links to cover the loss of SMW3.

    It is PTCL and the PTA who didn’t have any _Business continuity planning and/or Disaster recovery_ in place, and got caught with their pants down.

  10. I have read this piece with much interest, indeed. And would like to add my two bits.

    I have only my middle finger in solidarity with the Pakistan’s “call center industry” or any “net based” business model. I hate PTCL/PTA as much as any self-respecting Pakistani, but let’s not forget some points:

    – Pakistan’s “internet industry”/call center industry is managed and run mostly by back-to-the-nest quick-buck opportunists, who have NO interest in the long term viability of such an enterprise. It is indeed a “cultural flaw” in us, and has nothing to do with fancy sounding technicalities. Remember, the internet is just another tool, not a “business model”.

    – To blame PTCL for backup woes is like pointing three fingers back at themselves: You would not have started with the responsible business had you known the limitations, or had you any “responsibility” towards your employees/clients/Pakistan etc. Sure you jumped greedily on to the “internet business” bandwagon for a short-term profit – knowing well enough that there lies a big risk factor in terms of no-backup doomsday scenario. Don’t cry foul with “PTA/PTCL promised so and so” because that really exposes your professionally incompetent bare behinds.

    – Any socially/culturally/humanly respectable businessman knows his LIMITATIONS before his strengths. Our “net based” industry is nothing but a profiteering operation, which, with likeminded PTCL/Govt biggies, are reaping respective gains at the expense of consumer-interest, country’s “consumer-first” bandwidth, etc. Yes, “consumer-first” is an alien idea in our country, and will remain so.

    – Businesses/operations/people that really cared about “service” and their customer base did not really cried so much during the black-out. Indeed, so did the poor consumers, who sadly have no voice or choice. Such businesses/operations/people carried on with their businesses having suitable/optimum backup drills/plans and operations for such an event because a black out can happen even in the holy Silicon Valley, and it is the competent conduct of professionals that is to be judged (a perfect time to judge the wimps from the champs), not blame-games. Only those ill-equipped, ill-prepared (read profiteers) cried the foulest.

    – I wish I could name or cite examples, but I do not wish to muddy the already murky waters.

    Thank you.

  11. KO

    As you correctly pointed out:

    QUOTE

    It is illegal for Pakistani ISP’s to establish their own direct connections – they have to go through PTA/PTCL.

    UNQUOTE

    That was my point exactly. There is no restriction on obtaining satellite bandwidth from PTCL. The only problem here is that you have to pay for it and it isn’t cheap. The ISP’s should have opted for this ONLY available option if they cared for their customers. As a matter of fact, any sensible business venture depending on telecommunications would opt for ANY available diversity option. But they all want free lunch.

    I am in total agreement with the comments made by P.

  12. _There is no restriction on obtaining satellite bandwidth from PTCL._

    Kuya, PTCL doesn’t have enough satellite bandwidth to sell – so even companies wanting to buy satellite bandwidth couldn’t. You seem to be saying that these companies should have covered themselves by having bought enough satellite bandwidth as backup – well I know of a few companies who did just that and they did not get that backup when the fibre optic link went down. Satellite is not a viable backup to a fibre optic link – at this moment in time there is no way for a company to arrange for a proper backup. They cannot get their own satellite link – that’s illegal, and if they arrange for a satellite link through PTA/PTCL, they don’t get that full bandwidth because when the fibre optic link goes down PTCL uses that bandwidth to provide bad service to ALL its customers.

  13. KO, In case if you are wondering, I am not affiliated with PTCL in anyway :-p. I am just trying to have a neutral analysis of the situation. I have had my share of nightmares when it comes to PTCL QOS.

    In your comments above, I think you are referring to IP bandwidth (via PIE) which is different from clear channel IPLC (International Private Leased Circuit). I agree that PTCL does not provide good backup for IP bandwidth. Moreover, the IP bandwidth is shared among subscribers. That is probably why the companies that you know about did not get enough bandwidth on satellite during the outage.

    On the other hand, clear channel IPLC subscribed bandwidth is guaranteed. I have experienced it first hand as our satellite IPLC remained in service during the SMW-3 outage providing full bandwidth. So I would disagree that there is no proper satellite backup.

    The point that PTCL has insufficient satellite bandwidth is also valid. Still, I would say that if PTCL subscribers demand it, they would have to arrange it. No one would invest in expansive technology without market demand. Of course, if PTCL fails to arrange it despite strong market demand, then it is indeed their shortcoming.

