Fsck Xfinity

[voyager9 3,215]

So Xfinity started instituting monthly data caps this month.  Anything over 1.2TB in a calendar month is charged a “fee” for $10/50GB. 

I did the math and we typically use around 1.8TB/month so I’m looking at over $100 in fee   (I pay $80/month now for just 300mbps Internet)

fuck Xfinity.  Greedy POS’s.  Bad enough they leveraged their monopoly in this area and fleeced everyone for years with  high costs and increasing fees.  

Are there ANY other ISP’s in Burlco?

[Shocker 124]

I can’t help your situation but I can verify that in my previous house it was xfinity or slow-ass DSL far from a node. Xfinity knew it, too, and they jacked up prices without offering any promotional packages. Bunch of losers. 

[Displaced Texan 9,038]

We pay nearly $270/month for ISP and cable through Xfinity.

Thinking of dumping the cable package and rigging an OTA antenna. Screw Comcast/Xfinity. I can’t wait to move . 

[Sniper 6,370]

44 minutes ago, voyager9 said:

I did the math and we typically use around 1.8TB/month so I’m looking at over $100 in fee   (I pay $80/month now for just 300mbps Internet)

Did you pull up your account online and look at your data usage? When I saw this restriction come in, I looked at our actual data usage, and it shouldn't be a problem for us.

The only decent Internet provider I have is Xfinity too, and they suck. I've been getting emails from Verizon that they are providing wireless unlimited Internet for $40/month. If you're close to a Verizon tower, might be something to check out.

[voyager9 3,215]

16 minutes ago, Displaced Texan said:

We pay nearly $270/month for ISP and cable through Xfinity.

Thinking of dumping the cable package and rigging an OTA antenna. Screw Comcast/Xfinity. I can’t wait to move . 

I had their triple play and was paying that. Decided we didn’t need phone or TV and went to just Internet. Unfortunately there are no alternatives to xfinity around here. Ironically Verizon FIOS is available across the street but that’s a different town.  

[voyager9 3,215]

9 minutes ago, Sniper said:

Did you pull up your account online and look at your data usage?

About 1.8TB/month.  A lot of streaming video and three kids that play online games.  Plus me working from home so the VPN is up all the time. 
 

just checked Verizon. No FIOS or LTE. Just shitty DSL at 1.1-3Mbps. 

[Sniper 6,370]

Just going to ask you if 4G was available in your area. $40/month unlimited data if you have wireless plans on phones, $60 if you don't.

https://www.verizon.com/home/lte-home-internet

I'm seriously thinking about it, and put Roku sticks on the TVs. Although, wifey likes her recorded stuff on the DVR.

[voyager9 3,215]

1 minute ago, Sniper said:

Just going to ask you if 4G was available in your area. $40/month unlimited data if you have wireless plans on phones, $60 if you don't.

https://www.verizon.com/home/lte-home-internet

Yeah, I looked after you mentioned it. Not available in my area

[FXDX 618]

don't know if this helps but found this https://www.ubifi.net/ @ $99 a month. I never heard of them but looks sort of OK on the surface. Unless I read it wrong the disadvantages seem to be you have to buy their 4G LTE Gateway @ $315 and they don’t publish their upload speeds which may be a problem.  Looks like they offer a trail but the could jam you with a 15% restock fee on returned equipment. BTW do you monitor your own data usage or are you depending on Xfinity to provide the results?

[AlDente67 562]

Fios is fun too.  I pay for a 1gb/sec line.  Speedtest confirms a data rate of close to that (close enough, I guess) to our router, but then it drops down to 100 at best from router to my device.  They say I should be hard wired from the router (in the garage) to my laptop (not in the garage).  Or I can buy a bunch of repeaters.

[voyager9 3,215]

11 minutes ago, AlDente67 said:

Fios is fun too.  I pay for a 1gb/sec line.  Speedtest confirms a data rate of close to that (close enough, I guess) to our router, but then it drops down to 100 at best from router to my device.  They say I should be hard wired from the router (in the garage) to my laptop (not in the garage).  Or I can buy a bunch of repeaters.

Check out Eero for your WiFi.  I was getting 230Mbps from my device, depends on what node of the mesh getting hit.  

[Greenday 323]

Internet and TV providers are such scam artists. Artificially capping your speeds unless you pay them more. Now all these channels are doing on-demand services just to leech more money from us. Unless we hotspot from our phones, our only possible ISP is Xfinity in my town.

