Internet speed needs

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Framar

Framar

WOW Framer
Joined
Jul 24, 2001
Posts
26,421
Loc
Buffalo, New York, USA/Fort Erie, Ontario, Canada
For many years now the most speed I have been able to get out of my almost-50 year-old copper cables at home is less than 3 Mbps.

Finally, at long last, the stars are aligning and I will be having a fiber optic line installed after Christmas. Bell Canada is offering a variety of speed plans, The highest and most expensive being 3 Gbps for $200 a month (which might be good if I were to take up crypto mining) and all the way down to 50 Mbps for $55 a month. I believe I have been paying for 50 Mbps all along.

But since all I do online at home is Grumble, Facebook, eBay, and email, and a few YT videos here and there. - I cannot imaging needing anything faster. The next tier is 150 Mbps for $75 a month. Right now my copper line has gone on to glory, so they are letting me use my crappy flip phone as a mobile hotspot. They give me 50 Gb of data every three days - in the first three days (which, by their figuring, began 20 hours before they hooked me up), I used 2.61 Gb of data in the remaining 2 days and 4 hours. I have to call them very three days now and beg for another hotspot until they can install the fiber cable (after the 28th of the month when the cabling people reopen).

So, since I do not stream movies or TV shows or music, will the cheapest plan be sufficient for me? Whatcha think?

I am still trying to wrap my head around this.

Thanks!
 
Stick with the 50 Mbps plan. I have a 50Mbps plan and its all I need - mostly. I just did a speedtest on mine and am getting 32 Mbps down and 4 Mbps up. I do a lot of streaming; Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, Paramount+ and Discovery+ and it suits my needs. I occasionally stream 2 things at once; last night I watched Only Murders in the Building on Hulu on one TV and had the Bulls game streaming on the NBA League Pass app on a Fire Stick on another TV. Both streamed OK at the same time. OTOH, I have streamed 2 where the quality wasn't the best. I may up mine to the next level 100Mbps for an extra 20 smackeroos if I do much more multi streaming. But for you, I think 50 is your best bet. Start with 50 and if you become a streaming junkie you can always upgrade.
 
Just tested: 230 download, 21 upload
(100 a month)

With everyone home the coming weeks, plus I don't even know how many connected devices, this works well

Stick with the 50, that should be more than enough for your needs
 
Thanks!

I don't even use Internet for TV - I have a huge tower outside with a rotating antenna which brings me everything I want to watch - and I buy now-cheap DVDs for the stuff I want to watch again and again.
 
Framar, I don't know if T-Mobile is available in Canada, but it is just about everywhere in the US. About a year ago I said good-by to ATT's U-verse.

My current bill is $50/month including all fees and taxes. My speed test of a few minutes ago was 253 Mbps for download and 22 Mbps for upload. That is more than sufficient for my needs. The feed is via their 5G cell towers.
 
No T-Mobile in Canada. Only Bell and Rogers and Cogeco where I am. Sometimes my Jitterbug flip phone from the US can pick up Verizon's 5G towers, but for my Bell service at home, including landline, Internet and stupid flip phone, I pay close to $200 per month (Canadian). Which, today, in US funds, would be about $150 Canadian.
 
I have AT&T fiber at home. it usually test at about 800 Mbps (wired) $70 month
 
50 will be fine, and they'll likely bump you up to 100 for free - before too long. 100 is about the minimum most companies are selling these days. I think our bill says 25/25, but they have bumped us up several times and it is actually 160/160 or so.

The fiber at the shop is 300/300, but that is way overkill too.
 
Ylva said:
If only we could get fiber where I live. I check every year, but nope. Nothing
Click to expand...
That's crazy. We have it at home and are 8 miles from the nearest small (3-5000 people) towns. At our last house we were 3 miles from a 1000 population town and had fiber there as well - that had to have been 10+ years ago.
 
David, Not everyone lives in an area with fiber internet service that you got 10 years ago. In my neighborhood of Metro Detroit, we got it about 6 months ago. That was 6 months AFTER I got 5G internet from T Moble.

www.highspeedinternet.com

Top 5 Internet Providers in Gloucester, MA | HighSpeedInternet.com

Cable: XFINITY Internet Service is available to 100% of Gloucester, Massachusetts residents. Top speed for XFINITY is 1000 Mbps| Satellite: ViaSat from 100% available in Gloucester: 100 Mbps
www.highspeedinternet.com www.highspeedinternet.com
 
It's crazy. The entire state of VT has 650,000 people and almost every one of them has access to fiber.
 
Here too. I believe RI was the test market for Fiber, they wired our whole state at least 20 years ago. Ok maybe that didn't take long. haha
 
David Waldmann said:
It's crazy. The entire state of VT has 650,000 people and almost every one of them has access to fiber.
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I have a feeling that Comcast is doing everything it can to stop it.

It is crazy. We are in a populated area and the only option we have is Comcast. Insane.
 
Well, my fiber optic line was finally hooked up today - the Powers That Be finally gave us a decent day that had nary a howling wind, crazy blizzard, nor even an all-day drenching rain. My actual cable is still just draped loosely over the trees and scrub alongside the driveway, but they will be back for a proper burial in the Spring.

So now my download speed has increased from less than 3Mbps to between 17-19Mbps. Woo hoo!!!

The technician, who moved here from India four years ago, told me that the most difficulty he had adjusting to Canada was their incredibly slow Internet speeds and their outrageous prices for it. He said that in four months, India would have no more copper lines at all.
 
OK, latest wrinkle in my thrill-a-minute life: After the big Christmas blizzard that knocked all the power poles down, cell towers, and lotsa trees, Bell spent a good two weeks replacing most of the poles on my mile-long street, and I thought I was all set.

Nope.

Power flickered twice this morning for less than a second each time. And it took my modem, Internet, and home phone several minutes to recover each time.

Tell me about back-up battery power I can hook up to my new "improved" system.. This is unacceptable.

Also - the lowest speed they had to sell me was 100 Mbps and my current speed lands between 17-20 (which is way better than 3!).
 
Framar said:
Tell me about back-up battery power I can hook up to my new "improved" system.. This is unacceptable.
Click to expand...
Get one of these puppies. https://www.amazon.com/s?k=apc+ups&crid=3BN3OGL49MRUJ&sprefix=apc+ups%2Caps%2C95&ref=nb_sb_noss_1 Amazon.com : apc ups

I have this one backing up my PC, monitors and router. I have overhead AC lines so if there is a flicker I keep on ticking.

Amazon product ASIN B06VY6FXMM
You may not need as much if you aren't using it on your PC as well as your modem and router.
 
It is normal for it to take up to five minutes to reboot when you power down the equipment.

Is the computer you are using to test the speed very old? if so it may lack the network card to support the higher speeds. Either way that's still a lot faster than you had. :)
 
5 minutes is routine for my old Windows 10 machine with a conventional hard drive. My newer Windows 11 machine boots in seconds from an SSD. Even Windows updates go quickly.
 
Framar said:
Power flickered twice this morning for less than a second each time. And it took my modem, Internet, and home phone several minutes to recover each time.

Tell me about back-up battery power I can hook up to my new "improved" system.. This is unacceptable.
Click to expand...
Our telco-provided fiber comes with a battery backup for the line.

Our computer, modem, dish, TV, surveillance cameras etc are all on (3 different) consumer battery backups like Larry showed. And we have a standby propane whole house generator for if the power is out for more than a minute or so.
 
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