OT: Internet Options in Rural Areas?

[bmeryman]

Hi all,

As part of our upcoming move I'm assessing all of our current utilities. Although increasing internet costs have been at the back of my mind whenever we get our auto-pay bills from Comcast, I haven't really digested it until now. Internet is expensive!

I'm afraid that where we're moving looks like it will only have one local internet option, and while they offer similar speeds it will be ~20% more expensive. I work from home about half the time, and while we are not often streaming multiple devices, I do enjoy being able to follow along with races live (while working on spreadsheets) from time to time.

Does anyone here more internet-minded than myself have any creative solutions to this? I'm not sure I can even shop two providers against one another to get low introductory pricing.

Thank you!

[Tony T]

If you have 5G cellular, see if your Carrier has Home Internet (T-Mobile does)
Look into DSL from landline phone co.
As a new subscriber, you should get a cheaper introductory deal from cable.
Look into Satellite (Dish)

[2000m2]

You could check in to satellite based services like

• Viasat
• Hughes Net
• Starlink

Though, I can't offer any experiences with any of the above.

[mtb_frk]

Satellite internet is expensive. You could look into Star link, which also looks expensive. There are 5g home services, but where we live it isn’t offered. You can check on their webpages to see. We got lucky and got DSL in 2018, before that I was just using my phone and a hot spot. Another thing to check is if your current cell phone has decent coverage at the new location. Dish/direct tv is expensive as well just for tv. We were able to drop them and stream everything we need.

[glepore]

have had the satellite services, and they lag horribly. A no go for video from home. If you have a decent cell signal, there are companies that resell data only access over cell, which works pretty well. Starlink is really good if its available.
There is a federally funded push to get fiber to the last 1%, we had no cell and 6 mb dsl until last month, now 100gig fiber...

[Upcountry]

As a rural internet user, avoid any of the traditional satellite internet offerings. We literally had two options at our place in the woods when we moved here in 2020... Local Dial up, with up to 5mbps, or Hughes Net satellite with up to 20mbps, but with data limits each month, and it was then metered down to 3mbps. We paid for the business version, which was $170 per month, and gave you 150GB of data, which would not last us much more than a week on many occasions, which was ironic, as we were unable to stream anything due to the slow speed(up and down). (rough estimate is that 150gb data would be about 40 minutes of TV streaming a day, and doesn't include any browsing, email, voip, etc). Our neighbor has Viasat, and it sounds just as terrible. Additionally, the line of sight required for these can be a no-go depending on where you live, as the Viasat was really low to the horizon for us.

Starlink has been a godsend... Elon is a wacko, but we are thankful for him everyday... LOL. Despite raising their prices $5 every few months, its nice owning the equipment, and their service has been stellar. We have maybe an hour a week of "downtime" which is usually in little five minute bursts, but that could probably be remedied with some tree felling.

[uno-speedo]

I hear good things about nomadinternet.com.

[bmeryman]

Some really cool ideas so far, thank you all! I'll start picking through these one by one to see what's available and what might be our best option.

[nortx-Dave]

hWhen I retired to rural north Texas in 2014 I got Hughes Net as I thought it was really my only option. That lasted 2 years until I got DSL. Now we're waiting for our local electric coop to string fiber our way. Hughes Net was terrible. Too slow, very restrictive data caps and too unreliable to stream anything. I certainly would not want to work from home and use Hughes Net.

[reuben]

I can't speak for current satellite speeds, but when I lived semi in the woods and had DirecTV for about a year it was junk. Didn't work worth a damn during any precipitation, which is when I was more likely to watch TV or look for a new rabbit hole on the internet.

Caveat/disclaimer: My experience is only one person, and about 15 years old. I would check with people who live where you're moving about their type of usage, and how well it works.

All internet is local. - me

[wallymann]

verizon 5G is da bomb.

[yngpunk]

Originally Posted by bmeryman

Hi all,

As part of our upcoming move I'm assessing all of our current utilities. Although increasing internet costs have been at the back of my mind whenever we get our auto-pay bills from Comcast, I haven't really digested it until now. Internet is expensive!

I'm afraid that where we're moving looks like it will only have one local internet option, and while they offer similar speeds it will be ~20% more expensive. I work from home about half the time, and while we are not often streaming multiple devices, I do enjoy being able to follow along with races live (while working on spreadsheets) from time to time.

Does anyone here more internet-minded than myself have any creative solutions to this? I'm not sure I can even shop two providers against one another to get low introductory pricing.

Thank you!

Go here: https://broadbandmap.fcc.gov/location-summary/fixed and type in your address and it will bring up what ISPs claim they offer service to your address and the up/down speeds. There is also a tab to see who offers fixed wireless as well.

[metalheart]

In our previous rural home we had line-of- site wireless at about 6Mpbs down and it was ok and generally reliable, but those types of providers are not everywhere. When we moved to our current rural home wireless was not an option but we could get 5MPBS down DSL, although it proved to be unreliable. We are not near a cell tower to take advantage of some of the cell service internet access options. We know some local folks with both Hugesnet and Via Sat and both of those are detested by those who use them. When Starlink became available I jumped on it and it works pretty well, good download speeds and for me it has been reliable. it is costly compared to other options, but if you have no other option then it is worth it. It does have some siting requirements to ensure your antenna is not obstructed. There seem to be workarounds for most of the siting issues users have had with Starlink. It is worth checking to see if it is available in your planned location.

[yngpunk]

Originally Posted by reuben

I can't speak for current satellite speeds, but when I lived semi in the woods and had DirecTV for about a year it was junk. Didn't work worth a damn during any precipitation, which is when I was more likely to watch TV or look for a new rabbit hole on the internet.

Caveat/disclaimer: My experience is only one person, and about 15 years old. I would check with people who live where you're moving about their type of usage, and how well it works.

All internet is local. - me

FYI...Direct TV no longer offers Internet service. However, you can get Direct TV with your AT&T Fiber internet service...but not sure why you'd want both...

[2LeftCleats]

Nothing to offer regarding internet providers, but just wondering if you work from home, will your employer offset some of the expense, or can any of it be deducted as a business expense?