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Moving to North Glengarry, Alexandria Ontario

If you can actually get a wired connection, even if the company may not be the best, go for it. You would be best served leaving Xplornet to the absolute last option. I have Xplornet, unfortunately all I can get, and even if you are parked right beside the tower, they oversell the service and latency is well over 1000 most times and packet loss can go up to 50%.

edit: should have mentioned I have the fixed wireless service, not 4g. I have heard from others that the Xpornet 4g isn't much better, but I personally have no experience with it.
Here is an example of a short ping run from 6:47am on a Sunday. Actually not bad :

--- ds-any-fp3-real.wa1.b.yahoo.com ping statistics ---
1526 packets transmitted, 1238 received, 18% packet loss, time 2014858ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 54.656/169.085/2348.064/259.180 ms, pipe 3

reply to Stuntkok
I use the Rogers Rocket Hub so I can take it from home to the cottage in Muskoka. I've been quite happy with the performance which is actually better at the cottage than in the city.

There is also an option with the Rocket Hub to support a phone.

Not sure about coverage in your area but the Rogers site should be able to tell you. Distance to the tower is very important. If you have a Rogers cell phone already, looking at the bars in your new location will be a good guide on the internet service.

reply to colinp
I'm on Xplornet 4G, and it's better than the old "fixed wireless" stuff. Still not perfect by any means, but quite tolerable. I do VPN to work with zero issues, and I've actually reached the 10Mbps speeds I'm paying for, sometimes for long periods of time. On average it's lower though.

I did a similar (but shorter) ping test as colinp (via Windows 7) and I came up with 500 sent, 1 lost. rtt min/avg/max was 78/168/612 ms. I'm 13km away from the tower.

But as has been said, if you can get *any* wire-based service, it'll be better than wireless pretty much guaranteed. Plus, with wireless you may be looking at a tower or horrendous tripod-screwed-through-your-roof monstrosity (I have a 64ft tower).
--
Xplornet WiMAX -} Buffalo WZR-HP-G300NH running DD-WRT -} about 13 machines running everything you can think of.

reply to Stuntkok
Hi Stuntkok,

It was me you talked with at Fusion Telecom. We are a Start Communications reseller. When we 1st check with the postal code it gave me positive answer BUT as it is a rural area the postal codes are covering very wide areas.

I double checked and it seems the cable service is NOT available at your place, sorry.

I was trying to reach you but I was not able to retrieve your phone number.

Good look with your search!

Thanks,

Chris

Hi Chris,

Thanks for your reply. Now I'm truly sad, as I was really praying for a nice cable connection. I sincerely hope that I will be able to access DSL. I take it if you can't provide cable, it's because the cable infrastructure doesn't exist, right?

Is there any way to find out online whether I can access DSL?

Best regards,

Vince

yes, sent you a PM ... as per Bell portal the address is not serviceable ...

reply to Stuntkok
I'm coming to the bitter realization that neither DSL nor cable will be available at my new residence.

Help save my marriage!

Do you guys know any non-evil wireless companies that do not throttle and provide a decent cap for the county of North Glengarry in Alexandria, Ontario? Fair's fair, I don't mind paying for the bandwidth; I just don't want to be throttled for using what I'm paying for.

The only company name that I currently have for wireless is Explornet for 4G, and IGS that provides satellite. I know that I can find some names from the canadianisp.ca site; however, I was hoping for member testimonials.

reply to Stuntkok
Thanks everyone for you comments. If anyone finds themselves to be in the same boat as me, please visit the sites below.

internet service provider
»www.canadianisp.ca/index.php

Industry Canada Broadband Canada: Connecting Rural Canadians
»www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/720.nsf/en···005.html

Currently it seems that my two options for broadband internet are Explorenet and RiverLink.

Thanks again!

reply to Stuntkok
In Eastern Ontario, unless you live in an established town, there is little hope of getting high speed cable or DSL. You can try »www.eorn.ca/ but in your case all roads lead to wireless.

reply to Stuntkok
Alexandria would be served by Eastlink, which to my knoweldge has no resellers at this point....

You MAY want to get in touch with them as they should have internet in the area, and ask them if your address is serviceable...as IMO that would be your best option OP.

Good luck with your move!

Thank you nitzguy, they do indeed have some excellent cable options for Alexandria; however, not for people like myself who live out in the periphery. This will be great news for some friends of mine who live closer to Alexandria.

The good news is that EORN will be rolling out or putting down the infrastructure for terrestrial internet come fall 2013. So when I join any local ISPs, I will opt for a 1 year contract. I think it now boils down to Xplorenet.

Do you have line of sight to a location that can have broadband? Maybe you can setup a directional wireless link with that location?

reply to Stuntkok
Keep in mind that with EORN, "terrestrial" means DSL OR wireless. So it would be best to contact EORN to find out exactly what that means.

reply to ruddypict
To ruddypict: I'm afraid not, at least I don't think so. I will only be moving at the end of next month and do not yet know my neighbours. The local Google satellite map is not very promising.

To MacGyver: I'm happy to say that Bell Aliant has received the contract to put down the infrastructure for DSL internet, while Xplorenet will be upgrading and extending their coverage. Oh happy day!

»www.eorn.ca/assets/Uploads/SDG-r···INAL.pdf

Ok, so I won't be watching Netflix super HD in the near future, but still...

reply to Stuntkok
You’re lucky if you live within the EORN framework. I’m too close to the city of Ottawa for that (we’re in between Orleans and Sarsfield), but too far out to be covered by either Bell or Rogers wired connections. Since as far as I can tell neither company will ever extend their broadband infrastructure again due to the money they make from their “mobile internet solutions”, I’m condemned to be an Xplornet fixed wireless customer for the indefinite future. I’m fortunate in that I have a clear line of sight to their tower so it’s a stable connection, but it’s extremely slow. We’ve grown used to pixelated Netflix and how nothing else can be done while someone is watching a movie online. Their 4G solution might be better but it has a 60 gig maximum cap at my location, and I dread having to try and monitor everyone’s movie and TV consumption. I was an original customer of theirs back in the 2007 rollout so I still have an unlimited data package.

I’ve tried both Rogers and Bell mobile hubs and they can’t even maintain a connection, let alone do anything with it. It’s Xplornet or nothing for me.

reply to MacGyver

I will be living in the outskirts of Alexandria, which is why I don't even have access to DSL for now. Take heart, there is DSL service in Alexandria. Cable is also now being offered to the core of Alexandria; however, this is not the case for the wilds of the North Glengarry county (which is still part of Alexandria).