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keithpeter
June 21st, 2010, 07:39 PM
Hello All

http://duartes.org/gustavo/blog/post/why-brazil-loves-linux

That page is a couple of years old, but it got me thinking...

In the UK, we have the following:

Median annual wage £25 000

The cheapest PC you can buy (in the shop over the road, I live in quite a poor area) £150 for a reconditioned dell PC with 15 inch screen, 512Mb ram and something like a P4 with a 40Gb drive. It has XP on it. I'll ask the man about Linux... I suppose you'd have to add £30 on top of that for a router.

The cheapest broadband I've seem advertised here is £7 per month or £84 per year.

So I'm looking at something like 1% of gross (say 1.5% of take home) for a very basic Internet capable device.

What is your country like? Please reply...

http://web.media.mit.edu/~nicholas/Wired/WIRED3-07.html

Even dial up includes...

praveenthivari
June 21st, 2010, 07:45 PM
India: Best one at present:1 Mbps: Rs.500(roughly $10)/1 month

keithpeter
June 21st, 2010, 07:58 PM
India: Best one at present:1 Mbps: Rs.500(roughly $10)/1 month

Hello praveenthivari

Against RS 4500 per month ( 54000Rs per year) median wage level? so that is just over 10% just for the internet connection.

http://www.indiatogether.org/photo/2003/class.htm

I shall stop moaning about the cost of broadband in the UK right now!

What does a basic refurbished PC cost over there?

del_diablo
June 21st, 2010, 07:58 PM
Not this thread again? O.o
I think i saw this a year back too.

Yupp i did:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1441027

keithpeter
June 21st, 2010, 08:05 PM
Yupp i did:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1441027

Thanks Del diablo but I didn't find it!

Canada, India, Paraguay, US (various), Singapore, UK covered in the old thread.

Anyone from anywhere else? South and Middle America? Eastern Europe?

Xianath
June 21st, 2010, 09:15 PM
I get 40Mbps local / 16Mbps international speed for EUR 20. My router can't handle more and I really don't need more, but I could get double that for EUR 30. Cost of hardware here is outrageous. Take NewEgg and add 35% duty, 20% VAT, 20% profit, factor in transportation costs and then subtract wholesale discounts. I'd say a decent home PC is round EUR 400. That's twice the minimal wage or about the average one. Oh well.

keithpeter
June 21st, 2010, 09:31 PM
I get 40Mbps local / 16Mbps international speed for EUR 20.

Hello Xianth

That's fast by UK largeish city standards, and about our top end cost!

Euro 400 per month as median wage? SO a decent new PC is a months wages?

PS the £150 (Euro 180) for a PC was for a refurbished one from the local PC shop in a poor neighborhood. You can pay £1000 to £2000 for shiny games boxes or Apple Mac desktops with lots of RAM.

Is there a second hand trade in Bulgaria? If its a personal import market for new kit, I'd imagine there would be...

proggy
June 21st, 2010, 09:31 PM
Where i`m at it`s slow and expensive.

McRat
June 21st, 2010, 09:35 PM
In the US, I'd say the mean price for new complete systems is $700. The price range is from free for used systems, to $4000 for high end gaming machines.

Minimum Bandwidth costs vary wildly. Anywhere from $20 a month for adding it to your cable bill to $80/m for satellite if you don't have other means. If you want the "fast" stuff, the sky is the limit. I pay $80/m for 30mbps down, and 3mbps up.

odiseo77
June 21st, 2010, 09:37 PM
Here in Venezuela, at the ISP I'm subscribed to, my current plan is about 25 $ a month (1 mbps). A simple, second hand PC (P4, 512 mb of ram and a 40 gb HD) must be around 200 $. And a normal wired/wireless router must be around 50 $, I think (the cheapest ones).

keithpeter
June 21st, 2010, 09:39 PM
Where i`m at it`s slow and expensive.

Hi Proggy/Josh

OK, US, but what is expensive? Monthly figure compared to median earnings for full time work of around $45 000 per year?

Where do people in poor neighbourhoods (say lower quintile income, $20000 per year) get PCs? Local second hand shops?

Xianath
June 21st, 2010, 09:48 PM
As far as broadband speed goes, I think only Japan beats us. It's got to do with the way ISPs operate here, which in turn is governed by how cities are organized. When you have 100 condos in one building and 50 such buildings in half a square mile, it's easiest to just connect them in a LAN. Fiber optics in the better ISPs or just UTP cables hanging between apartment block roofs, a switch every few stories, and you got 100 or 1000MBps local connectivity. Given that the majority of traffic is peer-to-peer, it's easy to provide high bandwidth (hence the difference between "local" and "international" bandwidth). If it weren't for piracy, we would still be happy with V52 modems.

Second-hand PCs are very affordable, actually. There are a lot of IT companies here (IBM, HP, Cisco, VMware) and they all shop brand names and sell them off after the warranty expires (3yr, usually). It's cheaper for them to sell them or even give them away than to ship them back to the US or refurbish them. So you get prices like these: http://www.lianna.bg/?a=price&cat=1&all=1. Not bat at all, though even the cheapest piece of junk would mean, to my grandmother, being without insulin for a month. Go figure.

