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carcajou
join:2012-10-16
Riviere-Beaudette, QC

2 edits

carcajou

Member

Do we need a mobile broadband clients rebellion ?

Hello all

For several years, I have used mobile internet as a backup in case I lost connection with my primary supplier and also for when I was on the road. I had USB sticks from a few carriers and I now use a hub from Bell Mobility to connect to their 3G/4G.

My problem is that I moved to a new location where there is no DSL or digital cable and dialup cannot fill my needs. Mobile broadband became my main portal out of necessity and ( you guessed it ) my bills exploded. Hey, I could lease a new car and also fill its tank with what I cough every month.

I find no fault in Bell s procedures except the fact they gouge me. There is always a day each month when I get the hated screen warning me I m now going overage ( 1.3 cent per extra mb ). They even occasionally send me a letter by Priority Post to tell me they re going to REALLY smash my piggybank that month.

Anyone knows the justification why mobile broadband should be so expensive ?

Anyone knows of a more economical option for me ( besides moving back to civilization ) ? I need to connect to a financial data feed that sends me graphics that are constantly updated. What s the cheapest option for about 25-30 GB per month ? Suggestions will be appreciated.

Oh I forgot to mention I m in Quebec near the Ontario border and not far from highway 20/highway 401 so I guess many suppliers cover that area.

BACONATOR26
Premium Member
join:2000-11-25
Nepean, ON

BACONATOR26

Premium Member

It really comes down to, there's no justification but mobile providers know they can gouge and get away with it. No one regulates retail pricing and the providers make a huge markup for free. For the amount of complaints, there are far more people and businesses that are willing to pay for it and so they continue making you pay huge markups for it.

Guspaz
Guspaz
MVM
join:2001-11-05
Montreal, QC

Guspaz to carcajou

MVM

to carcajou
Lack of effective competition. The new entrants are not sufficiently disruptive in the market to cause any significant change in mobile bandwidth pricing. In fact, the largest new entrant (Wind Mobile) charges roughly the same (in the ballpark of $10/GB) as all the incumbents.

A prime example of the lack of competition is that the widespread deployment of LTE services should have produced a significant decrease in the cost per gigabyte of data, since LTE allows a much greater volume of data to be transmitted in the same spectrum. Instead we saw no change whatsoever in bandwidth pricing; excepting a sale, you still pay roughly $10/GB of mobile data. Carriers initially offered LTE-specific data plans (that weren't any cheaper), but now simply use the same data plan pricing for both HSPA+ and LTE service.
carcajou
join:2012-10-16
Riviere-Beaudette, QC

2 edits

carcajou

Member

Thanks Guspaz

Did you by any chance, hear about a supposed satellite that will become operational this winter and will compete with terrestrial antennas for the 4G market ? I m getting flyers in my mailbox from a company talking about that " VIASAT 1 " satellite and offering much cheaper rates per GB. They say they are with Xplornet and Shaw Direct ( resellers ? ) and there will be some kind of bundle offer for TV and internet access.

I m wary of such offers and dont find trace of that offer on the Xplornet website. Maybe because it s not yet current. I may give a call to Xplornet to verify legitimacy.

Guspaz
Guspaz
MVM
join:2001-11-05
Montreal, QC

Guspaz to carcajou

MVM

to carcajou
Satellite broadband is nice for people who have no other options whatsoever, and it can be an affordable alternative to cellular in terms of bulk data transfer, but it has one huge caveat: latency. A typical round trip time (ping) for satellite broadband is 750ms or more. 1000-1500ms is not unheard of. This makes a whole class of applications either completely impossible (any kind of gaming) and a whole bunch impractical (VoIP, remote desktop).

This isn't a technological limitation so much as it's a physics limitation (the speed of light, specifically). A thousand years from now, a geostationary communications satellite would still have the same problem.

Geostationary satellites are 35,786 km away (has to be precise to work). That gives a total round-trip distance of 71,572 km. The speed of light is 299,792.458 kilometers per second. Atmosphere only slows down the speed of light by roughly 3%, so we can ignore it.

Now, consider that doing a ping involves making that round trip twice. The packet goes like:

You -> Satellite -> Destination -> Satellite -> You

That makes the distance, then, 143,144 km. The math to figure out the speed-of-light enforced minimum transit time is simple:

143,144 / 299,792 =~ 0.477 seconds (477 milliseconds)

So, just to ping somebody, you spend 477 milliseconds just flying through the air. No manner of technological improvement (short of FTL communications) could ever reduce that. On top of that latency, you have to take into account processing latency at various stages, as well as the trip over the internet itself, between the satellite uplink station and your destination on the internet.

