Your Broadband Plan. Are you happy with it? Will you Change it? Improvements !!!!!

ZachUSAman said:

I'm on a college network so I can say that it sucks, though its getting better.

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I've always had fantastic luck with university networking but I guess I can't generalize my experience to all schools.

I pay $36.95/mo for a 25mbps connection. It's not terrible but it does have one benefit which considering the options is fantastic: no bandwidth limit. Most ISPs here have some limit like most do elsewhere I would imagine but I chose to go with some smaller company that specializes in building networking (I'm in an apartment). Compared to Rogers, it's a steal. For $35.99/mo with Rogers, you get 3mbps down, 256kbps up and 15GB of bandwidth.

vansmith said:

I've always had fantastic luck with university networking but I guess I can't generalize my experience to all schools.

I pay $36.95/mo for a 25mbps connection. It's not terrible but it does have one benefit which considering the options is fantastic: no bandwidth limit. Most ISPs here have some limit like most do elsewhere I would imagine but I chose to go with some smaller company that specializes in building networking (I'm in an apartment). Compared to Rogers, it's a steal. For $35.99/mo with Rogers, you get 3mbps down, 256kbps up and 15GB of bandwidth.

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bleh, the original college I was applying for got googles fiber optic internet, so they were blazing to say the least, comp sci professor opens up speed test and immediately the bar shoots to the max speed, was epic.
The college I'm at though recently got like 13% more people than expected, so they opened up an old dorm to us, area hadnt been used in about 5 years so it isnt top quality, and since their knocking it down in a couple of years, the college is very hesitant about upgrading/updating stuff.

the8thark said:

The funny thing though is most of us here would have trouble using up 20GB each month. So 250GB would be useless for us.

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And as in my OP i stated that they offered me a 1TB plan ??? Go figure its a good gimmick.
I have dl Boxee now and have had a look at it and ill be streaming that quite a bit, lastFM as well ... Once im up and going ill do a sort of graph over my month of service .... They give me a toolbox to as to when i can allow dl on/off peak

Kevriano said:

so no 50/50 (grrrr!), plus phone line and free calls to landlines, and a basic cable TV service in the bedroom for £49 a month.
The only way to get 50/50 or 100/100 here is to buy business broadband, which is at least £100 a month, just for broadband.
Overall I am happy with them though, it's very fast for downloads and streaming is nice!
They are trialing 100Mb too.

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The off/on peak times they have here is OnPeak 8am-2am OffPeak 8am-2am, but my figuring is with the 100/100 what ever i will be doing ill beable to dl anything in the OnPeak time without going into my slowdown period .... I bloody well hope so anyways lol

the8thark said:

Agreed. But I disagree with the TV. I think Australia has the best free-to-air TV in the world. So good infact that it almost makes paying for the Pay-TV not worth it.

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TOTAL agreeance mate. It is the best Free-to-air in the world. Just be lucky not being where Kev 'ole mate lives where every year (i believe) or could be once off but you need a TV License .... Its not that you cant watch TV without one there, its they go around in a little Van with a scanner to see which households have one or not then send you a license ... Yep me and a mate got busted lol

@Kash Mate SurplusMeter seems to do a good basic job for me ....



Might help some if its the sort of thing you was looking for

Cheers

That's an interesting piece of software with one major issue (which they acknowledge). If you move files across the network, it counts as "bandwidth". I just transferred a 713MB file from my file/web server to my Mac and as expected, about 700MB was added to my "bandwidth usage". It suggests pausing the monitoring but if you transfer a lot of files locally, that can be a pain.

Otherwise, it's a handy app to have. Also, out of curiosity, how come your up is so much greater than your down?

vansmith said:

Also, out of curiosity, how come your up is so much greater than your down?

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Your guess is as good as mine van 'ole mate ..... I have only had it myself a cpl weeks now and i had quit it back then, so it must run under the radar as well.
But curious as i dont have Transmission open and havent for month or so, so know one is getting anything from here ... Hmmm will look more into it... Will reset it and see what come out of it after a cpl of days.

I only got it as my pre-paid wireless broadband is costing me a fortune ATM $100 for 6GB so i wanted to make sure they were not ripping me off .... They havnt been but i needed it to check them out ....

