Hot on the heels of the Globe Visibility rebranding comes the newly minted “Smart Big Bro”, previously named Smart Bro Prepaid.
It has been repriced from P2500 to the lower price of P1995. It comes with free P100 worth of load (5 hours of Internet usage).
The device uses a 3G or HSDPA (high speed data packet access, if I remember my Network class lol) signal, whichever is available.
HSDPA speed is up to 2Mbps, but HSDPA is very limited in the Philippines. I don’t think it is even available outside of Manila (and even in Manila it is spotty at best), so other cities will probably just get 3G with a top speed of 384Kbps (or worse, GPRS).
Of course, published speed is never the same as actual speed. Actual speed depends on how strong the signal is in your area and how many users are tapping on that signal. If you want to know how fast 3G in your area is, try surfing the web using your cellphone (make sure it is on 3G and not GPRS). That’s the speed you get. If you want to know how fast GPRS is… well, I think dial-up is comparable to that.
Internet surfing on Smart Big Bro costs P10 for every 30 minutes. The kit comes with the USB wifi device and a Smart SIM which you can load up like regular SIMs, except this one will pay your Internet charges and not your phone bill.
Smart Big Bro is not available for international roaming so if you’re on your Sydney or Paris or Orlando vacations, you’re out of luck.
March 17th, 2009 at 8:52 am
Hmmm. I do wonder about the wisdom of any communications device being slapped with a name reminiscent of “Big Brother.” Kind of Orwellian…