Why does rural internet SUCK ??

[reddeerguy2015]

And why are there no options??

I mean we're coming into 2018, absolutely everything is technology driven - 4k streaming phones, tablets, tvs, you name it. We have put Rovers (several) on Mars.

Yet if you're one of the unlucky rural Albertian users (small town, or god forbid - acreage), you might as well be living on the moon.

Try finding a local provider that gives a constant 25mbps download speed (hah!).

Xplornet?? Joke.

Telus Smart Hub?? Only for select customers. And cap on data. Bogs down said towers.

Rogers Internet stick ?? Same as Telus but worse (more $$$).

Insert any other rural internet provider here: reasonably better than xplornet - but about 15 years behind our city counterparts.

So annoyed. Why no other options??

Why can't I stream BBC earth in 4k on Netflix!?!

Rant over!

[Kenny Blankenship]

Can't agree more, unfortunately xplornet is constantly buying out smaller players (platinum communications etc) which in turn even further limits any competition.

[RZR]

It sucks big time where I'm at as well. It's down more then it works.

[purgatory.sv]

Something to consider ,in a time not long ago a contract was awarded to an alberta contractor to provide access to rural alberta schools? If these schools do have this service approach them and see if an arrangement can be made to have access to the network?

This could work if a school is near your location?

This is only speculation,i have no real information on the infrastructure and what was to be delivered.


Adding to the rant.

[58thecat]

Ours is great out this way, MCSNet is what we have, no complaints.

[IR_mike]

Originally Posted by 58thecat

Ours is great out this way, MCSNet is what we have, no complaints.

Same here.

[landowner]

Originally Posted by reddeerguy2015

And why are there no options??

I mean we're coming into 2018, absolutely everything is technology driven - 4k streaming phones, tablets, tvs, you name it. We have put Rovers (several) on Mars.

Yet if you're one of the unlucky rural Albertian users (small town, or god forbid - acreage), you might as well be living on the moon.

Try finding a local provider that gives a constant 25mbps download speed (hah!).

Xplornet?? Joke.

Telus Smart Hub?? Only for select customers. And cap on data. Bogs down said towers.

Rogers Internet stick ?? Same as Telus but worse (more $$$).

Insert any other rural internet provider here: reasonably better than xplornet - but about 15 years behind our city counterparts.

So annoyed. Why no other options??

Why can't I stream BBC earth in 4k on Netflix!?!

Rant over!

Do you know why Telus Smart Hub is only for select customers ? The people in my area are having good results , yet not everyone is allowed to get it ?

[Dubious]

Maybe if you guys voted ndp it would change...

[reddeerguy2015]

Originally Posted by landowner

Do you know why Telus Smart Hub is only for select customers ? The people in my area are having good results , yet not everyone is allowed to get it ?

It's for very specific towers in certain areas. From my understanding anyways.

[JohninAB]

I just went thru this with a couple of different internet providers. Basically if you are rural, they tell you to bend over and smile cause they are going to have their way with you. They charge you a premium price for a non-premium service.

[Trochu]

Quite simply, there isn't enough rate of return for anyone to improve it. They are bringing a new line into our building from across the street, maybe 20 m, and its supposedly $30,000 (there may be some sales tactics there in an attempt to get us to sign, but thats what buddy said). If you take Ponoka County for instance, not right around Edmonton/Calgary but not extreme rural either, you're looking at 2,8xx,xxx km2 with a population of 9,800.

[sgill808]

Originally Posted by Trochu

Quite simply, there isn't enough rate of return for anyone to improve it. They are bringing a new line into our building from across the street, maybe 20 m, and its supposedly $30,000 (there may be some sales tactics there in an attempt to get us to sign, but thats what buddy said). If you take Ponoka County for instance, not right around Edmonton/Calgary but not extreme rural either, you're looking at 2,8xx,xxx km2 with a population of 9,800.

That's what is happening with us. Lines are coming in across the street and the distance is smaller than the gap in Kassian's teeth.

[Hound Dog]

I'm with cciwireless and pay $75 a month and my average speeds are around 4.5. I'd like to switch as well but not many options that are any better in southern Alberta.

[Jack Hardin]

We are in Red Deer County and due to trees we couldn't get a signal from the tower in Innisfail. Had a Rogers Stick but, it was too costly for what you got so, we switched to Xplornet but, had to take the satellite because we were too low for the tower at Dixon 12 miles away. Can't watch netflix on it and it cuts out once or twice a week. One of the prices one pays for living in the country.

[badger]

I am with Telus and they just upgraded the DSL in my area so I can get 15. Two years ago I was at 1.8 so that's quite an improvement. I asked about Smarthub and was told it is unavailable in this area, probably because the DSL was upgraded. Compare this to when I was living in downtown Calgary and had 150, it's a disappointment. But with the better service I could switch to Optik from Bell Satellite, now I get more channels, better PVR box at less than half the price.