The only way satellite broadband could ever offer low latencies would be for it to be a low-orbit satellite cluster. The Iridium cluster is an example of that. They're only 781 km high, so your speed-of-light delay for a ping would only be about 10ms, perfectly acceptable! The problem is that satellite clusters are ridiculously more expensive. With a geostationary satellite (like VIASAT-1), you just need one of them, it just has to repeat whatever it receives without really processing it, and it will keep working forever as long as it doesn't suffer any hardware failures.

A low-orbit satellite cluster, on the other hand, requires tons of satellites. Iridium's current cluster is 66 satellites, including spares. On top of that, low-orbit satellites experience atmospheric drag, so they eventually run out of fuel and de-orbit. It's also enormously more complex, because all the satellites are constantly moving, so the sender/receiver has to talk to different moving satellites, and the satellites themselves (in the case of Iridium) have to relay between multiple satellites to get to the destination.
bt
join:2009-02-26
canada

bt to Guspaz

Member

to Guspaz
said by Guspaz:

In fact, the largest new entrant (Wind Mobile) charges roughly the same (in the ballpark of $10/GB) as all the incumbents.

Despite having plans with overage fees, Wind still does have the $35 no-overages plan. It's got a 10G soft cap, but it's still a "we might slow you down if you go over the cap", not a "we will charge you through the nose if you go over the cap".
carcajou
join:2012-10-16
Riviere-Beaudette, QC

carcajou to Guspaz

Member

to Guspaz
Guspaz

Thank you very much: I should have thought of that myself. You re absolutely right. I m not a gamer, but such latency is a deal breaker for what I do.

So that flyer goes in the trash and I now dont care if it s a scam or not.

Maybe the moving truck is my only option after all.
carcajou

carcajou to bt

Member

to bt
BT

Thanks to you also. That plan seems cheaper than Bell, but I cannot afford being slowed down. I need constant internet at constant speed and 25-30 GB/month

Guspaz
Guspaz
MVM
join:2001-11-05
Montreal, QC

Guspaz to bt

MVM

to bt
said by bt:

Despite having plans with overage fees, Wind still does have the $35 no-overages plan. It's got a 10G soft cap, but it's still a "we might slow you down if you go over the cap", not a "we will charge you through the nose if you go over the cap".

True, but it's hard to make a direct comparison when they do the slowdown thing. You could consider it to be 10GB for $35, which is a good deal (only $3.50/GB), but it has no option to continue paying $3.50/GB for overages (so you can't get 20GB for $70, for example). And even $3.50/GB is high enough to make it an impractical replace for anything but extremely light usage.

Even if a user could survive on 50GB usage today, that'd be something like $500 from Bell, and even if Wind allowed overages on the $35 plan, that'd be $175...

hm
@videotron.ca

hm to carcajou

Anon

to carcajou
said by carcajou:

Maybe the moving truck is my only option after all.

Any wisps in your area?

Maybe make a new topic asking for help finding a wisp in your town? Nothing lost.
carcajou
join:2012-10-16
Riviere-Beaudette, QC

1 edit

carcajou to Guspaz

Member

to Guspaz
Actually, I d gladly take a 3.50/GB offer if I ever find one ( that s about what that company offered for the satellite ).

I now pay 70 for the first 5 GB and about 15 per extra GB

Maybe go with Wind for my first 10 GB and use my Bell Mobility hub only when Wind " slows me down "

Thanks. I ll see if they cover my area with a decently reliable service.

Guspaz
Guspaz
MVM
join:2001-11-05
Montreal, QC

Guspaz to carcajou

MVM

to carcajou
Hmm, you could try to see if you can get on a promotional plan.

When I signed up for an LTE stick for the convention in July, the deal from Rogers was $53/mth for 10GB with $10/GB overage. There is often that sort of plan floating around from somebody or other. Another common one is $30 for 6GB with $10/GB overage (which is what I have).

Combine that with Wind and you'd get $88/mth for 20GB with the option of $10/GB for high-speed overage, or free low-speed overage.

compewut
@videotron.ca

compewut to carcajou

Anon

to carcajou
If i'm not mistaken, Xplornet bought the rights for Canada. So you will in effect be an Xplornet customers if you take this. Which means:

1) Throttled
2) good luck with voip & latency sensitive applications (even viasat themselves aren't promising anything on this).
3) 3 year contracts
4) low usage
5) High B/W rates

Xplornet is a whore of a company, and sole supplier for this. No competition once again, so they can do as they please.

If it's cheaper than what you have, why not. But beware the locked in contract with them. You might get fed of them fast. But not like you have much of a choice in terms of an internet supplier.
MaynardKrebs
We did it. We heaved Steve. Yipee.
Premium Member
join:2009-06-17

MaynardKrebs to carcajou

Premium Member

to carcajou
said by carcajou:

My problem is that I moved to a new location where there is no DSL or digital cable and dialup cannot fill my needs.

