NetFlix chart shows Charter Cable as the #1 ISP with great speed when streaming flicks yet, I've had dropped connections when streaming a movie. At times I've had to stop watching and try again later.
If you're thinking I'm exhausting the bandwidth by streaming a movie and surfing the Net, I'm not good at multitasking like that. I do one or the other and no one else in the household is surfing.
My coworker has Time Warner Cable and her son's experiencing major problems streaming Netflix mid-day when most folks are at work. Her adult son works nights and likes to stream content during the day and can't because the stream dies or becomes pixelated with dialog out of sync. Of course, calls to TWC customer support resulted in her being told it's not their problem but Netflix.
This comes at a time when Netflix is under siege by major telcos who say “Show us the money!” The telcos / broadband providers allege that streaming movies taxes their networks costing them more money to deliver gigabytes of movies / tv shows to our homes. They want Netflix to pay for this, as well as you and I.
I'm reminded of the old days when I was sucker punched into paying $17.99 plus for a compact disc of music. Sometimes the CD had only 10 songs with less than 45 minutes of music, but there I was dishing the $$$.
Consumers are much savvier now and we understand that costs are minimal once the infrastructure is in place. The telcos alone have been subsidized by you and I in creating and stabilizing their networks. The greedy telcos still want more.
We are not users of the eighties.
We are unwilling to pay a 150% mark up.
We want to enjoy the media when and how we want.
The barn doors are open and the cows are in the field grazing.
Wake up telcos / broadband providers we're not going to be cheated!
Showing posts with label broadband. Show all posts
Showing posts with label broadband. Show all posts
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Sunday, February 7, 2010
PrePaid Broadband
My home wifi connection doesn't penetrate the walls from the den at rear to the front porch, so it's a good thing I have Virgin Mobile Broadband2Go megabytes to blow out. I bought the 250 MB / 30 days plan and it's been more than adequate for my limited weekday use, which averages about 45 minutes to an hour of online surfing.
I'm not committed to a 2 year contract, early termination or activation fees. If I need more megabytes I simply buy them directly from Virgin Mobile's site or I can purchase a Top Up card from any Best Buy. The denominations are: $20 = 250 MBs, $40 = 600 MBs, $60 = 1 GB all megabytes must be used within 30 days or you lose them - no carry over.
If you occasionally need mobile broadband connectivity then prepaid broadband may be a viable alternative.
I'm not committed to a 2 year contract, early termination or activation fees. If I need more megabytes I simply buy them directly from Virgin Mobile's site or I can purchase a Top Up card from any Best Buy. The denominations are: $20 = 250 MBs, $40 = 600 MBs, $60 = 1 GB all megabytes must be used within 30 days or you lose them - no carry over.
If you occasionally need mobile broadband connectivity then prepaid broadband may be a viable alternative.
Thursday, July 5, 2007
Broadband Update
We've transitioned from DSL to Cable internet because the DSL was just too darned slow. I download a lot of podcasts and I noticed that the download time was taking longer and longer, as if the ISP was throttling down the speed based on the amount of downloads. Well I didn't appreciate this in the least, since all I ever downloaded is podcasts and it's not everyday this occurs.
Thus far the cable has been totally fantastic. My downloads are completed in lightning fast time and there haven't been any glitches. I pretty much turn off everything when I'm away (I have everything set up on timers), so the service can't be abused. Installation was a breeze and the tech arrived on time.
The one thing he wouldn't do was connect the cable modem to the router. I guess corporate wants the customer to buy/rent the router from them. No problem though, since I set up the network I know how to configure things. My experience with Charter Communications, I've been a customer of theirs for over 20 years, has been positive. Sure I've had to call repair a few times, but they always keep their appointment and arrive on time.
We've transitioned from DSL to Cable internet because the DSL was just too darned slow. I download a lot of podcasts and I noticed that the download time was taking longer and longer, as if the ISP was throttling down the speed based on the amount of downloads. Well I didn't appreciate this in the least, since all I ever downloaded is podcasts and it's not everyday this occurs.
Thus far the cable has been totally fantastic. My downloads are completed in lightning fast time and there haven't been any glitches. I pretty much turn off everything when I'm away (I have everything set up on timers), so the service can't be abused. Installation was a breeze and the tech arrived on time.
The one thing he wouldn't do was connect the cable modem to the router. I guess corporate wants the customer to buy/rent the router from them. No problem though, since I set up the network I know how to configure things. My experience with Charter Communications, I've been a customer of theirs for over 20 years, has been positive. Sure I've had to call repair a few times, but they always keep their appointment and arrive on time.
Broadband Update
We've transitioned from DSL to Cable internet because the DSL was just too darned slow. I download a lot of podcasts and I noticed that the download time was taking longer and longer, as if the ISP was throttling down the speed based on the amount of downloads. Well I didn't appreciate this in the least, since all I ever downloaded is podcasts and it's not everyday this occurs.
Thus far the cable has been totally fantastic. My downloads are completed in lightning fast time and there haven't been any glitches. I pretty much turn off everything when I'm away (I have everything set up on timers), so the service can't be abused. Installation was a breeze and the tech arrived on time.
The one thing he wouldn't do was connect the cable modem to the router. I guess corporate wants the customer to buy/rent the router from them. No problem though, since I set up the network I know how to configure things. My experience with Charter Communications, I've been a customer of theirs for over 20 years, has been positive. Sure I've had to call repair a few times, but they always keep their appointment and arrive on time.
We've transitioned from DSL to Cable internet because the DSL was just too darned slow. I download a lot of podcasts and I noticed that the download time was taking longer and longer, as if the ISP was throttling down the speed based on the amount of downloads. Well I didn't appreciate this in the least, since all I ever downloaded is podcasts and it's not everyday this occurs.
Thus far the cable has been totally fantastic. My downloads are completed in lightning fast time and there haven't been any glitches. I pretty much turn off everything when I'm away (I have everything set up on timers), so the service can't be abused. Installation was a breeze and the tech arrived on time.
The one thing he wouldn't do was connect the cable modem to the router. I guess corporate wants the customer to buy/rent the router from them. No problem though, since I set up the network I know how to configure things. My experience with Charter Communications, I've been a customer of theirs for over 20 years, has been positive. Sure I've had to call repair a few times, but they always keep their appointment and arrive on time.
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