    It all boils down to how much can one invest. IP bandwidth is cheap. Clear channel IPLC’s cost more. I am sure we all heard the saying “jitna gur dalo gay utna meetha ho ga.” 🙂

  14. Very well written and thought provoking, KO

    I think the only way out, is corporatizing the whole thing. India itself had a very horrible situation with VSNL controlling everything. But the past 10 years have seen quite a few of the Infrastructure being privatized and that has seriously improved the life of Indian people.

    VSNL was sold to the Tatas, and its monopoly was ended. The Department of Telecom was corporatized and the telecom sector fully opened up. And it has worked wonders. Both Telephone and Broadband are much more freely available as of now, than when they were monopolized by the government. (Still there is a long way to go, as far as overall privatisation is concerned – people like me think that *much more* is needed). When the institutions are privatized, the lazy babus actually have to *work* and companies have to face competition. That removes complacency and makes it better and cheaper for the customer.

    The long term solution is ending the monopoly, and allowing markets to become free. Of course there will be people opposing that. For example, the current government in India has Leftist support and they are effectively screwing everything and halting development. But I’m sure something will work itself out – the Congress is slowly wiggling.

    And Yeah Sanchez, The Indian establishment owns and operates a trained team of lobsters to sever Pakistan’s cable links 😛

  15. You know, it’s particularly amusing that when I called PTCL from work (I work for Spider, the tech mag), to ask about the outage, I was casually informed “Aap Etisalat say kyoon nahin poochtay. Ab to yeh sub un he ka hai.”

    I was about to bawl, but I decided that it just wasn’t worth it.

  16. ppl yewve got lots of interesting views on this problem tat occured wid seamwe-3…

    erm i just dont get it y did pakistan didnt … subscribed for more submarines cables than having one ….and …….the other topic i think KO closed about connectivity….can you tell me whay the ms thing so high 350ms 330 ms to us and canada its erm…way to high doing sumthing with heavy trafikking there is a lag temme is there sumway it culd improve lyke it becoms below 200ms …..if not what do you guys think this culd happen in pakistan this sure sux….and btw ptcl alwayz make its own rules and regulations i heard of a company giving satellite broadband connections i just checked whether there was sum subscription in pakistan lol….there wasnt ane drop down link fer pakistan india ….yes…china…yes…nepal..yes…cept pakistan that reallee pissed me off…..y does this ptcl impose too many restrictions …..dsl services are still not availible in our region…umph :(i mean they are availible in chosen telephone exchanges …

    suppose i get a dsl connection multi net is giving 128k connection fer rupees 3750 for home users …in lawhore…will that ping remain the same i said above 200 ms or it wuld improve :S

    ny wayz whats the crab situation lawl…

  17. With etisalat having 4 of its 19 links knocked out by this underwater cable incident it means we only have browsing working in dubai, no p2p or instant messengers working and we are complaining over here, but for you guys in Pakistan with just the 1 cable…OMG….you have my sympathy……i hope your telecom / isp get there act together soon …….

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  19. Great Job KO! for pointing out things we already knew, I guess it helped you sleep well at night thinking you have done your job.

    For “P”, who only pointed out the “cultural flaw(s)” I must say those who can’t do, criticize; and that I guess is the biggest cultural flaw to bitch about the problems in the system and that’s about it.

    Cheer up fellows, think positive, practice constructive criticism, lot of good things are happing.

  20. i dont agree with

    “Pakistan does not have a place on the global map of out-sourcing so the impact has not been that great”

    I work in IT company in Lancaster, UK they get all their work done from pakistan and china. Pakistan is best place to get your work done withing feasible budget and good quality.

  21. i have bought v vireless phone . i live in village how we can use internet facility . i have activeted but ptcl arranger has not activated my connection for internet facility . realy i was so proud to me i wil use net at home on v vireless phone . but when i try to connet but there was no resposne . i think ptcl v vireless arranger are too lazy for provided to internet facility . i have another complained that ptcl v vireless is expensive for lower midlle class peope daily 8 rupess reduce without usnig

  22. i am very pleased to read the information from this site .

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    may be with 64k or 32 k of uplink with 128k downlink

    thanks in advance

  23. i am very pleased to read the information from this site .

