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Alan P
February 25th, 2014, 06:41 PM
Got my Fibre activated a couple of weeks ago:


http://www.speedtest.net/result/3332458263.png

Not bad for £10 a month. They do an 80/20 package but I don't get a discount so not going for that one at the moment. I'm also using a 5GHz Wireless Bridge instead of a cable so I'm pretty pleased with that.

Random
February 25th, 2014, 07:47 PM
You, sir, can fuck right off.

Sincerely,
An American Whose "Free Market" Has Dictated That He Has A Choice Between Shitty And Sucky For Broadband Service

Random
February 25th, 2014, 08:51 PM
Relevant: http://www.theverge.com/2014/2/25/5431382/the-internet-is-fucked

:angry:

TheBenior
February 25th, 2014, 09:48 PM
I frequently see the population density excuse for our shitty internet.

I don't buy it, because I live in a dense Chicago neighborhood (Tyler, Keith, and Adam can all attest) and all I can get is overpriced Comcast cable and horrifically slow AT&T DSL. Hell, I think AT&T has pretty much stopped investing in their local fiber optic network unless they're signing up a condo association or apartment complex with dozens of units.

KillerB
February 25th, 2014, 10:20 PM
Weirdly, Time Warner randomly upgraded my service from 50Mbps to 100Mbps, and sent me a letter saying the upgrade is free. Now, I haven't actually SEEN 100Mbps, but before it would flatline at 50Mbps, and now gets up to 85+. So that's nice, but I still felt like FiOS was more reliably fast.

Yw-slayer
February 25th, 2014, 11:10 PM
After some initial glitches (usually not more than 400/300 even on my man desktop) 1000/1000 fibre seems to be delivering, and is working out pretty awesome.

Alan P
February 26th, 2014, 04:40 PM
While for some people the lack of investment, especially in rural areas is really giving rise to a 'two tier' internet where those in population centres get huge choice over their provider while those in rural area are deemed to have a choice but what they get is a choice of which company leases space from British Telecom, I am glad that out Regulator, OFCOM basically tied one hand behind BT's back for several years, mandated that the part of BT that controls 'the last mile' (From Exchange to property) be spun off completely and is not allowed to give any Internet or Telephony provider preferential treatment. This means that there is plenty of competition, despite the fact that BT, Sky, Everything Everywhere (Formed by T-Mobile and Orange Merger), Talk Talk and Virgin (Owned by Liberty Global as it happens) control 98% of the domestic broadband market. You nearly always have the choice of changing provider if you're not happy with the existing company. Although I work for my ISP and used to get DSL free (normally £7.50 for what was 23 meg down, 1.2 up) and now pay half the standard price for my Fibre (the £10 mentioned in the first post) should I wish to I could choose from half a dozen other providers as well as dozens of smaller independent ISP's. The idea that a single provider brings competition, and the FCC can't see that it's bad for the consumer boggles the mind.

it's like the FCC has forgotten they have balls and is just pussyfooting around the big companies. The day these companies aren't afraid of the regulator is the day every consumer should be scared of. Virgin Media here have their own network that they've expanded while making losses of £100's of millions year on year while doing so. No one else has even bothered to consider creating their own network because BT's own network is already there. I can understand that someone like Time Warner or Comcast would be unwilling to open their own network that they've paid through the nose to setup and install, but IMO it should have been a condition of allowing them to do so. After a certain amount of time which they can have a monopoly to make their money back (or set it at a certain subscriber number as a ratio of potential customers reachable by the network) then they should have been forced to wholesale access to their cable service. At the moment they have their customers over a barrel, hence the overchartging for a poor service and they can't change to someone else. The FCC has dropped the ball not just once but multiple times.

Freude am Fahren
February 26th, 2014, 04:48 PM
:/ http://www.speedtest.net/result/3334778416.png (http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3334778416)

I could upgrade, I'm sure, but not worth it.

drew
February 27th, 2014, 05:30 AM
http://www.speedtest.net/result/3335921498.png

I may check it later this evening.

Jason
February 28th, 2014, 03:50 AM
http://www.speedtest.net/result/3335921498.png

I may check it later this evening.

That's basically what I get here in DC...

The thing I'm tired of, though, is the ever increasing prices. I pay $85 a month now for internet. When I started with Comcast some 7 years ago, it was about $40 a month.

Random
February 28th, 2014, 08:56 AM
It costs more to mine electrons these days. Thanks Obama!

Yw-slayer
February 28th, 2014, 04:13 PM
Oh. I pay USD70/month for 1000/1000 fibre. :D

Alan P
February 28th, 2014, 05:19 PM
£10 a month for 40 down 10 up. I admit that is half price. Normally £20+£15.40 for the line itself.

