Welcome to the self-proclaimed
Rural Ottawa High-Speed Internet Blog. High-speed Internet access is virtually
ubiquitous in the urban and suburban areas of Ottawa, but when I started this blog in 2005, only about 60% of the
rural areas of Ottawa have coverage.
However, even for rural citizens, high-speed Internet access is becoming as necessary as telephone service.
Happily, high-speed coverage for rural Ottawa has increased significantly, and not only is coverage
reportedly
above 90%, many rural residents and businesses now have more than one choice of high-speed ISP.
This purpose of this weblog is to track news and events related to high-speed (broadband) Internet access in the
rural areas of Ottawa and, to a lesser extent, in nearby townships.
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I've opened up this blog to allow anyone to post to it. However, I continue to moderate and will remove any inappropriate content, e.g. anything not related to high-speed internet access in the rural Ottawa, the Ottawa Valley, Eastern Ontario, and the Outaouais.
An
announcement on Xplornet's website indicates that it is planning to roll-out a 4G network starting this fall (which I guess means now). They don't indicate where they plan to deploy it first.
I could use more speed/bandwidth. 3 Mbps peak is not cutting it, and for the last week or so, the average download speed has been 0.5 Mbps, anytime of day or night.
9 Comments:
Yes, the Xplornet throughput has been very poor this past week.
I called Xplornet customer support last night. Basically, they could not see a problem on their end -- tower wasn't overloaded / over-utilized -- and my signal strength was acceptable.
They suggested a re-point to another tower, at my cost ($125 ~ $150), since speeds are not gaurenteed.
I suggested a downgrade of my service from 3 Mbps to 1.5 Mbps, since I wasn't seeing 1.5 Mbps anyway and there was nothing they seemed able or willing to do from their end. That's when I found out that I actually have the enhanced service -- I knew I had the 3.5 GHz service but wasn't aware that 3.5 Gig was the enhanced service. I'm only paying for the standard 3 Mbps service, not the enhanced service, but the reason given is that I got the 3.5 Gig enhanced service *before* they came out with their enhanced pricing structure. So downgrading to 1.5 Mbps enhanced would actually end up costing me more than they 3 Mbps standard rate I'm paying now.
So I left my service unchanged for now.
When I logged in this morning (~8am) and ran a download test, I peaked at 1.8 Mbps down, and averaged 800 Kbps down, which is much better than I've been seeing over the past week.
I hope Chris doesn't mind this post...
Does anyone want a Yagi antenna, formerly used with SimplySUrf? Cost $0 but you pick up. I am on Howie Rd between March Rd and Old Almonte Rd.
Details of it http://poyntingdirect.co.za/pYAGI-A0005/YAGI-Antenna-24-GHz--14-dBi.aspx
Drop me an email if you are interested at "anicesteak at gmail dot com".
I'd be very weary of Xplorenet launching a 4G service. I haven't been a customer of theirs in a while, since I used to use their satellite service. However even then they're service never matched their statements of quality, on top of the throttling, QoS they impose, and port blocking. I'm not sure if this has changed since i was using their service but speak from past experience. Lately i've been using the Rogers 3G service and so far thats been very reliable, consistent, no throttling or port blocking and speeds have been great (5mbs down/2mbs up). If any of these things have changed i may consider going back to Xplorenet, however until then if i was an internet-shopping customer i would stick with the big cell companies, especially when they launch their own 4G service. I know Rogers is doing testing in Ottawa now from their statements on Redboad.
It looks like Quebec (near Sherbrooke) is getting 4G first. Here is the FAQ about the service in that area. The speeds are much lower than I would have expected and the $95 price point for the 5MB connections is pretty astonishing.
Having said that, this is only the start of the rollout. Maybe the speeds will improve.
http://hautevitesseestrie.com/pdf/FAQ_Xplornet_microsites_en.pdf
Anybody got xplornet 4G service and care to comment?
I found this site by chance, I usually checkout xplornetsucks for information.
I have heard a lot of good things about the new Xplornet 4G Network. I work closely with a local dealer and a lot of the info I've heard regarding the their "FAP" policy and speeds being achieved on their also new 4G Wimax service has been positive. Daily limits are gone and in their place are easy to adhere to bandwidth allocations. Something I consider much more palpable.
Anyone heard anything new about the 4G Wimax service? The support person I spoke with this week had no info on when it might be available in rural Ottawa. Or has anybody found an affordable alternative to Xplornet? I've had the 3.5Ghz/3Mbs service since SimplySurf disappeared and it's been a disappointment. I work from home and I may as well close up shop at 4pm when the performance goes from poor to pathetic. Very frustrating.
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