Wireless/Sat/other Internet opinions?

[Peter M. Eick]

I am buying a house that does not have cable or DSL access to internet. It is on a ranch and while the services are in the area, they are not to my place. I plan to approach the cable company and AT&T about a DSL line, but I doubt they will mess with me as I am just one customer.

So my fall back is satellite or wireless (phone) type internet access. Both are expensive per GB but I can do either. The current owner is on Satellite, but they don't have young kids who live by Youtube which is a bandwidth hog. I have great 4G signal at the house (I can see the tower out the back door) so a hotspot works, but again, expensive.

Any opinions thoughts or suggestions?

Thanks

 

[NCW Ray]

My sister-in-law lives on the fringes of cell service but uses Verizon Wireless's jetpack wireless device. She had Hughes Net (now owned by Dish Network I think) and it was terrible for speed, plus they have bandwidth limits and if you exceed the plan the speed drops to slower than dial-up! Even with the poor signal of her wireless cell unit at times it is still better than satellite.

If you have 4g cell service I'd go with it.

 

[arjay]

My sister uses a satellite service.Its extremely slow.

 

[ChattanoogaPhil]

If it was me, I would first find out what my current Internet usage is. Then I would better understand what plans best fit my needs.

I'd check with my cell phone carrier about hotspots, then probably dismiss the idea and end up selecting a Satellite service bundled package with TV.

This is a decent 2014 review of Satellie Internet Providers. Satellite Internet Reviews in 2014 - Top 5 Service Providers

 

[jmmitc06]

Well between those two options you are comparing two very different things: bandwidth and latency. Bandwidth is how big the pipe theoretically is, most internet service providers bin their services based on this (10Mbps, 15Mbps, etc.). Then you have latency, which is how quick you can get something into the pipe. So for example with youtube, high bandwidth is needed to stream a large file (1080p video for example) but if you have high latency each time you fetch a piece of that data it will take a while to get that piece of data onto the pipe.

In general, although I have never used it personally, sat internet can have alright bandwidth but poor latency, while 4G has good bandwidth and good latency. So in most cases 4G will provide a better quality of service than satellite and that's what I would go with. IMO most things you do on the internet such as getting on a forum, checking your email etc will be noticeably better with lower latency while only data intensive things like youtube, downloading torrents, etc is better with more bandwidth.

Also if you have an android phone you can set up tethering wherein your phone acts as the wireless access point to which other computers can connect via wifi, so no extra hardware needed. It may be an option on iPhone as well but I don't know.

 

[rwsmith]

Check on DSL

You have a better chance of having DSL available, as it uses the phone line. If you want to stream movies you'll need a fast connection capable of throughput. We don't have cable, but we use Netflix and watch other computer videos a LOT so we have a high monthly usage.

 

[ACORN]

I don't know a lot of technical stuff about it but I have wireless through Verizon. I costs me about $50 a month for 10GB. I don't watch a lot of videos or game so its fine for me.

 

[ChattanoogaPhil]

Limited data plans and Netflix aren't a good match. 1080 content runs about 3gb/hr. I read that the new 4k is around 7gb/hr. Even standard def eats about a 1gb/hr. Limited data for a month can be gulped down on day one. Satellite and on demand will work.

 

[Peter M. Eick]

We churn a lot of data because my current home we have DSL with a 24 Mbit connection. We commonly have that saturated in the evening so either I will have to change the internet habits of the family or figure a better solution.

This will be my retirement home so once the kids head out, the drain on the internet will drop and I expect in time there will be more wi-fi/cell solutions over the satellites.

My first approach will be hit up the local AT&T folks for DSL since I will have a POTS line to the house for the security system. I think I am only about 1800 ft from the DSL central office so I should be able to get it if I can just convince the right folks locally. The national call in number could care less.

Thanks for the tips and suggestions.

 

[ChuckS1]

I have Exede/Wildblue and it's fine as long as you don't stream movies.

 

[indiandave]

I live in the middle of nowhere. When I asked about getting cable, the cable company said it would cost 5,000.00 to run the cable to my house. The phone company didn't offer DSL at any price. So I was limited to what I could get.
I went with DirecTV for television and Excede for Internet. Both work well for me. I had trouble getting a signal with my cell phone when I moved in. Now it works, they must have put in a new tower or something.
I like living in the country, it's worth it for me to put up with some inconveniences.

 

[Ogandydancer]

In your area you may be able to get Clear formerly known as Clearwire and if so that would be a possible option. You would need to go to clear.com and plug in your zip ode to know for sure.