Rate Your Internet Service Providers (ISPs)

[ErikVinoya]

2Mb down, 512kb up, 30GB monthly cap, for around $40 (converted) a month... [cries in foreign language]

 

[regenon]

in Romania we have 50 mbps for something like 8 $.

 

[banem78]

In Serbia I was lucky enough to have FTTH at the place where I live. 24Mpbs down and 12Mbps upload for ~15 USD (cheapest package - lowest speed). No data caps, unlimited traffic, usually have 200-300GB of transfer per month. So far I am satisfied.

 

[heffeque]

Over here in Spain (Europe):

200/200 Mbps FTTH (no caps at all, running a server at home) + unlimited landline calls + 2 cell phone lines with unlimited calls + 1GB of LTE data each = around $70/month

Can't say it's the cheapest package, and the company installed an older router that, although it's powerful enough to move the 200/200 Mbps, it can get a bit unstable at times. But all in all I'm actually very happy with the price/quality.

 

[Someone Somewhere]

One thing I've also noticed with the low prices seen in non-english-speaking countries is that because very little of the data comes from/goes overseas, the ISP doesn't have to have a great deal of upstream bandwidth.

Try running a speedtest to a different continent and see what you get.

 

[rantoc]

One thing I've also noticed with the low prices seen in non-english-speaking countries is that because very little of the data comes from/goes overseas, the ISP doesn't have to have a great deal of upstream bandwidth.

Try running a speedtest to a different continent and see what you get.

976mbps upstreams from Sweden (on a 1gb connection) <-> Usa. But yeah, many isp's dont have the backbone to handle the load internationally.

 

[heffeque]

One thing I've also noticed with the low prices seen in non-english-speaking countries is that because very little of the data comes from/goes overseas, the ISP doesn't have to have a great deal of upstream bandwidth.

Try running a speedtest to a different continent and see what you get.

Here's a couple test from my home connection in Spain:

Inside Spain:

Down: 202 Mbps / Up: 205 Mbps / Ping: 4 ms

To France:

Down: 193 Mbps / Up: 192 Mbps / Ping: 67 ms

To the US:

Down: 174 Mbps / Up: 174 Mbps / Ping: 103 ms

To Russia:

Down: 188 Mbps / Up: 183 Mbps / Ping: 107 ms

Taking into consideration that most traffic stays inside the country anyway (akamai and similar), can't say upstream is capped as you suggested.

Comment edited: It seems that the SpeedTest pictures don't show up in the web page, so I added the text.

 

[Kewlx25]

i call b.s. on this:
[For example, DSL service is a dedicated line and will therefore not be subject to bandwidth loss caused by "peak times" like its shared-connection cable counterpart. However, cable is inherently faster, and DSL speeds can also degrade as the distance between you and the target central office increases.]
obviously nobody has checked into rural dsl companies like fronteir or windstream
1) the networks constantly get expanded and oversold causing speed provisioning
2) electrical storms greatly affect these networks and their speed and response
3) like cable companies when every one jumps on at the same time especially for netflix or popcorn time it shows as the network bogs way down and becomes sluggish as the central box becomes over provisioned

my experience having used dsl from those companies and qwest and at&t has been even on cables worst days, they smoke dsl on it's best days.
1940's alexander graham bell (Ma') Bell Telephone wires just aren't cutting it these days as they are subject to alot of ground leakage when it rains and a considerable amount of cross talk and bleeding at the junctions and in the network boxes and these lines are just bell wire not even twisted or shielded.
http://s.hswstatic.com/gif/q400e.jpg

DSL actually is shared bandwidth, but it is a dedicated connection to the DSLAM. The main benefit is you get fewer transient signal issues that cable is infamous for. Most DSLAMs have 24-48 DSL ports and support T1, T3, or 10/100 Ethernet. At max, they had about 100Mb shared shared among 48 customers.

My ISP only sells dedicated bandwidth and never oversubscribes their interfaces. The fastest DSL they sold was 2Mb/s. They refused to sell any faster because if too many people purchased the faster rates, a DSLAM would get over-subscribed and customers would no longer have dedicated bandwidth.

