Are you getting what you pay for?

In an earlier post, I did a comparison of plans and showed how to compare prices, based on claims.

Another important question is, are you actually getting what you are paying for.  Common complaints with the incumbent providers are slowness, outages and erratic performance.

You will pleased to know that the NY State Attorney General is bringing a lawsuit against Time Warner and their parent Charter over speeds and performance.

When I heard this, I did some fact checking and went straight to the AG's web site:

https://ag.ny.gov/press-release/ag-schneiderman-announces-lawsuit-against-spectrum-time-warner-cable-and-charter

It should be noted that all reputable Internet Service Providers provide a speed test page. This includes Greenlight Networks.

To do your own speed test:

1. Find the portal for your current provider. Using a different one will not establish proper baseline. 
2. Plug a PC DIRECTLY in to the providers modem, or Optical Network Terminal. You must bypass your router, WIFI, internal cabling etc.  Again, this establishes a baseline 

Once you have established your baseline, you can repeat tests on the 'inside" of your router, over WIFI etc.  That could indicate performance issues on your side of the modem as well.

This should be done periodically no matter who your provider is.

High Speed Internet increases home values!

There are two major factors driving the need for true high speed internet in our homes.

The first in just business. There are many homes where at least one person works from a home office, tethered to the Internet.  We have a good number of people that work from home, either full or part time.

The second is purely entertainment. We now stream our movies, rather that playing a DVD. We can also stream any type of music, commercial free, anytime we want.

There are many articles online that talk about this. I recommend reading a few from different sources and get an understanding of why this is happening.

http://www.forsytheappraisals.com/2015/july/280-fiber-broadband-has-an-impact-on-home-values

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2941932/fiber-broadband-can-drive-up-your-homes-value.html

http://yellowstonemortgage.com/?p=324

http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/2015/07/02/Want-Boost-Value-Your-House-Get-High-Speed-Internet

Internet Plan Price Comparisons.

This morning I attempted to do a price comparison of the three Internet Service Providers in the Rochester market. These are the only companies than can actually deliver service to your home over a physical connection.

 This is about as close to an 'apples to apples" comparison you can make, and considers price and speed only. It does not address the limitations or capabilities of the underlying technologies for each.

Frontier

Plan: SIMPLY BROADBAND ULTIMATE

Monthly Price: $54.99 ($39.99 Intro rate)

Speed:  “as fast as 24Mbps”

Unit Cost per Mb: $2.27

Standard Construction/Install Fee: Unclear

Time Warner

Plan: Ultimate Internet

Monthly Price: $69.99 ($64.99 intro rate)

Speed:  “Up to 50Mbps”

Unit Cost per Mb: $1.39

Standard Construction/Install Fee: Unclear

Greenlight

Plan: Amazingly Fast

Monthly Price: $50/month

Unit Cost per Mb: $.50

Speed: “up to 100Mbps download and up to 20Mbps upload”

Standard Construction/Install Fee: $100

It is interesting to note that the technically superior product has a substantially lower unit cost.

Another thing to be aware of is the Intro rates. Several years ago, we signed up for Road Runner Turbo with Time Warner. In theory, we got "speeds up to 25 Mbps"  for an intro rate of $54.99. After 12 months the rate went to 64.99. And several increases later, we at now at $69.99.

Note that is now the retail rate for the faster Ultimate service. They will require us to get a new contract, They will not  simply switch plans based on the new retail rate.

The proposed solution was to purchase a "Bundle" of phone and TV. Neither of which we need or want.

I hope this is helpful.