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Most reliable internet provider
Moving to the villages soon, work remotely, and NEED a reliable internet provider. I notice we have some choices, including fiber. Do you have any you would recommend, avoid? Thanks in advance.
I recently switched to fiber in my current location. Upload speeds are great, but my main need is adequate download speed and reliability. Fenny area |
Your choices are limited to where you locate. For example, I am located near Lake Sumter Landing. I have Xfinity and the reliability for me has been great, but the cost is on the high side.
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Xfinity, just don’t confuse reliable internet service with good customer service.
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On Fiber, not sure you will have that as an option... 3 years ago they said I would be able to get it in a year, still nothing. I'm in Fenney... |
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The Xfinity service I had in my neighborhood was very reliable. I never needed to call support and I don't believe I may have needed to reboot the modem/router twice in five years. The T-Mobile service I have now had a week when it was acting poorly but has been very reliable otherwise. Since this service runs over the cellular system the issues I saw that week could have been due to oversubscription (too many people) or a cell tower under repair. All I know is it has been fine since. Many people on here have good things to say about Quantum but I have no experience with it myself. One way to find out which providers are in your area is to look on their sites. Xfinity, T-Mobile, Quantum, and others provide a way to check availability at your address. |
I have had both Xfinity and Quantum fiber. Both have worked well and are very reliable. I switched to Quantum about 3 years ago - it's fiber, so by design it should be more reliable and have more consistent speeds (and it does!). I'm getting 1GB service for $35/month. More than 3x the speed I had with Xfinity at less than half the cost.
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Fiber is Always going to be the most reliable since it's all fiber optic light wave.
The difference between fiber and cable is the technology. Cable's old copper network is not maintained for capacity anymore here in the Villages so depending on where you live you may get buffering at peak times because you are sharing the cable with all your neighbors. With cable you get the advertised download speed, most of the time but you only get 20-30mbs upload. No option. Limitation of the cable technology. With Fiber you get your own dedicated conection, no sharing to the ISP, and you get the same full download and upload speeds. Fiber is not suseptible to lightning or power surges like cable and is all light wave so when we have power outages, you don't have to worry about a hub not getting power in your area like you do with cable which needs power at several points. Since you live in Fenney, you can get Quantum fiber. as low as $40, no contract, no tax, no fees, no promotion, and the equipment is included. If you are interested, I can help just reach out to me. If you live south of Fenney, then Centric fiber is installed when the homes are built and they are also very reliable. If you can't get fiber, I tend to like Spectrum cable. |
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Cindy |
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It tells me I can get 200Mbps for $45. |
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Copper cable can be just as reliable as fiber. There are physical limitations and mitigations with both. Availability, service reliability, price, and support all matter more than the particular technology being used. - Fiber is no good at all if it isn't available. - 5G is not a good option at the limit of the cell where service is spotty - Cable is not a good choice if the price is high I would take a 100Mbps service in the $45 price range from a company that doesn't have a lot of complaints regardless of how it was provided. |
You don't have a choice, you're stuck with whatever provider is in your area.
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I have three properties in the villages. One is near LSL and uses Xfinity. Two are in the new areas and use Centric Fiber. I have found both Xfinity and Centric Fiber to be 100% reliable.
I have chosen the highest available speed from both providers and both are blazingly fast and exceed my needs. I have measured the speeds using typical speed check apps and Centric Fiber is faster, particularly in upload speeds, but I cannot notice that difference in ordinary use. Centric Fiber is cheaper than Xfinity. |
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I also checked a Linden Isle address on the Spectrum page. The particular address I queried already has a Spectrum account. You might give them a try. |
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Cindy |
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Spectrum looks really, really good if it's your only option. :smiley: |
Starlink
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We have Spectrum and are in 32163. Their customer service is excellent and they have been very responsive on the few occasions I have had to call to either change my service or make an inquiry about something. I have heard nothing but bad things about xfinity’s service but they are running a locked on 5 year deal right now. Quantum is not available in my area.
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Centric is great with near 1g Download and Upload speeds (mine is around 980) (great for uploading my YouTube videos). At 68.00 a month a great deal and the customer service there is top notch. I called them once and they came out that day (within a few hours of my call). It was actually my router causing the restriction (QOS setting). Before I actually moved to TV I submitted an online question and one of their techs called me that day. I had comcast up North, calling them was a chore. On hold, long wait times.