 

[Wisecracker]

Charter
Western Piedmont - North Carolina
3Mb down (advertised) / LOL-up
$32/month

They throttle, too. The only decent thing I can say about them is I get ESPN3.

 

[jclab]

I live in Cuba. There are a number of WiFi points scattered through the major cities. It costs 2 USD (-+ the equivalent) for 2 hours access. Speed... who knows? barely enough to get some IMO video chat. Oh and the range of said points is about a block or two. Perspective, huh?

 

[chicofehr]

I love my 7Mb or 700-800kB per second speed. Its better then dial up I guess

 

[firefoxx04]

Comcast is such junk in my area. They give us 30 down 5 up when we are told we are supposed to get 75 down 10 up. They even sent us letters stating that they increased our speed.

our area has a infrastructure limitation that limits us to 30 down.. probably because they have not upgraded their hardware sense their ATT assets acquisition in the 90s.

 

[whiteruski]

My point was that the cheapest I can get internet near Providence RI is for 65 USD after taxes and fees. That gets you a 15 Mbps down and 2Mbps up. I used to get the 25 or 50Mbps speeds but really its not worth the 10 USD a month. The three providers in my area (Cox, Verison Fios, and Comcast) all have identical pricing schemes.

All I want is to have a reasonable bill and to be able to stream in 1080p, which is about 5-7 Mbps. Why can't I get that for 30 dollars? Why can't I get anything fro 30 dollars? The minimum for any service from any of the ISPs is 60-70 dollars.

- ISPs have not lowered prices in the past 8 years since I have been paying for internet.
-They have provided marginally better internet speeds per price tier (haven't really noticed) in that time. Latency is about the same as well 20-50ms.
-They never advertise the true price. Taxes + fees are generally 20-30 USD more depending on package
-Their entire incentive / pay structure is geared to get you to spend more money and not to provide the service that you are looking for
- Their customer service is awful

Basically through experience, I have learned to hate...no despise every ISP that I have encountered. As soon as I have other options, I am outa here!

 

[palladin9479]

My ISP only sells dedicated bandwidth and never oversubscribes their interfaces.

That's so wrong....

The bandwidth limitation won't be at the distribution layer, that is piss easy to provide. The limitation will be either at the core router layer or at the egress points depending. ALL ISP's without exception, oversubscribe. If you have an aggregate layer serving 100 customers, each with 100Mbps subscription bandwidth, then you'd need to have 10Gbe of aggregate bandwidth just for those 100. Realistically your talking 500,000 subscribers for 50 Tbe (yes a T) aggregate bandwidth which is some ridiculously expensive equipment. Instead they will oversubscribe at a ration of 50~100 to 1 and possibly implement a large transparent proxy.

 

[bimbam360]

I don't live in the US so can't participate, but if your survey does not include the exchange you connect to it is kind of pointless. ISP ratings can be incredibly varied by localised regions and a national average will not always equate to what the end user in a specific locale receives.

At one point O2 were one of the highest rated ISPs in the UK but their equipment in my local exchange was trash. They even told me over the phone that it was 'impossible' I would get more than 8mbps with another ISP as the hardware was not in place. I had switched a few days prior and was happily sat at 15mbps.

 

[Kewlx25]

My ISP only sells dedicated bandwidth and never oversubscribes their interfaces.

That's so wrong....

The bandwidth limitation won't be at the distribution layer, that is piss easy to provide. The limitation will be either at the core router layer or at the egress points depending. ALL ISP's without exception, oversubscribe. If you have an aggregate layer serving 100 customers, each with 100Mbps subscription bandwidth, then you'd need to have 10Gbe of aggregate bandwidth just for those 100. Realistically your talking 500,000 subscribers for 50 Tbe (yes a T) aggregate bandwidth which is some ridiculously expensive equipment. Instead they will oversubscribe at a ration of 50~100 to 1 and possibly implement a large transparent proxy.

The entire Internet is oversubscribed. Petabits of edge bandwidth and only terabits of core bandwidth. The Internet runs on statistical multiplexing. Even the most expensive connections are oversubscribed by your definition.