Very curious as Lil Snitch lets me know what i have coming and going ...

Got a little of the worries now

Didn't mean to worry you. I was just making an observation.

I'd say I feel your pain with the bandwidth (I'd be lying given that I have unlimited) but $20 for 225MB? That's terrible. I just did a currency conversion and it's almost exactly 1 to 1 ($20 AUD = $20 CAD). Here is a comparison:

Closest to $20

Rogers
$28 = 500kbps down/256kbps up and 2GB bandwidth (that's the cheapest plan)

Bell
$22 = 2mbps down/800kbps up and 2GB bandwidth

In terms of what you get for $100:

Rogers
$100 = 50mbps down/2 mbps up and 175GB of bandwidth.

Bell
$53 (most expensive plan they have) = 25mbps down/7mbps up and 75GB of bandwidth.

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Hmmm, so we don't get ripped off as much as we think we do. Sorry that feeling had to come at your expense though.

I honestly can't imagine having only 225MB of bandwidth a month. I'd hit that in two days at the absolute most. Thinking about today, I downloaded the Fedora 14 Beta which was 713MB. That's 488MB over the limit which would have cost me ~$43 to download.

I;m much happier than I was with Time Warner Cable...

Currently on Verizon DSL... it's not the quickest, but (so far) it's never gone down and the speed is completely consistent and no caps.

Up where I live a single company controls everything, telephone, internet, and TV.

Personal use.
384 Kbps down, 128 Kbps up, 5 GB Monthly cap = $41
2.5 Mbps down, 256 Kbps up, 15 GB Monthly cap = $62
5 Mbps down, 512 Kbps up, 30 GB Monthly cap = $83

And business use.
384 Kbps down, 128 Kbps up, 5 GB Monthly cap = $41
5 Mbps down, 384 Kbps up, 20 GB Monthly cap = $62
16 Mbps down, 768 Kbps up, 60 GB Monthly cap = $83
25 Mbps down, 1 Mbps up, 75 GB Monthly cap = $124

And if you don't live *in* the major cities (Whitehorse and Dawson) you are stuck with one other option, Satellite internet which is pricey beyond words.

vansmith said:

I honestly can't imagine having only 225MB of bandwidth a month. I'd hit that in two days at the absolute most. Thinking about today, I downloaded the Fedora 14 Beta which was 713MB. That's 488MB over the limit which would have cost me ~$43 to download.

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HEHE all good mate. Not that worried, and looking at it it seems to be adding the ups and downs together or something. I have reset it and will keep a keen eye on its progress.

But you can see why i opened this thread and the excitement i have too finally getting a decent home BB connection. I didnt want to make this about connection speed, but when i get connected (the tech is LATE) Grrrr ill do a speedtest.net comparison but im expecting good results as they are using the best 3g network we have here ......
Im like a kid in a candy store lol Just sick of going to the library or else where just to get a 800+mb Combo Update

So mate thanks for the concern

Cheers

TattooedMac said:

TOTAL agreeance mate. It is the best Free-to-air in the world. Just be lucky not being where Kev 'ole mate lives where every year (i believe) or could be once off but you need a TV License .... Its not that you cant watch TV without one there, its they go around in a little Van with a scanner to see which households have one or not then send you a license ... Yep me and a mate got busted lol

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Haha, every year mate, yes. We pay a license because the BBC do not have advertising to pay for the programs. It's £140 a year now, and not really worth it tbh.
The thing is too, now that BBC now have iPlayer, which stores everything they broadcast for a week, so effectively you could watch on your Mac and not need a license at all, so long as you don't actually own a TV.
ITV and Sky (satellite) also have them, and Channel's 4 and 5, so you could really have a very good selection without the need for the TV at all.
This is why I think the license's days are numbered.

Kevriano said:

The thing is too, now that BBC now have iPlayer, which stores everything they broadcast for a week, so effectively you could watch on your Mac and not need a license at all, so long as you don't actually own a TV.

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Just as long as you're not watching it at the exact same time it's being broadcast on the BBC (according to the TV licence website)!