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If you can get fiber, that’s your best option. Go with either copper network if you can’t get fiber.
I worked out of my home in high tech and had 1G speeds fiber. In retirement, I have 1G speed using copper. Do not go with the 100, 300 or even the 500Mb speeds if you do a lot of data during the month because there are caps on how much data you can download/upload. Your faster speed networks usually have no data caps. Also remember, all copper networks (non fiber) have the very slow upload speeds (I have 1G down and 40Mb upload with spectrum) so if you do any large file transfers at the same time do zoom calls, your upload bandwidth could be degraded. If you get the slower speeds like 100, 200, etc, your upload speeds are even slower. When I worked from home, they wanted me to backup to the corporate servers which take all of the bandwidth of the slower copper cables. Also, you will need a good lan/wifi setup in your house to get reliable access to your computer. If you work in front of the router, no problem, but if you work in a Bedroom and the router is in the kitchen, get somebody to build you a robust network in your house, preferably using a wired connection to your router |
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Now are you saying Xfinity or Spectrum is just as reliable as Quantum? Different question. All three companies are very reliable just with the cable companies you are always getting promotions that you have to constantly re-negotiate. And the technology is totally different. As mentioned, when people reach out to me for help connecting to Quantum, a significant number say they are tired of the buffering at prime times, and this will vary depending on where you live here in the Villages, along with the need to reduce their monthly costs. The reduction comes with the internet service and getting rid of cable and moving to streaming. Remember, cable is a "shared" connection with good download but terrible upload speeds where fiber is a "dedicated" connection with the same download and upload speeds. The need for speed was mentioned. In many cases, cable subscribers sigh up for the higher speeds so when they sometimes get "slow-downs" during peak times they still have enough speed to do what they want. With fiber there is no need for that. Finally, did you know, one of the most common ways an induced lightning power surge can enter your home and damage and or destroy your sensitive electronic devices is through the copper cable line? It happens a lot and most do not know or install any surge protection on the incoming cable line to their home. In fact, many aren't even properly grounded. The protector costs about $29.95 on Amazon. With fiber there is no need to worry about this. Amazon.com |
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I've only had two outages since hooking it up 2 1/2 years ago. The first lasted of a couple hours, the most recent one (yesterday, as a matter of fact) lasted about 30 minutes. You can cancel anytime, no contract, no data caps. |
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You are right people tend to overestimate the amount of bandwidth they need and part of that comes from using cable. As mentioned, since cable is a shared service, some get more speed so when they get a slowdown, there is still adequate speed available to do what they need. Also, unless you get the most expensive cable internet package, the latency/delay is relatively high. Less latency will "feel" faster. With fiber no matter what speed you get, the latency is the same about 4ms. Very fast, so there is no need to get more speed than what you believe you need. |
In Fenney, using Quantum fiber. For $35/month it is awesome compared to comcast.
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Quantum in 32163.
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I live in 32163 and have had quantum fiber for a year, no issues
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Xfinity is a great deal for us currently.
A month ago, when our 2-year contract was up with Xfinity for internet (800Mbps) and cable TV and our rates went up, we made the decision to go with Quantum Fiber and YouTube TV for streaming service. The service with Xfinity was always reliable. I had been working remotely over VPN as a software engineer and had no issues with service, only the cost. After switching to Quantum, I called Xfinity to cancel their services. They made me an offer I couldn't refuse. While they made it clear that the cable TV service could not be discounted (They seem to accept that many are switching to streaming), they gave me a 5 year no-contract price for 1-GIG internet to match QF, and then additional discounts for autopay, our Xfinity mobile lines, and "loyalty", which are 2-yr discounts. My Xfinity bill is now $23.00. They also sent a free XUMO box (which I don't need and am not using). So I am back on Xfinity for internet and YouTube TV for streaming. P.s., for the brief period of time that I used QF, I had no issues with that service either.
