Home internet; here is somthing different.

Joined
Jul 26, 2004
Messages
14,110
Location
New Bri-en, CT
I have (had) DSL with Frontier. My account goes back to when DSL was offered by SNET (Southern New England Telephone)

That was sold to SBC, then to ATT and then ATT sold to Frontier. Never really wanted to entertain comcast for various reasons.

Frontier's service as always slow and expensive, now they are in bankruptcy and under investigation for misrepresenting service and various other things. I am currently working @ home and my 6Mbs wasn't cutting it.

When I looked @ their website, no indication of how much 18Mbs would be, just how great everything was for new customers, but nothing after the 1 year deal runs out.

I called the sales department and they promptly asked for my account #, my phone #, my email address (like duh you send me the bill) and I spend 20 minutes on the phone to get a price. Really?

Rolling down Route 1 in Old Saybrook, I see advertisement for "Middlesex Broadband"; I fill out the web form from my house and someone calls in 15 minutes.
Apparently they are a startup that piggybacks on Frontiers infrastructure and they offer service for less than Frontier; Their website has the $$ you pay, no "1 year deal", no "charge to collect taxes"
What you see on the site is what you pay. I order up 18Mbs (really all i need) and put in a disconnect with Frontier. They disconnect my DSL on the assigned day and the next day a few more frontier guys hook up a new wire to my house and give me a new modem. Apparenlty Middlesex Broadband just contracts Frontier to do the work. In 20 minutes I am hooked up with Middlesex.

Talking with my account rep, he indicates he is the POC for all technical and billing issues; I talk to 1 person for everything; kind of like a commercial account.
No talking to tech support and explaining to another person what my issue is. No "script readers" trying to get me to navigate to a website, when i have "no link light" whatsoever.
The sales guy also indicated they have a FIOS rollout plan, but it might take 4 years; he indicated a line is about 2K / home (just in planning phase) Frankly, I'd pay that at this point I'd pay that right out of my pocket if given the option. I might discuss being a prototype for any service they offer in the future.

This was an refreshing option for internet access; i am not sure how the Frontier business problems will impact my service, but I have a 2 year price lock in.
We'll see how it goes.

Shameless plug
https://www.middlesexbroadband.com/
 
Good thing you saw the advertisement!

18 Mb/s should be adequate for most things. I have a slightly faster service (ATT) and it's never been a major issue. Good luck on getting the FIOS / fiber. They've been promising it in my neighborhood for several years and there's no indication that I'll see it anytime soon. I think they've been trying to build it out starting in more densly populated parts of the county (apartments, etc.). I'd like to get higher speeds, but am not suffering with what I have. BTW, I had comcast with 75 Mb/s and it was erratic and unreliable (and customer/technical service was awful), so I understand not wanting to consider CC.
 
It's amazing that we as Americans accept ISPs giving individual price quotes. The electric company, gas company etc have published rates that are the same for everybody.

My ISP, Spectrum, is the same way. They randomly raise my rates then when I ask about it they'll say I had an introductory rate. Dudes, I've had your internet since 2002!
 
I have (had) DSL with Frontier. My account goes back to when DSL was offered by SNET (Southern New England Telephone)

That was sold to SBC, then to ATT and then ATT sold to Frontier. Never really wanted to entertain comcast for various reasons.

Frontier's service as always slow and expensive, now they are in bankruptcy and under investigation for misrepresenting service and various other things. I am currently working @ home and my 6Mbs wasn't cutting it.

When I looked @ their website, no indication of how much 18Mbs would be, just how great everything was for new customers, but nothing after the 1 year deal runs out.

I called the sales department and they promptly asked for my account #, my phone #, my email address (like duh you send me the bill) and I spend 20 minutes on the phone to get a price. Really?

Rolling down Route 1 in Old Saybrook, I see advertisement for "Middlesex Broadband"; I fill out the web form from my house and someone calls in 15 minutes.
Apparently they are a startup that piggybacks on Frontiers infrastructure and they offer service for less than Frontier; Their website has the $$ you pay, no "1 year deal", no "charge to collect taxes"
What you see on the site is what you pay. I order up 18Mbs (really all i need) and put in a disconnect with Frontier. They disconnect my DSL on the assigned day and the next day a few more frontier guys hook up a new wire to my house and give me a new modem. Apparenlty Middlesex Broadband just contracts Frontier to do the work. In 20 minutes I am hooked up with Middlesex.

