In this article I intend to explain what an ISP is, the different types of broadband internet available, and some information on pricing, best practices and things to look out for when selecting your ISP. We are mainly focusing on the types of service offered in suburban / rural towns such as the one I live in, Hicksville Ohio.
Oh Facebook, that weird little website with its groups. One group in particular, Nosy Neighbors of Hicksville, Ohio seems to have a question pop up all the time. “What kind of internet should i get”. The posts usually have tons of recommendations and everything from DSL to Fiber is discussed. But what does it all mean.
How much bandwidth do I need?
|Speed | Content |Devices Used| |---|---|---| |25 mb or less |1 1080 p stream |1 device| |50 - 100 mb|multiple 1080 streams or 1 4k|Good enough for a couple| |100 -250|multiple 1080 streams|Good enough for a family| |250-500|Lots of bandwidth |Large Family| |500 - 1000|All the bandwidth|Large family of impatient people| |1000+|MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE|Overkill. Bragging rights. Most home networks cant even use this speed|
First we should probably talk about the different types of internet. Again for this article I am going to focus on the most common and specifically reference the companies that serve the area in my town. There are few different Types of internet:
|Type|Speed Rank|Company in my area| |---|---|---| |Traditional Sattelite|6|Hughes Net| |DSL|5|Frontier (no new service)| |WIFI|4|Metalink| |CDMA (5g)|3|T-Mobile, Verizon, AT&T| |Starlink|3|Starlink| |Cable|2|Mediacom| |Fiber (DTH)|1|Frontier, SMTA|
So lets start with the slowest and work our way to the fastest.
A cap is a limit on how much data you can use in a set amount of time. If you use more than the limit you usually incur extra charges.
DSL - Digital Subscriber Line, or DSL, is an interesting solution that there is no longer a problem for. When the world first started turning off our 56k modems and switching over to broadband, there were huge parts of the country that had only telephone lines. By using telephone lines a company could send internet over the phone lines, and even keep the digital internet signals and the analog phone signals separate! This meant that you could talk on the phone and get on the internet at the same time. (Trust me this was a problem back in the day). However with its capped speed at 25 mb/s, in today’s modern world, its falling in favor fast.
WIFI Internet - Not to be confused with the WIFI router in your home, WIFI internet works by beaming the same radio waves as your home router at a much stronger signal strength. With special antennas mounted on your house you can pick up the different “towers” just like you would with cell service. This internet is usually costly because of its high maintenance costs, and its speed and latency are completely dependent on your proximity to the tower, any objects blocking you and the signal etc. Although this is a much better option than both DSL and Traditional Satellite when it comes to internet. Usually speeds are 25 - 100 mb/s.
Latency is the amount of time it takes for a packet to reach its host. Good latency is anywhere below 40 ms with acceptable latency being less than 100 ms.
Starlink uses Satellites that are much lower to earth than traditional satellite. There are no data caps and the service runs right around 120 bucks a month. The biggest caveat to Starlink is its expensive start up costs. You have to buy the dish that you mount to your home (or RV) and these can cost 500 to 1k depending on the version you get. Then you have to pay the monthly fees which around 120 for regular and 165 for roaming. (you can get a 50 gb data cap version of roam for 50 a month). This is a reasonable cost for this new technology and it has truly brought high speed internet across the globe. It has been used in emergencies (it can be deployed rapidly) and even in the Ukraine war! Its a solid choice if you can afford the start up costs and especially if you want to take your internet with you.
5G is much like starlink except the towers are on the ground. Your internet speed and latency highly depends on factors such as building composition (metal = bad) and other things like distance. It is possible to see speeds of 500 mb/s in modern scenarios. 5G is shaping up to be a good alternative to modern internet, but be on the look out for data caps and soft caps.
A "soft data cap" is where an isp will slow down your internet speed after you use so much bandwidth; this is common among cell phone carries such as T-Mobile and verizon.
2nd Place. Cable internet (mediacom). This is actually a really old technology, but with the latest DOCIS modems speeds can reach over 1 gb/s. There are a few caveats that cause Cable to be 2nd place. The first thing is in Hicksville Mediacom gives you data caps. They use that to force you to purchase higher tiered packages. Cable internet is also a bit unreliable because of the coax connections. As they wear with time, signal degradation occurs and rapidly causes the loss of packets and signal. It can also be difficult to diagnose issues with signal loss as they are commonly intermittent. The last thing about cable, is often upload speeds are much lower than download. Its common to have 1gb/s download and only 50 to 100 mb/s upload!
Download Speed is how fast you can pull things from the internet Upload speed is how fast you can send things to the internet. If you are streaming on twitch, for example, you may need a faster upload speed.
And finally Last but not least, DTH (Direct to Home) fiber internet. This is the fastest internet you can get. Its capable of reaching speeds of over 10gb/s and it can do it with latency in the single digits! As a matter of fact, we don't even have the computing hardware necessary to push fiber to its limit. The fasted recorded speed ever is 402 tb/s. That's Terabits! 1 Terabit = 1000 gigabit. SMTA and Frontier both serve the Hicksville area with fiber optic networks. The only downside to Fiber, is availability. It can be very costly to build out a fiber network so it many people do not have fiber internet available to them in their area. If you can get a fiber connection, this is hands down the only way to go in 2024. Its cheap, reliable, and simple. Once installed the fiber lines are just glass tubes carrying light, there is no rusting or signal degradation to worry about over time. If the lines are there, they will work. (unless you don't call before you dig and accidentally murder one with a shovel)
Speed is calculated in what we call bits per second.
1000 bits/second = 1 mbit / second
1000 mbits / second = 1 gb/s
1000 gb/s = 1 terabit/second
So which internet is right for you? It depends. The average cost of internet in the United States right now is 80 dollars a month for 1 gb /s fiber internet. Currently SMTA charges 220 dollars a month for gigabit and Frontier charges 70 a month for one year and 80 a month after that. Some people believe that SMTA has a much better value built in because of their excellent support, but I cannot see paying 3x the national average for internet, when there is another option.
Frontier has had some serious problems. It was rated as the worst ISP for customer service and their old DSL network was neglected badly. So badly in fact, that they just stopped supporting it all together. At this point once the DSL goes out, its unlikely they will repair or ever add new customers. But a few years ago Frontier declared bankruptcy and reformed their whole company. They rallied around fiber and rebuilt their entire infrastructure. As of the time of writing, they are being hailed as a great comeback story in the modern age. Hopefully this continues to hold true.
So that brings me to the conclusion. Which internet is best? FIBER 100% hands down bar none. What if you need portable internet, or internet out in the middle of nowhere? Starlink or 5G has you covered. What if you are just on the edge of town and just need cheap internet to get you by? Maybe WIFI is the way to go! Avoid traditional satellite internet and DSL at all costs. I hope this article helps you understand some of the ways our current technology keeps us all connected. If you want more information or an in home or business consultation please contact me.
Some more helpful information:
|Type|Speed |Use Case| |---|---|---| |Traditional Sattelite|25 mb/s|Email / Web browsing| |DSL|24 mb/s|Streamming 1 stream at 1080p| |WIFI|100 mb/s|1 4k stream or 4 hd streams| |CDMA (5g)|100 -500 mb/s |Multiple 4k streams| |Starlink|100 - 400 mb/s|Starlink| |Cable|gigabit|ALL the streaming / Crappy upload| |Fiber (DTH)|Unlimited (in theory)|The best of the best |
Drew Wort drew@worttechnologies.tech 4199081275