Dial-up

[Sarah in SC]

Hey, I just signed up for the $19.95 service--where is that $10 plan? I've been on dial-up for years, but they just made DSL available out here in the hinterlands and I'm sold on it now!

 

[DallasGuy]

Once you get DSL, you'll never go back to dial up...I went from a 16.95 AT&T dial up plan to a AT&T $19.95 DSL plan about 9 months ago....best $3/month I've ever spent. I think at the time I could've gotten it as low as $14.95 but opted for a little faster DSL speed.

I'm in an area where Verizon has installed FIOS/fiber optic lines. From what I understand, once I connect my house to that I can't go back to the old phone lines again. That means that I can't get the cheaper DSL from AT&T once I connect to FIOS. Verizon charges at least $30 per month (maybe $40...I'm not sure, but it's alot more expensive). I've heard the Verizon FIOS is great, but I didn't want to spend that much.

 

[UncleHoney]

Another option to DSL and cable internet is wireless internet.

An ex-coworker lives out in the sticks and did battle with his local phone company for about three years to get DSL, to no avail. He was just beyond the range for DSL and the phone company wouldn't upgrade the line for him.

He discovered wireless internet was available and now has a high speed connection. There is some kind of antenna that mounts on the roof and picks up the signal from a transmitter a few miles away. Seems to work fine according to him.

This is the kind of service he has in central Ohio.
NexGenAccess, Inc. - Providing the Next Generation of Communications Wireless Broadband Internet

One of these days "powerline" internet will catch on and everyone on the grid may be able to join in on "the need for speed".

 

[REWahoo]

An ex-coworker lives out in the sticks...

He discovered wireless internet was available and now has a high speed connection. There is some kind of antenna that mounts on the roof and picks up the signal from a transmitter a few miles away. Seems to work fine according to him.

I'm one of those out in the sticks folks and I also thought this service was going to be the answer to my dial-up blues. Not so - at least not for me.

Last year I tried two different companies, one local and one regional. Both worked fine for a month or two but then I began having problems that grew to the point the systems didn't work at all. What I was told was they use unregulated frequencies to broadcast those signals and all sorts of wireless phones, home wi-fi networks, etc. use the same frequencies. As more and more people set up networks between my location and the transciever, the interference became too much for the equipment to overcome. End result: no connection.

I ended up getting an AT&T aircard for the laptop which worked fine, plus I could take it with me when I traveled. Not broadband speed at the house (only in the 'big city') but considerably faster than dial-up. My one year contract just ended and I learned Sprint has broadband access out here via their aircard. Signed up with them yesterday...it works great!

 

[RunningBum]

Another option to DSL and cable internet is wireless internet.

An ex-coworker lives out in the sticks and did battle with his local phone company for about three years to get DSL, to no avail. He was just beyond the range for DSL and the phone company wouldn't upgrade the line for him.

He discovered wireless internet was available and now has a high speed connection. There is some kind of antenna that mounts on the roof and picks up the signal from a transmitter a few miles away. Seems to work fine according to him.

This is the kind of service he has in central Ohio.
NexGenAccess, Inc. - Providing the Next Generation of Communications Wireless Broadband Internet

One of these days "powerline" internet will catch on and everyone on the grid may be able to join in on "the need for speed".

I think my problem would be line of sight, plus 3 miles from a lot of my view is still wilderness.

My county is actually in an early pilot for broadband over powerline. I had high hopes for this, as it was touted as internet for the last 1% (not covered by cable or DSL). From what I hear, the early trials are not going well at all. I heard second hand talk of roughly 20% availability time for those in the trial program. That was a year ago, maybe it's going better. I did find a notice that they got certification from the FCC to deploy. I'm not sure if the delays to get that we due to reliability, or to study interference with radio signals, especially ham radio.

 

[Khan]

Speaking of broadband, any experience or opinions concerning clearwire?

They are advertising as available in my area.

 

[USK Coastie]

A couple of years back we went with Hughesnet Satellite. The possibility of DSL around here is non existent. Nearest town of any size is 14 miles away. A little pricey but good speeds.

Only troubles were antenna going out of adjustment fixed with service call, and some dummy (me) dug up the cable into the house with the tractor . Another service call on a Saturday.

 

[haha]

Speaking of broadband, any experience or opinions concerning clearwire?

They are advertising as available in my area.

