Reliable, inexpensive Internet service?

[Hillbilly77]

Hello, all.

I've been wondering about home internet service.
I currently have a Verizon data plan, and it is putting me in the poor house.
With my daughters home-schooling now the computer is being used a lot more, and our data is through the roof.

Does a regular old Internet service exist anymore? Is everything a data plan, or is there another option?
I'm looking for Internet - no combo packages, no TV, etc. - just Internet.

Is there anything out there that won't break the bank?
What do you guys have? I'm asking for suggestions.

Thanks for your help.

 

[skrazo]

I have an AT&T Air Card, plugs into USB port on computer. Limited to 5GB of data per month. $50/month plus tax. Decent speed for downloading stuff. I live in the sticks and the only alternative is "dial up", which is totally unacceptable. Until something better is available, I'm sticking with it. FWIW

 

[kozmic]

I can't help you with a valid solution, but I can attest that TW/Road Runner ain't your answer. Those folks are crazy expensive.

My cable/internet bill (with nuthin' fancy) dwarfs my gas and electric bill most months.

 

[R. G. Amos]

I have AT&T U-Verse with only internet service for about $42/mo. This is a hard line service. Cellular internet is very expensive.

 

[Jinglebob]

I currently have a Verizon data plan, and it is putting me in the poor house. :l:

I live way out in the country where there is no DSL or cable provider. I have to rely on satellite internet. Talk about putting a guy in the poor house.

 

[rwsmith]

I switched from ATT to ATT's 'Uverse'

I've been very pleased with the performance of the internet, but a lot of people complain that it takes a couple weeks to get things rolling right. One thing I DON'T like is the Uverse phone service. You'd think fiber optic would be very clean but I hate talking on the phone nowadays because it drops out, has all kinds of crazy noises the cover over the speech and feels like you are talking on a two way radio where you have to say 'over' after you complete a phrase because it doesn't seem to be good at carrying two voices coming and going at the same time. Sometimes it acts like it possessed when trying to answer a call and that it's just toying with you. Maybe I'm full of bunk, but that's my perspective.

Update: A friend of mine uses 'Frontier' and they are a basic, reliable service. I don't know how they would do with heavy users, but this guy doesn't do a whole lot of demanding stuff on the internet. Me now, I stream movies and that's a megabyte gobbler.

 

[venomballistics]

Reliable
inexpensive
service

pick two

 

[Airpark]

Guess it depends on what you deem expensive.

I have cable TV and internet for about $125.00 per month, modem included.

Got 90 plus channels of TV as wife must have HGTV, TLC, etc.

I use AOL, aint the best all the time but for $19.99 for old folks like me it aint the worst deal in town either.....unlimited useage.....just reload when it fails and start over.

We, wife and I, DO NOT Twitter, Facebook, Blog, etc. just research and work on real estate deals on the internet.

 

[Evil Dog]

Reliable, inexpensive..... somehow those two words just don't go together.

 

[Ogandydancer]

I use Clearwire, ,which is now just Clear .com I think they have two speeds. I have the lowest speed which runs about $40.00 a month roughly and is for the most part semi-reliable. Which that depends on how many tree leaves you have soaking up the signal between you and the tower. If however you are in the clear the service is nearly 100% reliable.

 

[ChattanoogaPhil]

Depends on who the ISPs are in your area, but there are budget Internet-only plans around here. Xfinity (Comcast) offers a 3mbps plan for $20 and 25mbps for $30.

For a couple years I used Comcast 1mbps for $9.99 which worked fine for surfing the Net, e-mail and streaming radio. Kids will want faster download speeds for vids and stuff.

 

[coltle6920]

Sounds like an oxymoron to me.

Reliable?...Inexpensive?...Service?

You'd be lucky to get two out of three at best!

 

[Mcwsky09]

If you are not looking for truly high speed you can get DSL from AT&T for as little at $15 a month - AT&T Internet Service | 800-784-0574 | U-Verse - but you may have to specifically ask for it. A friend of mine who is retired and had very limited internet needs had to replace a failed AOL DSL modem - I had her call AT&T and tell them she needs their least expensive service - they quoted her $30 a month and when she asked about the $15 plan that I had showed her the rep says hang on, oh yeah we can do that as well is that the one you want? Duh. Then it took her a couple months to (with me helping her talk to AOL on two occasions) to get her AOL switched to a free account.

Time Warner offers a $15 per month for 2Mbps introductory internet only option. http://www.timewarnercable.com/en/internet/internet-service-plans.html

I have cable and my bill for everything - Basic Family TV - 50Mbps internet - VoIP phone - with three DVRs (two linked and can record and play back on either) is about $250 a month - but since I work at home and my employer pays $100 a month for internet - and TV plus phone would cost more than $150 a month if I did them separately it works out for me. (supposedly 100Mbps is coming and I expect will not be an more $ but can't get details on when). I have had very few issues with the quality of the service and because I have the Signature Home package I get priority phone and onsite support, which I have used and it is better.

My SIL has used DISH and DirectTV and has had lots of problems with both.

Interesting - when I did a google search AT&T popped up with $14.95 a month but when I clicked on the link above the same page shows $19.95 a month. The best thing to do is call and ask if they have any plans under $20 a month and don't take no for an answer.

 

[ChattanoogaPhil]

The best thing to do is call and ask if they have any plans under $20 a month and don't take no for an answer.

/\

There's a lot to be negotiated with cable services.

Every year or 6mo I call Comcast and give them the hard luck story or else cut it off. Year after year... they put me on whatever intro price plan is available which is usually close to a 50% reduction from regular service rates. Once in a while they've balked and I paid regular rates for 6mo but not not since EPB has been competing with them in Chattanooga for the past few years. I'm saving about $80/mo versus regular rates. $1,000/yr adds up after a decade or two.

 

[H Richard]

I'm with ChattanoogaPhil, Comcast. Every year when they tru and up my rate I go right in to the Comcast office (Luckily we have one about 2 miles from my house) and the girl immediately OH, you plan ran out lets see what better plan we can get you. I currently have Digital preferred (about 90+ stations plus HBO) their converter with DVR, and great internet speeds for a combined price of $116 p/mo.

 

[Smoke]

We use T-mobile pay as you go internet. I think me pay like fifty bucks every two months

 

[rwsmith]

A word about ATT....

Stick with what you want, they will try like anything to offer sweet sounding 'packages' and they are very slick and insistent. I finally had to call them and tell them, "Look, I don't want any packages. I just want this, this and this and that's ALL."

 

[Oldiron]

Check with Charter. While I was working for "the phone co" even as one of their managers the best they would do was dial up. Normally 16K connection, ever try to do a remote connection to a server and make a simple change? Sometimes I would just give up and drive 25 miles to the office to take care of problems, 2 hrs to fix on dial up or 2 min. on the lan. I am on the wrong cards in the cross box for U-verse to be offered right now so when Charter ran their commercials a few years ago for $20 I called them up (they are advertising at $30 now which is what I pay nowadays). Have had very few problems with it. Don't know how many MBS it is running now, but started at 1 mbs and has gone up since then.
Larry