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    as soon as possible.

    thanks in advance

  24. Yes lot of talk about the bandwidth and broadband internet has been heard when we loose our world wide connection due to disconnection of the fiber optic cable. These talks are part of a phenomenon and which is about to be overtaken by another. This is just like natural and counter forces are keep working on it. But the most important issues are the content and mix with the local and international media and of course the entertainment component attached with it. Millions and millions internet users are using the bandwidth for just gosping as people misuse the telephone when they go on talking for nothing. The advertisement play a havoc and in the internet it does’nt work as there are limitations but it is a fact that IT companies have benefitted most from this business and they are using it as for granted while other companies are doing the research and putting lot of money to give additional comforts and ease to masses and in this way the business will go on and on. My point is that who loose in the whole process; is the common man is getting due share and his privacy and his concious is not shattered. We should exert enough pressure to protect our privacy and domain and any infringes whatsoever should be retaliated with full force.

  25. I m selling Downlink in Pakistan.If anyone required IVS plz contact me.I m selling Singtel CIR service..I m not from CompuCity.I have a Direct deal with Singtel.

    03332457207

  26. Sup KO! I read your shit and it’s fuckin awesome. I used to live in the States, and I am damn satisifed with the services there (what was it now, 27 bucks a month for a 1.5 Mbps link via SBC Yahoo! equivilent to appx. RS 1800). Anyways, I agree with you on the fact that PTCL is the one to blame for all of this shit. 700 Mbps total link speed? WTF MAN?! I’m not much of a debating person (fuck man I’m not even a legal adult yet), but one thing I DO know is that due to the lack of effort put forth by PTCL, all the consumers have to put up with overpriced bullshit. I will admit that the same package I had, 1.5 Mbps, is commercially available. However, I’m not willing to fork out RS 84,000 a month just so I can download shit off of BitTorrent and DC++ (w00t for filesharing). As a developing country Pakistan has several opportunities to have an excellent history with as little smudges as possible (unlike America which is full of bloodshed). However, just because greedy motherfuckers want money all the time not only do we, the consumers suffer, but the country and the outlook of it as well. As for the guy that called you a prick, he can eat shit and die. “Think positive!” I don’t see him giving any suggestions. “Well Bill why don’t you give us some suggestions?” Ok yeah why not. I read online that ZTE (a Chinese company involved in helping PTCL with the Internet project) is offering a major helping hand. That’s one solution. The next solution is fuck making connections to India. As far as I’m concerned, Pakistanis are too damn stupid. I’m sure the monthly boycott against India will fuck things up more. Next, these guys have billions of rupees. Getting one good quality fiber-cable would really help these motherfuckers out. I can’t tell ya how many times I feel like attempting to do something stupid like steal Internet from the local gaming zone. I’m really sick of this crap. I can’t do shit since I don’t have any power, nor do I have any funding. Had I any funding from a group of people I’d go and make my own arrangements for setting up two or three segments of 100 KM fiber optic channels. Sure it would cost me a lot but with the appropriate backings why not. My skill level may not be much (I’m just in CCNA 3 right now) but with extra time looking for ebooks and manuals I’ll get over this hurdle myself. Seriously, if everybody just pitched in and worked together everything would be much better. True, we’d be making an illegal connection to the Internet, but you know what I think? Fuck that shit. They can’t prosecute me anyways. I’m not about to listen to some hyppocrite who stayed on his ass longer in office than he was supposed to. Besides this is an anarchist state anyways. A good group of twenty or thirty people with some good equipment and the Internet shall come. So, assuming this all works out, what would I do?

    1. Set up my own individual link to the Internet via the same fiber port in the sea using high quality cabling (I can’t remember the standard’s name but I believe it allows for literally unlimited bandwidth). Connect that over to a nearby office.

    2. Set up multiple servers with gigabit NICs and trunk them, say six gigabits per server, five servers. That’s nice compared to now. Each server represents a district. Lay out the fiber line from each server to a specific area and employ private IP addressing in a format like so: Server 1 (PECHS) Address: 192.168.(1,2,3,4,5).254 with DHCP enabled. Server 1 alone would have 759 clients. This is without subnetting. I’m not really good with subnetting as it is, but in the future subnetting may be implied. For five servers the total number of clients add up to 3795. That’s not a lot but for starting out it’s ok.

    3. Enable NAT and IGMP on all the servers (Windows 2000 Server). One downside of affordable Internet is always the fact that some gay shit like ISA is implemented. No thank you on that I believe ports shouldn’t be blocked.

    4. Use bandwidth restriction policies on all IP addresses. What about different bandwidht packages? Create DHCP reservations for specific hosts so that that host always gets a certain IP and use limiting on that IP. Now this is kinda difficult since people with other IP address may be paying low amounts for low bandwidth but as soon as a system with higher bandwidth shuts down they low bandwidth system changes its name and after rebooting gets higher bandwidht but that’s of no matter considering the client’s already paying for the stuff.

