My SUN Broadband Wireless Experience

I first applied for the Sun Broadband Wireless plan 649 back in the first week of October. Two weeks passed before I was actually able to acquire my plug-in because of poor customer service (we went back to the SM Sun Shop three times before they finally settled our account). They told me to wait for a maximum of 24 hours for the wireless sim to get activated. Well, guess what? Two days passed, still no signal. : < At this point, we were really pissed with Sun Cellular's system, but since I had already paid 649 for the dongle, I went for the last time. Thankfully, it was resolved in the evening and I was able to use my SBW plug-in.

The USB dongle should light blue the entire time you are using the internet, it means that you're connected to 3G internet. I live in Brgy. Mansilingan, and the signal for the wireless internet is great here.

For the internet speed, I'll compare it with the Pldt MyDsl we've been using here at home for the past 4 years (we attached the dsl to a wireless router so our house is a wifi zone).
1. Browsing speed - about the same
2. Downloading speed - Dsl is faster during the day, SUN is faster during offpeak hours (12mn onwards)
3. Uploading speed - SUN is faster
4. Gaming speed - I get disconnected a lot of times on Pangya when I'm using the SUN. BTW if you're planning on getting a wireless dongle for online gaming purposes, then DON'T. Better stick to a dsl connection.
5. Torrent / P2P sharing - when I first tried downloading using uTorrent, the download speed strayed between 5-10kbps (super slow!) despite the healthy number of seeds. It's because of Sun's Fair Usage Policy, they somehow disallow p2psharing and online gaming to avoid clogging up the network. I tweaked my torrent settings a bit, though, and now I'm at least able to get a speed of at least 25kpbs. If you're a torrent downloader, stick to dsl as well.

The following were results from yesterday evening and this morning, using SBW:

When I downloaded something off the internet at around 6:00 in the evening (peak hours of internet):

When I downloaded a 70mb file last night (off peak hours) the download speed capped at around 105kbps. Not too shabby for a 649 plan, I guess. It's a bit faster than the other wireless broadbands I've used, and can compare to a dsl connection (during off-peak hours, at least).

Overall, I'd say that SBW is not a particularly fast wireless connection, and it may not tailor to suit your exact needs -- but for the price it's a good deal. You just need to adjust to the crappy customer service first, though. :/

Bean Boozled - We Dared!

Chabs and I saw this crazy candy over at the snack exchange section yesterday: Bean Boozled jellybeans. Upon looking at the back, it boasted 10 colored jellybeans and 20 flavors: 10 which were heavenly, and 10 which were just plain weird and unmentionable. Intrigued, I bought one. It cost a steep P99.75 for a single box (about as big as a Nerds candy) but believe me-- spending that much on jellybeans was worth it.

Kinda like Bertie Bott's Every Flavored Beans, eh?

So we staked out a place at the annex part of SM with our giant university floats (supposedly to wash off the aftertaste if we ever ate a jellybean we couldn't tolerate). Before we opened the pack, we were in good hopes. I mean - all of these were still edible in the end, right? It couldn't be that bad. Pfffft.

Among the flavors I so unfortunately ingested were: toothpaste, skunk spray, canned dog food, baby wipes, centipede, moldy cheese, rotten egg and pencil shavings. Chabs got lucky and ate most of the good stuff.

The 20 flavors! 

My top pick for the most "spit-it-out-ASAP" flavor? Not skunk spray or rotten egg (they were tolerable) -- but BABY WIPES. Try mixing one teaspoon of baby powder with one teaspoon of rubbing alcohol, and you have an idea of the horror I went through chewing that one devilish jellybean. Too gross.

My brother also ONLY spit out baby wipes (and he ate a booger and barf-flavored jellybean, mind you) so I guess it makes it official.

Overall, Bean Boozled is a great candy - not to eat, but to have fun with. Try it with a group a friends and find out who's the unluckiest one of all. I won't be eating one of these again though. : >

Good for a mighty rockin' time with your pals :>