Load testing my connection, running 24/7 ping tests over month long periods have resulted in 0.0001% packet loss to servers in other countries(Germany, England, and France) and less than 5ms of jitter, less than 1ms of jitter within the USA. Whatever you try to claim, I essentially get 100% of the bandwidth 100% of the time, with virtually no jitter and no loss.

All in all, I've had more issues with my LAN than my ISP.

 

[JDBella]

I use Telus in Western Canada. Previously I had used Shaw's top tier package, 120 down, 6up. This is priced at $120/month. It's also sharepoint so if you have several users in your area online, you're sharing bandwidth. If you don't have fiber internet, your provider is using sharepoint coaxial. Common for cable companies.

So I flip to Telus, who previously was terrible. I now have 166 megs down, 32 megs up. I am paying $55 for next 6 months because of the whole new customer thing, then it's $120/month. With Fiber it's always this speed. Never slower than 1% of advertised rate.

It's honestly amazing how fast this is. Advertised package is 150/30 and I am getting 166/32.

Telus. Who would have seen this coming. Speedtest tells me I am 98% faster than all other Canadians

 

[leo2kp]

I pay about $70/month for 105mb/12mb Comcast in MN. WAS paying the same for 50/12mb service - they've recently doubled speeds for free - but it sure beats the CenturyLink performance out here. The most CL offers in our area is 20mb/800k for about the same price. I know a lot of people hate Comcast but we rarely have outages and performance over Speedtest is always higher than what we're paying for (122/13mb) with 13ms wireless ping and 25ms ethernet ping (my gaming rig goes through a Cisco Small Business router). I own a SB6120 modem and D-Link 3200AC router which helps stability. Wouldn't recommend renting anything from an ISP if you can manage it, and I'm convinced that that's where a lot of the reliability issues come from. I've had Comcast at three homes in three different cities (using my own hardware) and never had a problem.

 

[Sulfurous]

I live 200 miles from the Arctic circle in Canada (city of Iqaluit, Nunavut).

The best service available is from Northwestel "Nunavut Internet 5": 5MB down, 0.512MB up, 30 gig/month for $190 with tax (every extra gig is $15). Minimum lag for internet gaming: 600ms on a good day

 

[Puff3r]

1 Mbps down 512 K up on a microwave connection in the middle of no-where Missouri. $100 per month to boot.

 

[SirGCal]

I pay over $100 for TWC with 100/10M service that isn't. One person starts using it and pings go to oblivion while that connection is established. Even using a limited to 500k download. Worse if they are uploading something, even bandwidth limited. Want to play a game? Better not do ANYTHING else for anyone...

 

[SirGCal]

1 Mbps down 512 K up on a microwave connection in the middle of no-where Missouri. $100 per month to boot.

To be fair, at least you Do have some sort of internet connection... I'd love a farm or ranch but lack of connectivity scares me a bit.

 

[_Antibios]

Couldn't be happier with my ISP. They let me upgrade to 1Gb/1Gb but grandfathered my price point in for being a long time customer(1 year) and they even offer 10Gbps now even if it is $300/month

 

[theyeti87]

50Mbps down, 6Mbps up Mediacom Cable, $75/month and I get the speeds I pay for.

 

[Achoo22]

For example, DSL service is a dedicated line and will therefore not be subject to bandwidth loss caused by "peak times" like its shared-connection cable counterpart.

This is wrong, Derek. The DSL subsciber lines are aggregated at the CO or DSLAM, and there is often inadequate uplink to service all customers simultaneously. For example, my DSLAM serves 183 people while only bearing a small handful of 1.5 Mb/s t-spans. If my neighbors are streaming Netflix, for example, my meager $70/mo 1mb/s DSL develops 400ms pings to the first hop and packet loss up to 20%. I don't blame my neighbors, of course - this is Windstream's fault. My connection suffers horribly on nights and weekends because Windstream (and the cellular ISPs that also serve the area) only invest in enough backbone for people to check their e-mail or update their Facebook.