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Ashtabula
Premium
join:2004-06-07
|  Tucson: SBBD ends July 31. I'm going to SimplyBits.
I have been a happy customer since 2001. Still paying $40/month.
I looked at the Sprint EVDO description, but the 5GB/month cap was a deal-breaker. Not a rant/flame: That product is just not meant for fixed residential. A long-haul trucker at DSLR enthusiastically reviewed it, noting that he turns on his laptop and is connected anywhere in the country. Another reviewer played an online game while on a car trip to San Francisco.
I pull down Linux distros -- got the Knoppix 5.3.1 DVD just last month. The kids play online games and download game demos, and these things now clock in at 1+ GB. The wife runs VPN into the office.
For me, the potential of EVDO was that I could get the service for $60, buy a box of cards, and all of us could surf wherever we were. (Just ignore for the sake of argument the cap and security.) But alas, it is similar to a cellphone in that only one card can connect at a time.
The "traditionalist/incumbent"(?) choices here are QWEST+MSN DSL and Comcast cable. »Wi-Power.com serves the areas west of me. Gain Communications is no longer doing this.
We are moving to »SimplyBits.com which is a local ISP. They use Motorola Canopy (same as wi-power), another microwave point-to-multipoint technology. They have some 40 antenna towers throughout the local region. The house antenna is aimed at (sees?) two towers for redundancy.
The SimplyBits packages are 1/384 for $45; 2/768, $65; 3/768, $75. Installation is $199 with a 1-year contract; $99, 3-year (yes, 3-year contract saves a hundred bucks). We are going to start with the $45 speed and 1-year, and see how it goes. Aiming for installation near the end of June.
I chose SBBD years ago, at a time when the boards here were full of folks begging to be in the next build-out. Remember those "... but the CO is right across the %@#$%!@ street and I can't get DSL" days? Anyway, SBBD hooked me up for free and they got me multi-Mbps download speed for forty bucks, at a time when 512kbps down was $60 from the monopolies if you get it. Yes, micro-outages, no ping/tracert (motivation was to stop a Windows worm, but we have Linux and Mac), and that notorious upload speed which requires insane Receive-Windows (proudly running RWIN=120KB).
[cliche]Every ending is a new beginning.[/cliche] I'm about to be out two hundred bucks and download speed is dropping, but upload speed is tripling -- so a challenge and an opportunity. And with that, I go from one positive ISP relationship to perhaps an even better one. | |
|  svBackstreet
join:2008-06-24
85742-9650 | Re: Tucson: SBBD ends July 31. I'm going to SimplyBits. I'd be vey interested in hearing of your experience with Wi-Power | |
| | Ashtabula
Premium
join:2004-06-07
| SimplyBits experience need to do a review one of these days....
this is actually SimplyBits, which uses the same technology as wi-power, and serves the eastern part of Tucson. additionally, there is webhiway, which is WiFi and +40dB antennas aimed at those tv towers on top of Mt. Lemmon, and they advertise 11Mbps.
pros: faster upload than SBBD (384kbps). high reliability (no outages in two months).
neutral: price is $45/mo for 384kbps/1Mbps and $65/mo for twice that speed. DSL locally is $40 for 1Mbps and $50 for 2Mbps. do not know cable. SBBD was $40/mo for 100kbps/5Mbps.
cons: installation is $200. low speed -- 1MBps down is just not enough in 2008.
anyway, there you have it. I qualify for 2Mbps DSL for $50/mo, but I chose to do business with a local provider. | |
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