Internet in the Country

[California]

Something new here (Northern California):

Sonic.net, a local ISP, is now offering ATT's Uverse at about half of ATT's second-year price. Sonic calls it 'Fusion FTTN'. I just ordered it.

I'm some 18k ft out where DSL runs about 2k stable and Sonic says I should now get nearly all of the 11k Uverse speed specified for my location. The improvement is because FTTN is fiber to a neighborhood box vs my present DSL from the Central Office. Anybody know if the Last Mile will be fiber, coax, same 1950's copper pair, or ???

And I understand ATT provides everything so their Uverse modem/router is mandatory. Does anyone have advice on how many internet connections this allows, and whether an additional router can be added for more connections, shared printers and scanners, etc?

If you aren't familiar with them - Sonic is famous for best-in-the-nation security of its customer records, and for running unlimited speed fiber to various neighborhoods in this region and in a few other regions. Also their tech help is quick and top quality. What they provide is internet as it should be everywhere.

 

[aczlan]

Based on them calling "FTTN" "Fiber to the node" I would guess that the last mile will be copper, but that may vary.

Aaron Z

 

[Wooddust]

Internet for rural America is going to change a whole lot in the not too far future.

Today, CenturyLink reconfirmed our commitment to rural America by accepting 33 statewide offers from the Federal Communications Commission to deliver fast broadband speeds to more than 1.2 million locations through the Connect America Fund (CAF). CAF is designed to accelerate the build-out of broadband to rural areas where the costs of deploying service are high through financial partnerships with broadband companies. By accepting approximately $500 million a year for seven years from CAF, CenturyLink will be able to bring Internet service with speeds of at least 10 Mbps download and 1 Mbps upload to more than a million people who do not currently have the broadband access that many of us enjoy today.

Ill believe it when I see it. Im a CL customer at my home and at my farm. We have high speed at home through CL but the farm, in Bates County Mo, I was told will likely never have it due to not enough people.

 

[sdef]

As others have mentioned, the options will depend upon what is in your area. I sold my last home in far out ex-burbs with well, septic and garbage collection. I work from home supporting computer servers and 6mb DSL was the best I could get. But it was good enough for everything I needed- including streaming video on occasion.

A friend on a farm is in a similar situation as the OP and uses HughesNet for entertainment purposes and Verizon 4G from his phone (tower close by) for computer security work from home. Neither option are inexpensive, but he functions okay. FYI- in general satellite Internet is notoriously slow using VPN, if that is a requirement, but it does not sound like it is.

We are building a new home in a different ex-ex-burb area, surrounded by farms/horse farms and I will have 50mb fiber to the house from TruVista, septic system, private water co. at the road and no garbage collection. Go figure House is wired for Cat 6 Ethernet, Cat 5E for phones, three AC Wi-Fi routers and RG for TVs. I am fortunate and content

 

[MMagis]

Just figured I’d give a small update since I finally got my new service installed this weekend. So far, so good. Installation only took about an hour, they install a smallish “canister” on the side of the house which is the antenna. Ran a cable into where I wanted the router and that was about it. I’ve only had it for two days, but so far speed seems to be quite good. I downloaded a 135mg game on the Ipad for my boys, only took a minute or so. Videos seem good, though we still have to limit those. I wish I could remember the name of it, but Verizon doesn’t have it on their web site yet. I suspect that’s why no one knows about it. They do list a similar devise that bundles a wireless home phone and internet, but it’s actually cheaper to keep them separate. Service is $60/month with a 10gb limit. I was paying $50/month for 5gb, plus $10/month overage fees most of the time, so this gives us consistent high speed internet and larger cap for the same money. I’m fairly certain that this service works anywhere you can get 4G cell service (though it gets much better service than a cell phone), so I’m sure it won’t work for everyone here.

 

[kcflhrc]

Ill believe it when I see it. Im a CL customer at my home and at my farm. We have high speed at home through CL but the farm, in Bates County Mo, I was told will likely never have it due to not enough people.

You never know, look at the CAF map and see if the area is on the list. Keep in mind that CL is in the business to make money as are the other Telco's. If it takes them $25k to get a cable to the "Farm" how long do you think it will take them to recoup that money? You have to be realistic about it.

 

[RedNeckGeek]

Just an update. Last Tuesday a tech from the local WIMAX company, Digital Path, did a survey of the property here and could detect no signal from any of the nearby antennas. Apparently I'm just too far below the canyon rim for line of sight to any of them, even if the antenna was mounted near the top of one of several seventy foot Ponderosa pines growing here.

Cellular service is spotty here as well, but I'm curious if any of you are using HotSpot devices from either AT&T or Verizon, or even one of the pay-as-you-go outfits like PagePlus, as your main Internet connection. Can it be substituted for a satellite or cable modem and service ethernet as well as WiFi connected devices?

 

[MMagis]

Until Sat, I was using the Verizon MiFi, which is one of the hotspots they offer. It will do what you want it to do, but I don’t know all the details as to how. However, if the hotspots will work I’d suggest going to route I went with. It’s using the same satellites/towers, but the signal is MUCH better. The email I received just called it LTE internet, but if I can figure out the actual name I’ll edit my post later.

 

[kcflhrc]

Until Sat, I was using the Verizon MiFi, which is one of the hotspots they offer. It will do what you want it to do, but I don’t know all the details as to how. However, if the hotspots will work I’d suggest going to route I went with. It’s using the same satellites/towers, but the signal is MUCH better. The email I received just called it LTE internet, but if I can figure out the actual name I’ll edit my post later.

I use the Verizon MiFi for work since I have to be connected to the Company Network for our dispatch system. It works great. But it uses the same towers as the phones and the same 4G/LTE data network. No satellites are involved. Only drawback it is based on usage, but I don't pay for it anyway.

 

[TMR]

We are on 80 acres in rural northern Minnesota. We have had a "point-to-point" internet served from a tower to an antenna on our roof. We have just a bit too much between us and the tower and our speed was variable at about 1.5 meg download.

After about 3 years of announcement we just had fiber installed to our home and hooked up last week. 50 mbps download and 10 mbps upload. This project was financed/funded heavily by gov't money from the "stimulus" program. County sponsored and greatly mismanaged...but finally here.

Internet is now great. We have enough home in Minneapolis area where we have had 7mbps DSL for quite a few years and that serves us pretty well. We do not download movies or play games so our speed requirements are modest.

Our new "fiber to the home" project is likely to have financial problems once wiring and install is complete. Many rumors that the "sign up" rate is way below the financial forecast used to justify the budget. Pretty confident worse case some other company will buy the "system" at a great discount to install cost and operate going forward.

We shall see! TMR