[fishtank]

The big 3 is doing a 10 gb data/ with phone plan for $60 better off with the cell data

[MugEye]

How does one check what speed there net is ? I’m in the sticks and I would like to share my story

[Stubb]

I'm with CCI and get anywhere from 1.5-4.5 download and pay $75/month. Checked into Smart Hub as well and not available for me either. I definately share everyone's frustration.

[Trochu]

Originally Posted by MugEye

How does one check what speed there net is ? I’m in the sticks and I would like to share my story

http://www.speedtest.net/

[reddeerguy2015]

Originally Posted by fishtank

The big 3 is doing a 10 gb data/ with phone plan for $60 better off with the cell data

The problem with the sticks and hub is data usage.

1080p can use over 1 gb per HOUR. 10 hours of Netflix streaming (binge watch one series...) And you're out of data!

4k video streaming (if you're lucky enough to sustain the required speeds) uses over 2 gigs of data per hour.

They have you either way.

[Scopithorne]

Originally Posted by reddeerguy2015

It's for very specific towers in certain areas. From my understanding anyways.

Thats what telus told me when i phoned and asked if you go into a telus store they will likely tell you a differnt story. What happened for us anyways we have great speed considering the options like 125mps

[6MT]

My service provider got bought out by xplornet earlier this year. And I have great service from xplornet. Granted, my path is only 3/4 of a mile. But, I am getting 25mps download speeds consistently. And between 5 and 10mps upload speeds. Even in heavy usage time frames, the service is darn good. Of course, I'm not an online gamer. So my speed and bandwidth requirements aren't as great as those people. But, I live outside cable and other hard line service providers. And with three computers running, I have no bandwidth or speed issues. Sometimes the weather can play havoc with service, but this is very rare. I switched from 2.4GHz to 5.3GHz and it's a much better band. Much less noise and interference from household appliances.

And, I can upgrade to LTE service if I like. I might just do that because the Motorola Canopy transceivers are getting pretty long in the tooth.

[CritterCommander]

Went with Smart Hub very early on, was warned at local store that not all towers will work. We got lucky and despite being in a fringe area was getting around 3mps down and roughly 0.5 up, which was 4x what our wireless provider was able to give us. I put a booster on the house, and we are getting 25mps down and 12 up, on average, very pleased with the Smart Hub. As a result most of the neighbours are now using Smart Hub and boosters and Netflix series is a new topic of discussion from time to time......

The Government, Fed, Prov, Local, all chipped in money in the form of grants to the local wireless guys and when we made FOIP requests to figure out where that money went got the run around hard, and still are. So gave up and went Telus.

[Au revoir, Gopher]

Try this page

https://servicealberta.ca/WISP_Search.cfm

Type in the legal land description and they will tell you who offers internet service there. I'm in the city, so I have no idea how useful/reliable the information is (it comes from a government, so I'm skeptical )

ARG

[amosfella]

Originally Posted by purgatory.sv

Something to consider ,in a time not long ago a contract was awarded to an alberta contractor to provide access to rural alberta schools? If these schools do have this service approach them and see if an arrangement can be made to have access to the network?

This could work if a school is near your location?

This is only speculation,i have no real information on the infrastructure and what was to be delivered.


Adding to the rant.

That was a fiber optic network to connect all schools and government buildings.

[Norwest Alta]

I decided I'll only pay for the days it works. Gpn must not of liked my new plan because it works better then it ever has.

[Au revoir, Gopher]

Originally Posted by amosfella

That was a fiber optic network to connect all schools and government buildings.

That was the SuperNet.

Myth #3: The SuperNet is only for the government

FACT:
The SuperNet is for all Albertans.

Because of the SuperNet, more than 250,000 people in rural Alberta have their choice of connectivity, and 66 wireless internet providers can run their businesses to serve them. Of course, the SuperNet also provides a vital service to the Government of Alberta in connecting our schools, hospitals, libraries, municipalities, and government entities.

ARG

[cdmc]

Our family has been through this time and again.
We have had every concievible option.
We live in a heavily wooded area and our nearest tower is many many miles away.
We have had very good luck with a booster on a tower coupled with a Telus smart hub.
Without the booster we can get by but it's painful. With the booster we can do work, stream Netflix or android all day. We have yet to go over on our allotment.

[Ranch11]

We had mcsnet and it was good, real good. They did an upgrade and then the tower we were on would not give us the performance we had prior??? So we switched to xplornet. It was ok at best. Many times we had zero internet. We’d phone and they always said oh we can upgrade at no cost. This happened about 4 times per year. I don’t know why they just wouldn’t upgrade on their own with out a phone call. So I started recording date and time that we didn’t have internet. I’d call em for money back but they said I had to call at the time it wasn’t working to get reimbursed. So I did. And it was lots. My bill some months was a third of the price, which was still expensive. Switched to Telus hub and it is very very good.

[colour86]

on MCSNET east of lamont and usually have no issues. slows a bit during peak times but its a minor difference. i can speedtest at 25 Mbps 90% of the time, stream HD no problem and have a 500GB data cap which I never hit. every other option blows, between the speed and data usage. only option really unless you hardly use the internet. The one thing i miss about the city is the super quick internet.