If you have other broadband possibilities, I would probably not go with Clearwire. On the plus side, their customer service is excellent. On the negative side, I have to call them too often. When it is running well, I get about 1500 kbps download, which works pretty well- sometimes some buffering on hi-res video. But it tends to degrade from that when there is a lot of traffic. Also, there are some kinds of interactions with my own computer and the modem/tower which slow it down. One other good feature is that it has never gone down completely- I have had access at some speed ever since I signed up.

I pay about $40/month, and I will likely be switching when my contract is up. It may be cost effective to go on and switch now, even paying a penalty.

I went with Clearwire because my housing situation was a bit unsettled and I needed access right now to shop for apartments, keep track of investments, etc. For that purpose it worked very well, as I was up and running within an hour of stopping by the vendor who was just down the street from me. In retrospect I might have better bought a laptop until I got settled.

 

[Khan]

If you have other broadband possibilities, I would probably not go with Clearwire. On the plus side, their customer service is excellent. On the negative side, I have to call them too often. When it is running well, I get about 1500 kbps download, which works pretty well- sometimes some buffering on hi-res video. But it tends to degrade from that when there is a lot of traffic. Also, there are some kinds of interactions with my own computer and the modem/tower which slow it down. One other good feature is that it has never gone down completely- I have had access at some speed ever since I signed up.

I pay about $40/month, and I will likely be switching when my contract is up. It may be cost effective to go on and switch now, even paying a penalty.

I went with Clearwire because my housing situation was a bit unsettled and I needed access right now to shop for apartments, keep track of investments, etc. For that purpose it worked very well, as I was up and running within an hour of stopping by the vendor who was just down the street from me. In retrospect I might have better bought a laptop until I got settled.

Thanks. I'll stick with DSL.

 

[kaneohe]

Once you get DSL, you'll never go back to dial up...I went from a 16.95 AT&T dial up plan to a AT&T $19.95 DSL plan about 9 months ago....best $3/month I've ever spent.quote]

Isn't the DSL cost on top of the basic plan so the incremental cost of adding DSL is more than $3. And did I understand correctly from some other post.......the DSL provider is the ISP now so you can deduct the cost of the old ISP?

Couldn't get any help from the old ISP (compuserve) in setting up dialup on a modem for a MacBook so returned the modem today for full credit a few days past the deadline. Now will have to explore DSL. I understand that my old Win95 computer won't work on DSL unless I have a DSL card installed. How do I tell if one is there already?
Perhaps it was a blessing in disguise that Compuserve wouldn't help since it would have been a crime to put a brand new MacBook on dialup.

 

[DallasGuy]

[Isn't the DSL cost on top of the basic plan so the incremental cost of adding DSL is more than $3.

The DSL cost is not on top of the basic plan. But I do believe I had to have AT&T's local phone service in order to qualify for their DSL (which I already had anyway). In my case I was paying $16.95 for dial up and then switched to DSL for $19.95 so it actually only increased $3 per month. I actually could have switched to AT&T's cheapest DSL plan which was $14.95 and it would have been $2 cheaper per month.

 

[youbet]

The cheapest I can find DSL on ATT is $19.95. How can I get it for less from ATT? I have an ATT land line.

Here's where I started on their web site to get to the $10/mo DSL.

https://swot.sbc.com/swot/promoLanding.do

Note, this is their slowest package (768 up and 384 down), but compared to dial-up, it seems lightning fast to me! Also, the free modem is not wireless and with this package there is no option for a wireless modem. I had to go to Circuit City and buy a wireless router for $40. I got a D-Link WBR-2310 and it worked out fine in conjunction with the ATT supplied modem.

Setting up the DSL with my desktop, including installing the supplied filters on the various phones around the house, was easy. Getting the wireless router to work with my laptop presented more of a challenge.

Good luck.

 

[Sarah in SC]

I called ATT and whined about not getting the $10 package offered to me, so they dropped the rate for 6 months to $14.95. Plus I got the modem free without having to do the rebate runaround, which is pretty worthwhile.

 

[Martha]

We have Clearwire. Much cheaper than cable and because we don't have land lines, much cheaper than DSL.

As Ha says, their customer service is excellent. We have had a variety of issues, they finally had to put an antennae on top of our roof. They did not charge us for the fix, which was nice. But it would have been nicer if it had worked great from the get go.