Dustin2128
June 21st, 2010, 10:06 PM
at a pawn shop in the U.S., you can usually pick up a fairly capable computer with 512 Mb RAM and a CRT monitor for about 350$ or 235£, at a brand name store you usually can't get a 'typical consumer' computer below 600$ (400£) . As for internet service there are a few free dial-up services to my knowledge but they're so slow it's not worth it. Average broadband is about 20-40$ a month (14-28£) for cable or DSL, 50-100$ (35-70£) for fiber depending on your area.

keithpeter
June 22nd, 2010, 09:15 AM
Not bat at all, though even the cheapest piece of junk would mean, to my grandmother, being without insulin for a month. Go figure.

Xianath

I understand that, and in the UK there should be statues of Aneurin Bevan in every town. We have a huge capacity for taking the 'social wage' for granted here.

Everybody

Keep 'em coming. I'm interested in the grunge end of the market. Second hand PC and cheapo connections. Its an idea for charity/voluntary work and an idea for a maths lesson...

smellyman
June 22nd, 2010, 09:57 AM
Hong Kong 30meg down, I think 15 up, is about $30 USD

The Real Dave
June 22nd, 2010, 10:04 AM
Here in Ireland, broadband is fairly expensive, considering the poor quality your likely to get. There isn't enough exchanges to cover those living towards the country, so often slow broadband or even dial up is the only option. That said though, mobile broadband is usually pretty good, there are few places that aren't covered. But download caps are generally tiny, around 5GB. They're probably the cheapest option, around €20 a month.

My ADSL broadband costs €55 per month. It's an up-to-3Mb package, with a 40GB cap, free unlimited local and national calls and discounted calls to Vodafone mobiles. A nice enough, and fairly standard package. But thanks to my poor line quality, and the fact that I live almost 6km from the exchange I'm connected to, my max download speed is only 256Kb.

I've picked up plenty of free computers from schools and different businesses, and I would usually sell them off fairly cheap. A nice Pentium IV, with 512MB of RAM would be €80-100, depending on what parts I had to replace, work that needed to be done etc. That's about the cheapest you'll get a computer in my area.

Xianath
June 22nd, 2010, 10:45 AM
...in the UK there should be statues of Aneurin Bevan in every town.

you'll have to wait another five years now won't you :)

Linuxforall
June 22nd, 2010, 10:57 AM
In India for the fastest Unlimited connection its measly 512kbps which you can get for $25 a month, not a great deal in anyway. :(

Breambutt
June 22nd, 2010, 11:05 AM
Here in Finland, the pioneers in almost all things computer nerd, everything costs twice as much as anywhere else in the world - Somalia and Afghanistan included. And I'm pretty sure their landline speeds are much higher with a lower ping.

I don't know what a basic PC means but I'm sure I could ask people around for some old hardware and get a few dozen perfectly usable machines (albeit not up-to-date, hence useless for me) for free.

VeeDubb
June 22nd, 2010, 11:13 AM
A quick google search says that the latest census reports a median income in the US of $52,000 (and change) per year.

Barring ridiculous deals and sale prices, the cheapest I ever see new computers with monitors is around $300.

The cheapest I've seen for broadband internet is around $30/month after taxes, fees, etc. (varies regionally)

300+(12*30)=$660 (Router not required if you only have one computer, and even then, many providers give you a broadband modem which functions as a router)

That's 1.27% of the median income.



Pick up a good deal on a refurbished computer (or a great sale) and you're looking at around $200.

Likewise, if you bounce from one broadband carrier to another, following new account promotions to always keep the best deal, you can have basic 256k-1Mb DSL for as little as $15/month.

That brings it down to 0.73% of the median income.


Get a used junky but functional computer at goodwill for $50, and go with one of the few companies that still offers really really really crumby dial-up internet for $10/month, and you're now talking about 0.32% of the median income, putting a home computer and internet service within the reach of everyone in the country who isn't unemployed.



Get the same junky computer, add a $10 WiFi card from newegg or monoprice, and "borrow" your neighbor's unsecured WiFi, and we're now talking about 0.11% of the median income.

In short, the only people in the United States who don't own a computer and have internet service, are those people who don't want it, and the homeless/nearly homeless.

keithpeter
June 22nd, 2010, 04:07 PM
you'll have to wait another five years now won't you :)

Even the present gang will be very careful about the national health service. They'll chip away at the edges, but it would be political suicide to try to dismantle it.

Try explaining that to people across the Atlantic...

keithpeter
June 22nd, 2010, 04:09 PM
A quick google search says that the latest census reports a median income in the US of $52,000 (and change) per year....That's 1.27% of the median income.

