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How Much Does Your Broadband Cost?

Posted by Cliff on from the huge-market-for-last-mile-fat-pipes dept.

Anders Höckersten asks: "Recently, the Vice President of Sweden's largest ISP Telia declared that broadband is far too cheap in this country, compared to what it costs internationally. Meanwhile, surveys have shown that people aren't prepared to pay more than what they are currently paying. My question is simple: How much do you pay for your broadband, and what upload and download speeds do you get? As a reference, getting 1024 kbps (that's kilobits) download and 200 kbps upload from Telia currently costs 295 SEK (around $30)."

9 of 143 comments (clear)

  1. I pay $80/month for 768 kb/s down, 384 up... by renehollan · · Score: 3, Informative

    ...on a dedicated pair 12.6 kft from the C/O, from Internet America in the Dallas, Texas area.

    --
    You could've hired me.
  2. $50/month for standard cablemodem service by Paranoid · · Score: 3, Informative

    1.2Mbit down, 128Kbit up.
    $40/month for the service, + $10/month cablemodem rental.
    Charter Pipeline, South Lake Tahoe, California.

    --
    Paranoid
    Bwaahahahahaa.
  3. using Qwest Biz DSL by kootch · · Score: 3, Informative

    I'm paying $150/month for 768k/768k

    I also was given the opportunity to buy blocks for IP addresses at 5 IP's for $50 (one-time fee)

    I can also upgrade my service to 1.5mbit/1.5mbit for an extra $50/month (total of $200/month)

    These is a slight discount if you engage in a 1yr or 2 yr contract with them also.

  4. What they really want to know is... by Webmoth · · Score: 3

    Appears to me that they've realized that they can charge more to increase profits. What they want to know is at what price point (as price is increased) will the revenues lost to unhappy customers outweigh the increased revenues from remaining customers?

    So Telia figures that Swedish customers are getting a great deal. Too good of a deal, because customers elsewhere in the world pay more. Doesn't this tell you that we in other countries are getting soaked, that it really DOESN'T cost them $44.95USD to provide me with broadbad; that they could be charging $30USD and still make a profit?

    That's $44.95USD for 1024kd/256ku for AT&T Broadband cable I'm paying.

    --
    Give me my freedom, and I'll take care of my own security, thank you.
  5. Twice as much as before... by NetJunkie · · Score: 3, Informative

    I had a RoadRunner cable modem for $40/month. My company picked up the bill for it so now it is registered as a business cable modem. They pay $80/month for exactly the same setup.

    To get a static IP I would have to pay a $99 install fee (they change me to a Cisco box) and an extra $50/month.

    But, I'm very happy with it. 2Mb/sec down, 384Kb/sec up and I get every bit of it.

    1. Re:Twice as much as before... by LWolenczak · · Score: 3, Informative

      I have several customers on business cable modem service. I have yet to see any of their ip addys change since Road runner around here seperated business and residential users. Incidently, my ip on my earthlink cable via time warner has yet to change, and its been three months since I had it installed. I got the same ip with my laptop, and with my desktop after cycling the cable modem power, so it seems my ip is also semi-static.

  6. Check out dslreports.com by Sentry21 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Check out DSLReports.com for a lot of ISPs and reviews thereof in multiple countries (US, Canada, UK, and one other afaik).

    Also, I use Shaw, as does another slashdot user. I get what s/he gets.

    Also, a friend of mine in Washington state gets wireless internet for free. Not legally, but...

    --Dan

  7. Re:Bizarre comparison by Sentry21 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    God, just shut up.

    This is the internet remember? You can find anything if you know what to look for. GDP, average incomes, tax rates, tax brackets, population densities, urban plans, street maps, bandwidth prices...

    But have you ever tried to find an ISP or cable company in a country you've never lived in? Keyword searches don't work too well, since most companies assume you know where they are and who they service.

    By finding out from customers (such a diverse array of customers as this) you can find out that (maybe) Americans are paying more than Canadians and Germans, but maybe Germans are paying more than Canadians. Then you can compare that against economies and get a good idea of what's what.

    Add on to that the fact that a lot of broadband providers don't even quote exact speeds that you're rate-limited to, let alone that you're likely to get.

    There have been some sincerely stupid Ask Slashdot questions in the past, but this isn't really one of them.

    --Dan

  8. TimeWarner RoadRunner, Western NY by extra88 · · Score: 3, Informative

    US$45/month ($5 discount if also paying for $30+ cable TV)

    2Mbps download cap
    384Kbps upload cap

    Noticably slower at peak times but still satisfactory (can listen to 128Kbps audio streams, load web pages and download files many times faster than dialup).

    Only noticed one case of downtime (couple of hours) in the past 4 months.

    Latency is pretty good, I can always find 100ms Quake3 servers.

    Service includes USENET news server (including binary groups), 5 email accounts, 5MB web disk space. No virus filtering on mail.

    The only port I know is blocked is 25 (you can't receive mail on your own SMTP server). Running servers is not explicitly supported but they're not shut down either. Ditto for NAT boxes (tho' they will sell you additional IPs for $5/month if you want). Port 80 has never been blocked.

    IPs are not static but address seems to change only once a year for the same MAC address (if your MAC address changes, your IP changes).

    DSL is available in the area with comparable features & rates. I am pretty happy with my service. I don't think I would seriously consider dropping it unless the rate went over $50/month.