[Rant] It’s time to upgrade the internet connection

I’ve been using my internet connection for almost 2 years. I can cancel it without any extra charges now and get a new internet connection. Otherwise it will automatically get renewed.

So why would I need to get a new internet connection? One reason. Discounts!!! When you get a new internet connection here in Japan, they give us a big discount on select products OR sometimes give cash back. I’m after that! In fact, if I buy it from kakaku.com, I can get discounts on even more goodies. Me loves goodies!!! A new graphics card, anyone? A new camera anyone? Yippie!

But there is one catch. It takes them a long time to give me the internet connection. I cannot live without a internet connection. It is just like living without electricity. But it is fine, as there are many friends living in the same building and I can use their wireless internet connection until they give me the connection.

Wireless connection, I said. What about my desktop PC, the PC that I use mostly. It doesn’t have wireless. But then I remembered, I don’t have to worry about it. When I moved to this apartment, I had the same issue. I didn’t get internet connectivity until a couple of weeks had passed. So I had to use a friend’s WI-FI connection. For that, I bought a USB wireless adaptor which cost me JPY1,257. It is supposed to support 802.11n but you never get the full speed anyways.

So I went through my stuff and found the dongle. I connected it to my desktop via a USB 3.0 port. It got recognized and then I could simply enter the WI-FI access key of my own WI-FI connection and connect to the internet. It worked! At first I was a bit worried that it didn’t work.

I ran a quick benchmark to see how good the dongle was. Here’s the speedtest result.

Looks pretty sweet, right? Not bad for a USB WI-FI dongle. I guess I will be able to survive with these wireless speeds until they give me the connection. I won’t be downloading anything large, because I will be using my friend’s internet connection until such time.

But on the other hand, this is what I get when I connect through the LAN cable. Crazy batman!!! I just love Japan for the internet speeds alone.

Well, at least I know I won’t be in the dark until I get the new connection. Now I need to ask a friend to let me use his internet connection. After that, I need to analyze my options.