Thanks VeeFubb, I may have misread the pages, I thought that was household income! Good stats, great post


That said though, mobile broadband is usually pretty good, there are few places that aren't covered. But download caps are generally tiny, around 5GB. They're probably the cheapest option, around €20 a month.

Hello Real Dave

You are the first to mention mobile broadband as being a viable alternative for rural locations, I sort of guessed there might be more, thanks for this.


In India for the fastest Unlimited connection its measly 512kbps which you can get for $25 a month, not a great deal in anyway. :(

Any use of mobile broadband in the major cities? No copper or fibre to put in so lower capital?

keithpeter
June 22nd, 2010, 04:11 PM
I've just realised you can't delete your own posts :oops:

cascade9
June 22nd, 2010, 04:23 PM
I can get complete older boxes 2nd hand for less than $100 (including monitor) and while that place is open to the general public, most people wouldnt know it was there. The same level system would be about $350 at the more common places for people to buy 2nd hand x-gov or x-lease computers.

You dont need a router. Handy, yes, needed, no.

As for the connection cost- I pay about $50 a month for 60GB 'peak' and 60GB 'offpeak'. Which is pretty good, there are more expensive places around. You can see all the avaible australian ISPs and plans here-

http://bc.whirlpool.net.au/

*edit- my $50 plan is ADSL2+, and since I'm pretty close to the exchange I get 20Mbit down, 0.8Mbit up. Real speed, not the sync speed :)

Average income? No idea, and *potential political rant removed*

sf-it-services
June 22nd, 2010, 04:29 PM
virgin media.....PAYG addict tarriff, 30p per day {£9.00 per month}flat fee obvious fair usage (*when you top up £10 per month) , but as long as you dont stream music/video or download you will be fine (I use it to SSH into my home server and tell that to download what I need) if you top up £20 its all free the following month. tethering is better than a dongle......
a) you dont need a dongle
b) its a USB lead so my phone stays in my pocket {even though I look like a jihadist when I am on the train with wires going into my coat.}

my home broadband is £35 a month, but that gives me a landline, 50GB Broadband, cable TV. (I got a special deal), my broadband is fast we manage to stream loads through it, my home network has a lot of bandwidth users, iphone, xbox, wii, PS3, laptops, servers.

CHEAP AS CHIPS

WinterRain
June 22nd, 2010, 04:57 PM
The cheapest PC you can buy (in the shop over the road, I live in quite a poor area) £150 for a reconditioned dell PC with 15 inch screen, 512Mb ram and something like a P4 with a 40Gb drive. It has XP on it.

Wow! That's $222 US. I sell pc's like that for $90-100 (~63 pounds) with monitor, keyboard and mouse.

km6xz
June 22nd, 2010, 04:58 PM
The medium income levels in the US is highly misleading and out of date, besides being "Household Median Income" not median income for individuals. Divide the household total by 2.5 to get a better idea. The bottom 20% have seen a $140 increase since 2000 but a cost of living increase of $460 during the same span. Household income has dropped for each of the last 5 years while cost of living has increased. There are millions of people in that category of "homeless or nearly", with 5,000,000 families in the prior 18 months having lost their homes and 17-20% real unemployment...9+% stated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics which only counts those receiving unemployment benefits.
The available money left over after paying for basics for a typical family is much lower than many places with lower gross income, the average household savings rate is -8%, spending more to live every month than income. EVERYTHING is billed separately that in most developed countries is a basic service taken care of by taxes. I would not like to be poor(the fastest growing population category) in the US, it is more miserable an existence than in any other developed country. Conversely, it is possibly the country with the biggest advantage to being wealthy. There are MANY people who can't afford any computer or internet.

I currently live in St Petersburg Russia, away from my native California, and find that average ISP fees are about 600Rubles or $20. Mine is 1200Rubles, mostly because I have not bothered to take advantage of the offered switch to fiber from ADSL that my ISP proposed. I am visiting the US right now but will return in a week and change over to the Fiber. That is supposed to be 6mps up and down for the same price. My ADSL connection is about 3mbs down and 1mbs up. At my office, the rate is symmetrical 6mps but for $300 a month.
Computers are about 9000 Rubles for a medium power new desktop, without monitor or OS. Laptops are 20,000-50,000. I had a dozen computers I replaced in my office and offered them to schools along with CRT 20" ViewSonic monitors and was turned down. Finally I found a metals reclaimer to come pick them up. The kids want the latest gamer rigs and teens/adults want laptops so it is hard to give away a Pentium II or III with 512m and 40 gig drives.

praveenthivari
June 22nd, 2010, 05:57 PM
Hello praveenthivari

Against RS 4500 per month ( 54000Rs per year) median wage level? so that is just over 10% just for the internet connection.

http://www.indiatogether.org/photo/2003/class.htm

I shall stop moaning about the cost of broadband in the UK right now!

What does a basic refurbished PC cost over there?


U can get tht in a range say 5000-10000.

U may b right in tht sense. At present broadband services too costly and tht too r of lower speeds. It's changing though with many players entering the market. May b in year or two it may slash down.:p