Which Internet access technology do you use?

[abarkl]

Cable for us. Nothing beats a piece of copper from the great state of Arizona!

[Edd505]

Need more than one option, cable @ home 4G on the road

[BuddyRay]

I assume we're talking at home? Because on the road I use 4G with Cingular.

"Best" internet service is really dependent on location. In some cities, the phone company does a better job than the local Cable franchise. In others the Cable company wins. And in some cities the new Google Fiber service is tops.

And even if you go with the Phone company (DSL or UVerse) it depends how many yards your home is from the closest Fiber head end. The farther away you are, the slower and less reliable service you have. So your neighbor up the street may brag about his screaming fast, reliable service with ATT. You sign up for the same company and discover you get dialup speeds that drop right and left.
Cable is a little better over distance - but Cable companies are prone to hook too many people to the same wire. It's a little like a water pipe, one person taking a shower gets great pressure - if a dozen people try to take a shower on a 1/2 inch water line . . . So you may sign up and get great speed - then 4 more neighbors sign up and all of a sudden your favorite cat video is breaking up.

[clubhouse]

Cable is the absolute best in my area...why, because it cost just a bit more and for some reason many folks around here would rather have $20 DSL vs $50 Broadband, which is all good to for me since I have access to a big pipe that isn't shared with many other.

[bansai]

A topic near and dear to my heart, my tech career started in telco / IT.

In the Denver area, Cable wins every time. It really depends on where you live. FIOS, Google Fiber, and other Fiber to the home advancements are going to make DSL and traditional cable obsolete.

If the FCC allowed more competition, we'd all be on fiber lines right now.

Here, it's either Comcast, or Century Link. I spent 10 years working for one of the baby bells Mountain Bell, turned - (USWEST) before they were gobbled up by QWEST, and now Century Link, and they just can't keep up. I'm a *very* high bandwidth user. In a couple years I think most of us will be on Gigabit connections. I'm on a 200Mbps connection at home, but I only pay for 150. Sure, with cable you are on a 'shared infrastructure' but the bottom line is in most markets it is faster, every time. If I could get FIOS here, I'd do it in a nano second.

[jloco]

I'll go a step further..
How many people regularly test their download/upload speeds to make sure they're getting the speed they're paying for?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[norty1]

I'm on Comcast/ Xfinity at home and use my Verizon hotspot or wifi on the road.
I check both my iphone and home connection often for comparison and consistent speeds. They vary a lot.

I am also a retired old Bell baby from a Toll Test board career.

Currently my copper home/ dial tone is out of service since Tuesday and ATT says it will be close of business Friday before fixed. Our whole neighborhood is out of dial tone.

[Jagiven]

I have lots of choices where I live. But the best bang for the buck is DSL. Have 40mb service can get upto 1gb service if I wanted, but with 40 we never have any issues. Actually never had an issue with 7mb service.

[Mustang65]

Originally Posted by bansai

A topic near and dear to my heart, my tech career started in telco / IT.

If I could get FIOS here, I'd do it in a nano second.

X - Illinois Bell, Ameritech, installed my first 110 teletype back in 1973... moved on to 202 datasets, T1.... Most of my years was in Special Services - Data and now we are talking Gigabytes... Amazing

Better think 2x about FIOS, which is now Frontier and down here people are bailing out and going to the other available services. Had friends that were out of service for almost 2 weeks, with a "Oh-Well" attitude. Businesses with VOIP were dying.. quality of service has really gone down hill.

Personally, I believe there should only be one physical cable company that supplies the actual fiber/copper to the door. They would then lease their cable/fiber to the ISP's and they could send their programming across the cable to your or my house or business. Less crap hanging from the poles and one place to call for repair.

Don

[edatlanta]

Originally Posted by Edd505

Need more than one option, cable @ home 4G on the road

I agree with one more option. I use AT&T U-verse at my home base site and Verizon 4GLTE on the road.

[blujay40]

Originally Posted by Edd505

Need more than one option, cable @ home 4G on the road

+1

[mike837go]

Poll needs check boxes, not radio buttons....


Cable modem at my parents' house (TWC-Earthlink)
Cable modem at SWMBO's house (TWC -RoadRunner)
Cable modem at the office (Cablevision-OptimumOnline)
Free Wi-Fi where I can find it.
AT&T 4G in between (Haven't rigged personal hotspot, yet)




I thought ISDN was dead? "I Still Don't Need it" used to be quite the battle cry.

[thomasmnile]

In our previous stick n' brick, we had cable Internet til the price of the 'bundled' service got stratospheric expensive. Switched to Century Link DSL, for most of our relationship max download speed was 5mbps (on a good day). Century link upped the speed to 10mbps (and the price by about 30%) before we sold our home and moved. Back to cable now since it's the only option in the apartment complex. 35mbps download speed.....sometimes.

Century Link would tout the lines in our neighborhood were fiber optic, and they were, until the house connection which was twisted pair copper, and that's where it fell short. Coax kicks twisted pair butt. When traveling, Verizon 4G service for us.

[DanNJanice]

We have cable, as that is the only choice in our area. Honestly, their service has been outstanding over the last 15 years.

[DanNJanice]

Originally Posted by Mustang65

X - Illinois Bell, Ameritech, installed my first 110 teletype back in 1973... moved on to 202 datasets, T1.... Most of my years was in Special Services - Data and now we are talking Gigabytes... Amazing

Better think 2x about FIOS, which is now Frontier and down here people are bailing out and going to the other available services. Had friends that were out of service for almost 2 weeks, with a "Oh-Well" attitude. Businesses with VOIP were dying.. quality of service has really gone down hill.

Personally, I believe there should only be one physical cable company that supplies the actual fiber/copper to the door. They would then lease their cable/fiber to the ISP's and they could send their programming across the cable to your or my house or business. Less crap hanging from the poles and one place to call for repair.

Don

A small town near me did this, only with fiber. The city laid the fiber and leases them the various operators. IMO, this is the best option for people who do not live a large population center.

[nambarc]

Me uses carrier pigeons. How comes carrier pigeons is not on da poll.

[Crabman]

Now namby, carrier pigeons are not capable of delivering the internet.

[mike837go]

Originally Posted by Crabman

Now namby, carrier pigeons are not capable of delivering the internet.

But pigeon poop is more useful!

[RPreeb]

Cable at home - it's our only viable (fast) option out here in the boonies. On the road, 3G/4G, or any wi-fi I can latch onto. When actually camping, I'm usually off the communications grid.

[Force]

I'm lucky enough to have the option of Comcast Xfinity or Verizon FIOS

Because that affords me the option to tell Xfinity how absolutely terrible their cable internet service is.

FIOS is hands down better. 150Mbs both ways for $50/mos and light years more reliable, performance wise, than Xfinity. At least up here in MA.

(we cut the cord and have Hulu and Netflix for TV)