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So, here is what happens, sorry for the rant. You stay with Xfinity for 5 years. After the 5 years is up, whatever they offer you, by that time everything will have increased in price, will probably be way more than if you went with QF now and locked in the current price for life with them. I've seen this with my neighbors many times. That $35 1 Gig service QF had will probably never happen again but thousands of us here in the Villages will be enjoying that service for years to come. Just another perspective on the subject. |
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Cable systems need to periodically powered from your home? Sure, you have to provide power to the cable modem but you also need to provide power to the ONT. Where is the difference? Providers are deploying fiber for cost and bandwidth. More fibers in a smaller space enables connecting more customers. I didn't write that fiber wasn't the best choice for new installations, I wrote that cable networks can be just as reliable. Quote:
Business practices and price are also considerations but are less important. If you only chase price then the phrase, "You get what you pay for," comes into play. I am not at all interested in renegotiating my price every year; in fact, I'm willing to pay a little more to avoid playing those games. Likewise, a company that gains a reputation for an odd interpretation of the term "price for life" is not attractive to me either. Quote:
The characteristics of fiber allows for higher upload speeds. This is not an issue for me but can be an issue for certain use cases (multiple camera feed stored in the cloud, recording OTA TV to the cloud, probably some gaming, etc). Quote:
Quantum tells me their most popular plan is 940Mbps plan for $65. I have no idea whether that is true but I'm sure the statement drives people towards that plan. Their bottom tier plan is $45 for 200Mbps so look at that, I can get 370% more bandwidth for only $20. I can pay $0.23/Mbps or I can pay $0.07/Mbps - the more economical 940Mbps plan is the clear choice. But I am not using the entire 200Mbps, much less 940Mbps! If I only need a cup of milk then it doesn't matter that the price per ounce is cheaper if I buy the quart since I will be throwing most of it away. Paying extra to waste milk once doesn't make sense, doing it every month is foolish - the same goes for spending more to purchase bandwidth you will never use. You have mentioned the slow-downs during peak times frequently. I have never seen that but I can imagine that it could happen with a poorly provisioned network - including a fiber network. Providers can offer higher speeds on fiber networks because the technology supports it and because they know the subscribers won't actually utilize it. However, as they route more and more subscribers through the same concentrator and as devices start utilizing more of the bandwidth even "dedicated" fiber networks will start to have slow downs. It will be interesting to see how long that takes. Quote:
$30 is very small amount to pay to protect a $1,000 television but debatable for a $200 cable modem that might be covered by the provider. In all the years I've had cable into my home or satellite dishes sitting on the roof I have never had a problem with lightning but yeah, it does happen. |
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The $35 1G service from QF is not happening now or two months ago when he changed providers. Today, QF will be happy to sell me 940Mbps (close to 1G) for $65 compared to the $23 that he is paying. Even if some of his discounts only last for two years, that is over $1,000 saved and if the $23 price lasts for five years the savings will add up to $2,500. If he starts with $2,500 savings by 2030 then QF will need to raise their 1G price to over $100 in order for him to break even by 2035. How likely is that? What's the chance that QF won't discover a new meaning of life again and increase those $65 payments? What's the chance there won't be another shift in technology and new plans at 5Gbps or higher will be available for the same price? |
I pay $39.99 for 1G spectrum, why would I go any slower in speeds? I was paying $80 for 1G xfinity before that and they wanted to almost double the cost for 1G so I went with spectrum
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At the end of the day, most people here in the Villages are cost driven so they will tend to go with the cheapest solution and not necessarily the "better" solution. The cable companies know this and right now they are "taking a beating" so they play on this. The big problem with cable is the industry knew that customers would eventually cut the cord but the rate that this has been happening is faster than anyone imagined which is causing them to diversify by selling cell phone service, for example, in order to stay in business. I don't have a problem with Xfinity or Spectrum except for their business model where they try to bait you into signing up for a promotion then forever try to raise you to their full price rates. There are a lot of people who live here in the Villages who have the ability to re-negotiate with the cable companies but there are also a lot who don't have this ability and many of those are unfairly paying full price to subsidize those promotions. Just look at the folks in the Bonita area where these was not choice in providers untill recently. Almost all were paying full price for everything and no deals because the cable companies knew this area, for example had no choices for wired interner providers. So, if you can get fiber at a reasonable price that meets your needs then that is the "best" service you can buy right now no matter what the cable companies offer you. And this was the initial question the OP was asking. |
Copper networks are never going to be as reliable as fiber. With copper, when I was working at home in high tech, on snow days when my neighbors were home, the network took a huge nose dive in performance. The more neighbors you have on the network the less bandwidth you will have with copper networks. With fiber, you don’t have these issues. All networks going across the country use fiber not copper.
I must have been lucky because for 30 years, work always paid for my network at home. I put in ISDN (I think it had 256k speeds) in my house in 1991 to work at home or access work if I was on call. Then went to dsl, Microwave, then fiber and copper. For working at home, I would get fiber no matter the cost. |
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