Jason
March 1st, 2014, 04:04 AM
:blahblah:

drew
May 11th, 2014, 07:23 AM
http://www.speedtest.net/result/3494229980.png (http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3494229980)

Turns out my old modem was a choker...

Alan P
May 11th, 2014, 04:27 PM
Nice.

Yw-slayer
May 11th, 2014, 05:06 PM
Good start.

CudaMan
May 11th, 2014, 06:42 PM
Behold the wonders of ATT DSL. :smh:

http://www.speedtest.net/result/3495040615.png

Yw-slayer
May 11th, 2014, 07:23 PM
LOL

drew
May 12th, 2014, 03:37 AM
oof

Conman
May 12th, 2014, 09:09 AM
http://www.speedtest.net/result/3496286654.png (http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3496286654)

Alan P
May 12th, 2014, 06:27 PM
Behold the wonders of ATT DSL. :smh:

http://www.speedtest.net/result/3495040615.png

If you can get some stats from your Router Brian and check your phone and broadband setup you might be able to improve that. Same with AT&T being able to tweak some of the settings, noticeable the DNR down slightly might get you another Meg or two.

CudaMan
May 12th, 2014, 07:15 PM
It's all kind of over my head. We've changed routers a couple times and had ATT check the lines, mostly because the connection is not the most stable. If memory serves that download speed is actually not far off what we pay for.

I remember my friend having FiOS in Oregon, hmm, 10 years ago maybe. It was light years ahead of this. 10 years is a long long time in the tech world. We should have all had FiOS-like connections by now.

Yw-slayer
May 12th, 2014, 07:41 PM
My work connection:

http://www.speedtest.net/result/3497201838.png

Random
May 14th, 2014, 08:28 AM
I remember my friend having FiOS in Oregon, hmm, 10 years ago maybe. It was light years ahead of this. 10 years is a long long time in the tech world. We should have all had FiOS-like connections by now.

Don't worry, the free market will take care of it.

*cough*

21Kid
May 19th, 2014, 10:58 AM
:lol:

Random
August 4th, 2014, 10:17 AM
We apparently got the "free speed upgrade" that Comcast has been rolling out. 57MB/s down, 5.7Mb/s up. Now we just need to address the fact that they are charging $100/mo for internet and phone. :|

thesameguy
August 4th, 2014, 10:23 AM
Let me know how that effort goes.

I pay $65 for symmetrical 20mbit internet, no phone, TV, etc. It's stretching my tolerance.

Random
August 4th, 2014, 10:30 AM
SureWest (or whatever their new name is now)?

I can get the same Intertoobs speed that I have now from Comcast for $65, sans phone. UVerse can't keep up for the money--they top out at 45 Mb/s.

Random
August 4th, 2014, 10:51 AM
google fiber cannot show up quickly enough. :|

Kchrpm
August 4th, 2014, 10:59 AM
google fiber cannot show up quickly enough. :|
Let's all move to Austin.

21Kid
August 4th, 2014, 12:08 PM
google fiber cannot show up quickly enough. :|

:random: +1

Alan P
August 6th, 2014, 05:33 PM
You guys are really getting screwed over. :(

thesameguy
August 6th, 2014, 06:21 PM
$80/mo for cell service, $50/mo for broadband and $4/gallon for gas... whaddayagonnado?

TheBenior
August 6th, 2014, 08:04 PM
http://www.speedtest.net/result/3673427654.png (http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3673427654)

Apparently my old Linksys E2500 was slowing things down, as I wasn't breaking 50 Mbps before. We picked up an Asus RT-AC66R, which we actually mainly got for the increased range now that we have a second floor to worry about. I replaced my old WRT54G with the E2500 because the WRT54G died after several years of faithful service, but it seemed like the WRT54G had better range, presumably because external antennas are better.

KillerB
August 25th, 2014, 08:59 PM
http://www.speedtest.net/result/3714326355.png

Not bad for being over the wireless router.

Freude am Fahren
August 26th, 2014, 07:15 AM
I hate all of you.

At least I don't download torrents anymore really. My 8Mb/s* does fine for browsing and streaming just fine. But that GT6 update last night was a pain in the ass, as are any game updates/downloads.

*I think I get throttled at a certain point.

George
November 6th, 2014, 08:12 AM
Do any of you guys know how to get a provider like Comcast to put an offer in writing? Get this...

