Ask HN: ISP Survey | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: ISP Survey

10 pointsS_A_P5 comments

Im curious what the internet offerings in your area are like. I would be interested in knowing the following: 1) Country/State/Province/City 2) How many ISPs are in your area that you know 3) What is they highest bandwidth connection available that is "consumer grade" 4) What does that cost 5) What does the cheapest connection/bandwidth/cost 6) How good is the service? 7) Is Municipal/Government/public utility internet available? 8) Do you like your ISP?

I will start. I live in a rural/country suburb of Houston TX about 40 Miles from downtown Houston.

Currently, we have their "double play" service which is the following: 1) 1Gbps cable modem.(I can get pretty close to that most of the time.) Currently that is the maximum available in my area. 2) pretty much every channel they offer that isn't an international, porn or other niche channel. We have a large family of 7, so there are 5 cable boxes.

That runs me around 180 per month in USD. Personally, I would like to cut the cord on cable, but its not really a huge savings to be had, and the spouse isn't ready to do that yet... I have managed to reduce costs somewhat by using roku boxes and purchasing my own cable modem. If there were other choices in my area, I can assume that would bring down costs. I don't know that I have any other complaints though. Comcast has generally been hated since their inception, and I do feel like things have improved somewhat.

1) New Delhi, India

2) More than 10 - Airtel, Excitel, Den, Spectranet, MTNL, Vodafone, Jio, Idea, Tata, Tikona, MTS (and a few others?)

3-4) Highest bandwidth is 150 Mbps, costs around 1500 INR a month (~$22). No data cap that I know of.

5) Cheapest is definitely Jio. 1.4 GB a day at 4G speeds (mobile broadband) and after that unlimited at 64kbps. Costs 400 INR (~$6) for 84 days.

6) Service for Jio is spotty. Service for that 150 Mbps plan (Spectranet) is top notch.

7) Yes, MTNL is a govt entity. Their plans have no data caps but are very expensive as compared to others.

8) Definitely like my ISP. I get 100 Mbps from Excitel at 800 INR a month (~$12). I can almost achieve 96 Mbps downstream and 90 upstream. No data caps. No major connectivity issues either (the connection may drop around once a month but I don't mind)

1) New York City, NY, USA

2) 3 in my building: RCN, Verizon FiOS, and Spectrum

3-4) Verizon FiOS: 940Mbps down / 880 Mbps up for ~$94 | RCN: 1000Mbps down / 20Mbps up for ~$65? | Spectrum: 940Mbps down / ?Mbps up for $65? (all prices including taxes, fees and modem/gateway rental)

5) RCN 250: 250Mbps down / 20Mbps up for $44

6) I use FiOS 100Mbps up / 100Mbps down plan for $54 (advertised as $39.99 but I pay $54 with modem rental and auto-pay from my checking account). The service is descent except it can slow down in the evenings when streaming video, which I suspect is due to packet shaping. I have found that using a VPN with a local server typically increases speed during these peak times and allows me to max out my speed.

7) Sadly no, but there is this: https://www.nycmesh.net/

8) I like how the fiber is run into my apartment and near my desk. I like how they offer a fast upload speed of 100Mbps for the cheapest tier. I don't like how I have to enable auto-pay from my checking account to get a $10/month discount - but I use a separate account for this purpose, different from the account I have my paycheck deposited into. Their phone support is descent and local to the NY/NJ area, which is nice. My price is locked in for a year, and after that, if they raise the rates, I am likely going to move to RCN. RCN is a cable service and claims they will be reconfiguring their network to allow for a faster upload speed in the future, greater than 20Mbps, though that should be adequate for my needs.

Also, I am quite lucky that my building offers 3 options for Internet. The most common provider is Spectrum, followed by Verizon FiOS, and if you are lucky, RCN I am told.

1) London, United Kingdom

2) A lot (pretty much unlimited, considering anyone can resell DSL service from OpenReach, the company that manages phone lines nationwide).

In London we have Virgin Media which is an HFC/DOCSIS (cable, think Comcast) network, HyperOptic which is an actual fibre to the premises network (capable of 1Gbps and most likely more upon request), a few local fibre providers that can get you a leased line (higher price, but possible if HyperOptic/Virgin don't cover your area), and finally the dozens of DSL providers (which work anywhere you can get a phone line).

3-4) £64 for 1Gbps (symmetrical, so 1Gbps upload too) from HyperOptic. Failing that, 350Mbps (20Mbps upload) from Virgin Media for 50£.

5) 30Mbps Hyperoptic for 24£/month. DSL providers (which there are a ton) could probably go even lower at the expense of speed (especially upload speed).

6) Virgin Media is decent in terms of speed. Customer service is run by monkeys, akin to Comcast. No IPv6, etc. DSL providers are mostly trash so you get what you pay for.

7) No.

8) No (customer service is trash), but speeds are decent and since I'm not in a contract (I always choose the monthly commitment instead of yearly) I can switch if things get too crazy.

1) Seattle, WA, USA

2) 2 ISPs are available

3 & 4) 1Gbps ($75/month via Centurylink) or 1Gbps/35Mbps ($90/month plus fees and 2yr contract with Comcast, 1TB cap)

5) 15Mbps is $30/month via Comcast (1TB cap) or 40Mbps at $45/month via Centurylink

6) I go 6 months between outages on Centurylink, compared to Comcast (when we used them) its much much better.

7) No municipal option, though City Light runs fiber with every project over the past couple decades. Politics has killed actually using any of it though :c

8) Centurylink is sufficent, especially on the lower tiers you can drive a hard bargain (got a family member 40Mbps for $27 a month for 2 years, no contract or bundling).

Unasked questions:

Whats done for entertainment?

I don't do fixed format TV, but for those that do we've gotten by with Sling TV Blue and some addon packs to add specific channels. OTA is also crystal clear, it pulls in dozens of channels surprisingly!

What about phone service?

We're smartphone only, its okay-ish, but I may pick up some Grandstream DP720's eventually, as a non-cellphone can be quite handy. Maybe someone will craft a way to tie that into Signal?

1. Ireland, Dublin

2. Around 10? Eir, Vodafone, Sky, Digiweb (DSL/Fibre depending on location), Virgin (cable), Magnet (fibre), imagine (LTE), Pure. Three. Other smaller players I've forgotten.

3/4. 360mb/s at €64/mo with 24 month contract + bundled TV, €56/mo @ 240mb/s without (Virgin)

5. Sky doing 100mb/s DSL for €30/mo is the cheapest real broadband. Eir doing prepaid 4G for €20/mo (includes €10 to spend on calls/texts) with a 7.5gig limit also exists for very light users as the absolute cheapest option.

6. I'm on virgin business (400mb/s @ €80/mo). Their DNS was appallingly slow at times, but after switching that out they've had 1 outage I've noticed in four years.

7. Not in my location, but Siro is a government funded network that many of the midtier ISPs (as in not Eir and not Virgin) use around the country.

8. Apart from the slow DNS which I've bypassed, I have no issues. I have had serious issues with Eir in the past and only Eir and Virgin go above 100mb/s to my house.

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