Talking with my account rep, he indicates he is the POC for all technical and billing issues; I talk to 1 person for everything; kind of like a commercial account.
No talking to tech support and explaining to another person what my issue is. No "script readers" trying to get me to navigate to a website, when i have "no link light" whatsoever.
The sales guy also indicated they have a FIOS rollout plan, but it might take 4 years; he indicated a line is about 2K / home (just in planning phase) Frankly, I'd pay that at this point I'd pay that right out of my pocket if given the option. I might discuss being a prototype for any service they offer in the future.

This was an refreshing option for internet access; i am not sure how the Frontier business problems will impact my service, but I have a 2 year price lock in.
We'll see how it goes.

Shameless plug
https://www.middlesexbroadband.com/
If Elon Musk comes through with this it will solve your and my rural internet problem: https://www.starlink.com/ Beta testing is supposed to be starting up this summer.
 
If Elon Musk comes through with this it will solve your and my rural internet problem: https://www.starlink.com/ Beta testing is supposed to be starting up this summer.

Yes. It looks like it will provide a reasonably priced option for ample bandwidth in rural areas. To my dismay, it won't be made available (at least not for some time) to people that are underserved or have no option other than a monopolistic provider in more suburban/urban areas.
 
If Elon Musk comes through with this it will solve your and my rural internet problem: https://www.starlink.com/ Beta testing is supposed to be starting up this summer.
The main downside to LEO satellite service will be longer ping times, so gamers might not appreciate it much.

I am curious to see if rural high speed internet expansion combined with VR technology will fuel something of an exodus from the cities as professionals will be able to work from anywhere. That would be disruptive in a lot of ways.
 
The main downside to LEO satellite service will be longer ping times, so gamers might not appreciate it much.

I am curious to see if rural high speed internet expansion combined with VR technology will fuel something of an exodus from the cities as professionals will be able to work from anywhere. That would be disruptive in a lot of ways.
I am not a gamer but from what I've read the ping times are not bad because the satellites are very low orbit. That's the reason they need so many satellites because at such a low orbit the coverage area is small.
 
The main downside to LEO satellite service will be longer ping times, so gamers might not appreciate it much.

I am curious to see if rural high speed internet expansion combined with VR technology will fuel something of an exodus from the cities as professionals will be able to work from anywhere. That would be disruptive in a lot of ways.
Completely goes against the great green plan of centralize everything, way fewer cars on the road and everybody uses public transportation though ;)
 
Completely goes against the great green plan of centralize everything, way fewer cars on the road and everybody uses public transportation though ;)
Yeah, I hear you, though it's not the reality on the ground. The tide of young people who were flocking to the cities in the first half of the last decade has turned and they've started leaving at a greater rate than moving in for the past several years.

I for one would love to be able to pack up the 5th wheel and find a spot on BLM or National Forest to work and play remotely for a month or two out of the year.
 
Good to hear! Weird that an internet company provides service without a hassle!

Got an email from Cox a week ago stating that internet service may be affected for a few hours one day due to upgrades. First thought that went through my head was "OH GREAT! My internet is going up soon!"
 
The main downside to LEO satellite service will be longer ping times, so gamers might not appreciate it much.

I am curious to see if rural high speed internet expansion combined with VR technology will fuel something of an exodus from the cities as professionals will be able to work from anywhere. That would be disruptive in a lot of ways.

Due to economy of scale the likely customers will be the one with worse alternative (i.e. dial up, low end DSL), and they would take long ping that comes with it, or have DSL with the starlink service.

To scale well they will need to only use it mostly for bouncing off the signal as locally as possible. They also likely will target different customers in large metropolitans vs rural. The large metropolitans customers will likely be those who want secure connection without local law restrictions, or those who want fast transcontinental signals (speed of light is faster in air or space vs in fiber). The volume and bandwidth won't scale enough to knock cable internet off the monopoly market.
 
Here is an option if you like to tinker around with this stuff. You can apply to be a beta tester at no cost from Elon Musk's space x .

The program in already underway, and plans to have 10's of thousands more satellites in space. It will be MUCH better then current satellite service.
 
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