Do any of the realtors use broadband as a selling point for homes?

Damn, I must be lucky. Verizon Fios

Ping 5ms download 42.95Mbps Up 25.95Mbps

have to admit, it's smokin fast

Just now using Cox cable:

Ping 47ms Down 23.4 Mbps Up 5.68 Mbps

Question is how accurate is that test? I'm only paying for "up to"

Good point. Like everything else an agent tells you, it's prudent to confirm the claim. Fortunately, that's not too hard.

And often no business connections either. Unless you have really significant requirements and want say gigibit MAE service they won't bother.

What most people don't realize is that unless they are in a major market many businesses are stuck with crappy Internet because the cable company wired the residential neighborhoods and never thought about the commercial and what used to be industrial areas and the phone companies often care very little about upgrading their wired infrastructure.

We border on what used to be a rural area where people decided they don't want neighbors so they moved out there . There are maybe 10 homes/mile. The few people who live there are constantly making noise about why everyone else should pay to bring cable services to their homes.

Exactly, but for some reason people will pay for that but want cable infrastructure installed for free.

A friend moved out to a rural area and the power company wanted around $30k to extend the power lines and they paid that because they don't want neighbors. But yet they keep on insisting the cable company is rotten because they won't build out to their property for free.

Sure, but their is a easy remedy for that. They just install a remote DSLAM . But the problem is phone companies are largely not interested in maintaining or upgrading their wired networks because say they put a remote DSLAM down the block from you they still can't offer TV.

Sure, it made sense to help make our food supply more efficient by bringing electric lights, motors and refrigeration to farmers. But what value is to the average taxpayer to pay for someones broadband because they live in a sparsely populated area typically by choice?

Comcast does it by estimating construction cost. They will eat the first so many dollars per installation.

Tests are fooled by what comcast calls "powerboost" . Basically the first part of a connection is allowed to go through at a much faster than your rated speed. So it fools the sppedtest sites and is great for bragging rights for people who don't realize what is happening.

Of course I don't. Why did you think I did?

Harry K

Yep. 1 mile down the road from me is one of the biggest John Deere dealerships in this area. The fiber optic rus right by them - no tap. I can see the tower they use for internet from my bedroom windwo.

Harry K

That tower might be for their GPS. It could be a correction tower for the farmers' tracking systems. Farm equipment can steer itself now.

We have a facility and slow DSL is all there is. Last year one of the cell companies put a site really close to that facility. Verizon ran almost 4 miles of fiber from their CO to the new cell site. I got all of the info I could from the cell people and no one in Verizon is even the slightest bit interested in talking to me about getting connectivity over the spare fiber they ran.

We looked at a point to point link and an 80' tower would be needed to clear a ridge. It would cost $30,000 to put up a freestanding tower.

What's the point of the whine about it running right by your house, if you know it can't be used? It might just as well be a hundred miles away?

It turned out to be rather impossible. Comcast's site claimed we were in their service area. Considering that the house is in a part of the development that isn't yet built out (there are only two houses, of perhaps twenty, on my street). I was skeptical but Comcast confirmed, until I went to order service. Fortunately, AT&T had reasonable DSL service there. Hughes, with it's 250MB monthly cap, wasn't going to cut it. I had 3G service but it was really weak (often only available next to the window).

That tower might be for their GPS. It could be a correction tower for the farmers' tracking systems. Farm equipment can steer itself now.

What's the point of your post? You just bored or sumpin?

Harry K

Ah. that explains it then. I see Cox advertising something like that but didn't think about it affecting the speed test. Actually in everyday use I noticed little difference between my current Cox cable