Every couple years, I just go to the store and tell them, "What can we do to lower my bill? I don't feel like playing the game and threatening to cancel like everyone does." Then they'll just give me a package they are offering new people and I go on my way. After taxes and all the hidden government fees and shit, I think we are at $180/mo for 250 Mbps download speed and cable that includes some premium channels. They also gave us the phone line but we don't use it. This is the highest my Comcast bill has ever been.

[Sniper 6,370]

Has anyone considered Satellite, like Dish network? I did a hardware to hardware comparison (4 TVs) I think back in the Fall, and using a wireless hotspot (like the Verizon one I mentioned), total monthly cost was less than half. But I know weather has caused issues with satellite reception.

[DirtyDigz 1,346]

1 hour ago, Sniper said:

Has anyone considered Satellite, like Dish network? I did a hardware to hardware comparison (4 TVs) I think back in the Fall, and using a wireless hotspot (like the Verizon one I mentioned), total monthly cost was less than half. But I know weather has caused issues with satellite reception.

Considered, but never pulled the trigger.  One downside to satellite is relatively high latency - takes longer to bounce a signal up to space and back than over the surface of the earth.

Doesn't really matter for web browsing/streaming, but if you or your kids are into video games where reaction times matter you won't be happy.

Satellite internet latency comparison¹

Connection type	Median latency	Median latency in seconds
Satellite	594–612 ms	0.59–0.61 sec.
DSL	25–80 ms	0.03–0.08 sec.
Cable	15–34 ms	0.02–0.03 sec.
Fiber	12–20 ms	0.01–0.02 sec.

[voyager9 3,215]

From what I can tell Satellite, LTE and DSL are all a significant step down from cable/FIOS.   Both in terms of bandwidth and latency. 

[voyager9 3,215]

3 hours ago, Greenday said:

Every couple years, I just go to the store and tell them, "What can we do to lower my bill? I don't feel like playing the game and threatening to cancel like everyone does."

I had been doing this. Was paying $80 for 300Mbps internet-only. Now theyve added these caps and it doesn’t scale with the Internet plan and the overage fees are redonkulous.  

[Shocker 124]

10 hours ago, FXDX said:

don't know if this helps but found this https://www.ubifi.net/ @ $99 a month. I never heard of them but looks sort of OK on the surface. Unless I read it wrong the disadvantages seem to be you have to buy their 4G LTE Gateway @ $315 and they don’t publish their upload speeds which may be a problem. 

AT&T will do that, doing home broadband through a 4G cellular gateway. Maybe Verizon too, idk. But the when I was looking it was no faster than my poor dsl choice. 

[AlDente67 562]

Remember the 9600 baud modem, and then the 14.4 came out on the market?  We were in awe at the speeds!  Lol.

[voyager9 3,215]

7 minutes ago, AlDente67 said:

Remember the 9600 baud modem, and then the 14.4 came out on the market?  We were in awe at the speeds!  Lol.

Lol. Dialing into a BBS with 14.4 or 28.8 only to have mom then pick up the phone. 

[dilbert1967 108]

On 1/13/2021 at 9:19 PM, Displaced Texan said:

We pay nearly $270/month for ISP and cable through Xfinity.

Thinking of dumping the cable package and rigging an OTA antenna. Screw Comcast/Xfinity. I can’t wait to move . 

By "OTA" do you mean "on the air"?  I think most TV stations went from analog to digital broadcasting several years ago.  I'm not even sure if televisions offered for sale nowadays have connections in the back for an external antenna.  Anyone know?

[voyager9 3,215]

12 minutes ago, dilbert1967 said:

By "OTA" do you mean "on the air"?  I think most TV stations went from analog to digital broadcasting several years ago.  I'm not even sure if televisions offered for sale nowadays have connections in the back for an external antenna.  Anyone know?

You can buy digital OTA antenna that plug into TVs.  Or buy tuners/etc (Tablo, Amazon) that convert it to a local stream to distribute to devices on your network. 

[Sniper 6,370]

14 minutes ago, dilbert1967 said:

By "OTA" do you mean "on the air"?  I think most TV stations went from analog to digital broadcasting several years ago.  I'm not even sure if televisions offered for sale nowadays have connections in the back for an external antenna.  Anyone know?

Most have the connection for a standard cable to attach. The internal tuners will search and find any digital OTA channels nearby.