I think you need to teach a lesson to the j*ck*ass who decided you should move to that location where there's no DSL/cable service. You should picket outside his house with a big sign saying, "No cable internet here. No DSL internet here. Stupid made me do it."
carcajou
join:2012-10-16
Riviere-Beaudette, QC

carcajou to compewut

Member

to compewut
Hi

Guspaz already convinced me that going with a SAT wont do for me.

I ll try Windmobile. I did not know about that new supplier; so starting this thread paid up for me.

If they cover my area, 35 bucks for 10 GB is quite good. I will even set up multiple accounts ( and multiple sticks ) if that s the way to always pay only 3.50/GB.
Dcite
join:2006-05-12
Mississauga, ON

Dcite

Member

I am not sure if WIND Mobile actually covers that far away from Ottowa, which is their only real coverage of Quebec. Maybe you can check if Public Mobile's (licensed to operate in Quebec) much more limited Phone selection provider can reach you? I can't say I would recommend any of their devices... but it's certainly cheap. (I think some users reported 1.5Mbit as a top speed test)
carcajou
join:2012-10-16
Riviere-Beaudette, QC

2 edits

carcajou

Member

I never saw my Bell Mobility hub going above 3.5 mbps ( even if they advertise a maximum theorical speed of 20 ) At 1.5, I can still function. My hub isn t the latest technology: I bought that 2 years ago. Download speed is more or less irrelevant anyway when you are wireless. It s simply too expensive per GB to use that for large downloads. When you have a big download to do, you go see a friend who has cable/DSL internet and you pirate his connection.

I m in Quebec near the ON border. About 30 kms from Cornwall

Guspaz
Guspaz
MVM
join:2001-11-05
Montreal, QC

Guspaz to carcajou

MVM

to carcajou
You're like 150KM away from Wind's nearest coverage area.
MaynardKrebs
We did it. We heaved Steve. Yipee.
Premium Member
join:2009-06-17

MaynardKrebs to carcajou

Premium Member

to carcajou
said by carcajou:

I m in Quebec near the ON border. About 30 kms from Cornwall

Do you know anyone who works for Bell/Rogers/Telus?
Sometimes there are all-you-can-eat cell packages for not a lot of money for employees.

Or somebody who works for one of the major banks? Same idea.

Maybe somebody will adopt you.
bt
join:2009-02-26
canada

bt to Guspaz

Member

to Guspaz
said by Guspaz:

True, but it's hard to make a direct comparison when they do the slowdown thing.

Agreed. It's definitely a subjective comparison. It's a trade-off, not an absolute improvement.
said by Guspaz:

Even if a user could survive on 50GB usage today

My mother is often under 100MB naturally, so people can definitely survive on little usage - depending on what their needs are, of course.
bt

bt to carcajou

Member

to carcajou
I was going to say "What about Videotron?", but I just checked their mobile packages.... cheaper than Rogers/Bell/Telus for 15GB, but $0.02/MB after that which is roughly double the Rogers and Bell overages.
carcajou
join:2012-10-16
Riviere-Beaudette, QC

carcajou

Member

I just read on the CRTC website that they want to make speeds of 5 mbps accessible and affordable to all Canadians by 2015 LOL

Hey CRTC ! I m 3 kms from highway 20/401 right in the corridor joining Montreal and Toronto the two largest cities in the country !

elwoodblues
Elwood Blues
Premium Member
join:2006-08-30
Somewhere in

elwoodblues to carcajou

Premium Member

to carcajou
The issue at hand here is not a rebellion, but that people are trying to use cell service for their internet. That's not going to work.

While a TSI et al. don't stand a chance in a major urban centres, and putting cost aside (it'll be a long time to recoup I'm sure) they should build out those areas.

Make a deal with the developer, while the ground is still dug up and start putting in the fibre to neighbourhood , if not the home, now if the incumbents want in, the they'd have to play ball with the TPIA providers instead of the other way around. Marc can now submit his own ###'s to justify the cost of allowing Rogers et al in the door.

The incumbents are interested in this kind of "land based" service any more, it's too costly to build out, considering they can put a few cell towers for less money and alot less infrastructure to mange and the profits are huge.

One only has to look at Bell rolling out cell service in the north to provide internet service to see that happening.

El Quintron
Cancel Culture Ambassador
Premium Member
join:2008-04-28
Tronna

El Quintron

Premium Member

TSI et al. Could also set up some towers or lease space on existing ones... from what I know most WISPs lease space on someone else's tower so there's no reason for the larger IISPs to not get into this.

If anything with proper service delivery and good customer service they could probably lock the incumbents out of these areas forever.