Anyway, back to the question at hand. I pay £70 a month with Virgin Media for their 20mbs service (sorry, not tech savvy here, so correct me if mbs is wrong terminology!) but that also covers cable TV and phone line + certain phone calls. I think it's a bit expensive but my husband's work covers some of the cost as he works from home quite a bit.

No major complaints with Comcast here. Although they now publicly admit a "cap" on monthly downloads, I've never brushed up against it that I know of. Service is a solid 24Mb/s and I've had little to no downtime in the 10 years that I've had it.

I'm not exactly certain what I pay for the service as it's bundled in with my cable TV and VoIP phone. My rough monthly bill is about $160, but again, that includes DVR, HD, HBO, phone, Internet, etc. I'm sure I could do better at an introductory rate with FIOS, I just don't trust Verizon's billing.

beachbenefit said:

Just as long as you're not watching it at the exact same time it's being broadcast on the BBC (according to the TV licence website)!

Anyway, back to the question at hand. I pay £70 a month with Virgin Media for their 20mbs service (sorry, not tech savvy here, so correct me if mbs is wrong terminology!) but that also covers cable TV and phone line + certain phone calls. I think it's a bit expensive but my husband's work covers some of the cost as he works from home quite a bit.

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I assume you have an upgraded TV package with Virgin then?
You can't actually watch at the same time as the broadcast, the programmes generally appear 3-4 hours after broadcast though.

Kevriano said:

Haha, every year mate, yes. We pay a license because the BBC do not have advertising to pay for the programs. It's £140 a year now, and not really worth it tbh.

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Ahhh thought it was every year ...... Just couldnt remember what i got told when told i had to buy a license. But £140 is a bit steep in my book. Yea well i have a Elgato EyeTV Diversity so i would have free TV onto my 42" via my MBP then ...

This is why I think the license's days are numbered.

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From what you have just written, i am in total agreeance with you there. There will have to be a time in the near future, that they find another revenue angle as it seems like its days are numbered ...... I remember watching Channel 5 the most then any other channel *cough* *cough* BBC Hmmmmm
But looking on wiki your Catch Up Services seem to all be there



But with 17 and 1/4 Million house holds using Internet TV



You wouldnt think it long before they do something. Then again doing quick calculations there is a revenue there of £35 Billion+ .......

Lets be grateful we dont live in Belgium having to pay for a Car Radio License


lol

Well the other thing that is creeping in here, are sponsored TV programs, so you get (as an example) Coronation Street is sponsored or bought to you by Cadburys.
The BBC haven't succumbed yet though, but they will.
On the catch up services you do still get ads at the beginning of the programmes on ITV, Channel 4 etc, all the commercial channels basically. I guess they charge less though.
There is another service too, See Saw, who have a lot of older classic programmes too, and they also have ads at the beginning, but at least the programmes are un-interrupted.

Kevriano said:

Well the other thing that is creeping in here, are sponsored TV programs, so you get (as an example) Coronation Street is sponsored or bought to you by Cadburys.

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Without getting too far off topic, But i had to laugh when i read that, as only recently (within 6 months) there has been a Cadbury's Commercial that was done with everything in Chocolate and and the Chocolate people where eating there Chocolate world, but the setting was that of Coronation St lol I even said to my missus to watch it next time and she reckons it was Coronation St ... The view of all the homes and the camera looking down the street with a park on the other side of street ?? Think i remember it correctly ...

Yea anyways FUNNY ;P

Cheers

TattooedMac said:

@Kash Mate SurplusMeter seems to do a good basic job for me ....

[image]

Might help some if its the sort of thing you was looking for

Cheers

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That looks useful, but it really wouldn't do me any good. My PC is the main bandwidth hog and with my small HTPC coming in soon, most of the bandwidth will be streaming files across the network. My Macbook gets very little use these days, I'm usually on the PC or on the iPad.

Kash said:

That looks useful, but it really wouldn't do me any good.
My Macbook gets very little use these days, I'm usually on the PC or on the iPad.

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No worries mate. Just thought i would put it out there

Cheers

Kevriano said:

Haha, every year mate, yes. We pay a license because the BBC do not have advertising to pay for the programs. It's £140 a year now, and not really worth it tbh.

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I get the BBC and don't have to pay a license fee. Hooray! Although, to be fair, I do get commercials.