    Now, I know this isn’t exactly your day to day “proffesional work,” but for a 17-year-old to come up with this on the back of his head, it’s still something. At least I have SOME ideas. If only I had financial backing and a little bit of information as to where I can buy equipment from and where the fiber port is I would be able to set it up myself no problem. Well, the fiber port hook up would be bothersome but that’s about it. The biggest problem out there nowadays is that there are no real standards implied. Poor voltage ratings in phone lines, non-certified personnel providing “assistance” (cough cough fucking things up more), etc etc. With some solidification any plan can easily be executed perfectly, such as the one stated above.

    Well, if you live in Karachi and ya wanna talk to me sometime give me a ring.

    021-824-1881

  27. we need some information about the backbone structure for fiber optic so if it is possible so give us the maps and information simultaneously

    we r doing a research in this context we need to have these iformation for completing it

  28. Hi guy,

    I can see the need of better/reliable/efficient technology in Pakistan specially in Telecom sector. So huyz now we have heard a lot about the flaws now why dont we put our heads togather and come up with some solution.

    I have a plan ( please let me know where I would need permission from PTCL/PTA and/or government or correct me if I am wrong)

    I see that pakistan satellite link is not enough now so why dont we have a short term solution is which we provide shared solution via DVB-RCS termination outside of pakistan using VSAT. Since its going to be shared solution the bandwidth will be cheaper and hence affordable to the end users.

    Now would I be allowed to terminate outside of pakistan?

    Do I need to get a transmission license from PTCL/PTA?

    If yes – is it an easy process or do I have to have my uncle working in PTCL to get the license 😉 ?????

    Where do I get more information as to what kind of international gateway does PTCL have for linking their voice and data traffic to outside world other than Fibre.

  29. Dear All,

    Logitech was the pioneer in stellite bandwidth in Pakistan. In the mid of 2005 because of low cost bandwidth of PTCL, we adjusted our services only for the Corporate clients who can pay a bit more and were willing to have good quality service. At present we are in a position to provide satellite downlink services to all those who knows that the cost of quality has to be paid. Nevertheless, it is affordable.

    Shakil Khan

    0300-8293627

    shakil@logitech.net

  30. hi sir i m doing DAE in tele comunication technology from GPI haripure and i wants to do the course of optical fiber technicion please tell me how i can do that free i will be very thank full to you.

    thanks

  31. I was on a short trip to Pakistan during the 2005 “incident” in Pakistan. Considering the severe nature of that event, GoP should have sacked the followings:

    Minister of IT

    CEO, PTCL

    MD/CEO, PTA

    Immense lack of planning, foresight and political issues forces them to do otherwise. I heard that was lot of hullabaloo during initials days of Etisalat’s PTCL takeover.

  32. and i am interested in acquiring satellite bandwidth for my company i have the following scenario which i want to fulfill by acquiring bandwidth from any satellite bandwidth so i want to check if any company can provide me with the following facilities.

    * I have an office in Karachi, Pakistan and an office at Pathumthani, Thailand in which our company’s work in conducted, is this possible that i can acquire a 4MB pool on your satellite bandwidth and then i can uplink data from Pakistan and then downlink in Thailand, our data is mostly via ftp protocol and we don’t use VoIP or Video.

    – If this can be done via what equipment will be required?

    – On what band will you give this bandwidth?

    – What will be the cost of satellite bandwidth per Mb?

    – which company would be good for this?

    if anyone can provide a aolution i would be glad

  33. Hi,

    I am happy in pakistan PTCL launched new technologies day by day, some people think about the technologies not effect on current world, but why the govt leve all people to blame to each other they not blame the service of ISP (Internet Service Provider) in local pakistan not PTCL. The PTCL Internet Service I like it (Inshallah) it will imporve for us and our pakistan business.

    I am E-Commerce Developer, Since 5 years i used many ISPs but i like it PTCL Net Service V-PTCL. Why because it’s new and different, no modem no wires, wireless technologies data transfer faster then wire logical.

    Stop to blame Pakistan Govts, Think before say any think to your country, what you give your mother land.

  34. I need the solution to transfer the data from Lahore (Pakistan) to Bangkok (Thailand) with out using any cable or lower speed solution. I have listened about VSat but i don’t know what is the best way to get VSat soluton or some other solution to trabsfer my data through satelitte.

    Required quotations

    Wajid Saddiqie

    +92 0321 4961282

    Email: wajid_saddiqie@yahoo.com

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