A neighbor, not a Comcast employee, and good friend called my wife and told her of a decent deal Comcast is running. The specifics don't really matter for the purposes of this post, but it seems like a good deal and we would save a decent chunk of money every month by combining TV, internet, and phone for at least two years. Yeah, I know after that we'll need to shop again.

Anyway, my wife called the Comcast sales chick who sold the same deal to our neighbor. Wife jotted down the details. I asked my wife to get it all the details in an email or a fax. I don't think she asked for it.

Yesterday was installation day. My wife called me at work because something didn't seem as promised. I talked to the installer who said he was just a contractor with a work order and did we want him to do it or not? We sent him on his way. I asked my wife to have the sales chick call me after she called me wife. Certainly a sales rep who just lost a sale would be on the phone within minutes, right? Nope. She never called and it has now been over 24 hours.

Comcast has recently opened a large retail office directly between my work and my office, so I stopped in yesterday evening to get their price list of whatever they could show me in writing to see exactly what we would get for exactly how much money. A reasonable request, right? Of course.

I had two sales guys helping me and they could rattle off every spec and every price immediately, but expressed only in terms of "$X more per month", and not completely explained without asking for clarification, such as this:

Comcast Dude: "You have three TVs? You'll need two small boxes, in addition to the large one for your main TV. That's only $9.99 more per month."

Me: "Ten bucks gets the two extra boxes?"

CD: "It's $9.99, Sir." (I am not making this up!)

Me: "$9.99 is for BOTH boxes?"

CD: "Uh, well, no...that's for each."

Me: "So it's twenty extra dollars per month more than we're paying now, and we're already have cable going to three TVs."

CD: "No, not that much, because you're already paying $2.99 for the boxes you have."

Me: "Three bucks each or for both?"

CD: "It's $2.99 each, Sir."

Me: "So this is going to cost me fourteen dollars per month MORE than I'm paying now. Why would I even consider this?"

CD goes off into a speech about how awesome DVRs are and how we're missing out on recording four TV shows while watching a fifth, none of which I have the slightest clue about or interest in. I haven't recorded a show in more years than I can remember, although we do have two VCRs and some really old blank tapes, so I could probably pull it off if I had to.

Ah well, I've gone on long enough; sorry. But I felt like I was in a car dealership and told the guys so. Finally I asked them for about the tenth time to give me all the specs in writing. The two just looked at each other in bewilderment. One helpfully suggested that I would see all the details every single month on the bill, but he played dumb when I asked him for it in advance. I even asked them to let me see the computer screen they kept looking at. One guy's exact reply: "This is for us, not you. You wouldn't understand this."

I gotta hand it to them, these guys were excellent actors. I asked one if he would do business with a company would wouldn't put the deal in writing. His reply: "Lots of people do every day."

Those guys were sleazeball salesmen.

Despite all this, the deal as promised, verbally, seems good and as the "free market" in my area pretty much offers Comcast or CenturyLink (which we have now), it's the only other choice other than rabbit ears. I hear there are a lot of broadcast TV channels in my area and would cancel cable in a heartbeat if I lived alone, but my wife wants her Turner Classic Movies and my kids would FREAK without a few shows they love that are only on cable.

Comcast makes a big deal about how the prices are good for two years but they won't give it to me in writing.

I guess I should go yell at clouds or something. It would probably be equally effective as calling their 800 number.

And still I wonder, why has no one from Comcast called us to find out why we cancelled the installation? That's just nuts.

Edited to add: I just did some (very little) Googling and my suspicions were confirmed on the first link I clicked:

http://criticalmas.com/2013/01/how-to-deal-with-comcast/

“The problem with Comcast is they continually lie about the price and terms of conditions of the package you sign up for. What they tell you on the phone is almost never what is reflected in your bill. If they tell you the install is free, you can bet they will charge you. If they are offering a 1 year deal, expect it to end in 6 or 9 months at which point they will start jacking up the price. Since most of the price negotiations take place on the phone, it is always your word against theirs.

I’m convinced the Comcast business model is to overcharge customers with the expectation that few will catch the error and to discourage those that catch the error by making the process of reversing charges so painful that you capitulate and pay the higher (not agreed upon) rate.”

CudaMan
November 6th, 2014, 12:40 PM
So far they've been straightforward with me, George, but I wanted internet only which keeps things simple. I ordered it via their chat system on the web, so I got it in writing that way (it lets you save the chat log at any time). The install tech even spent about 3 hours here trying to get me exactly what I wanted rather than something that would merely work, and it was covered under the standard $50 install fee.

-

So here's my new Comcast Xfinity install, with a fresh cable run from the home entry point straight to the modem (there were cables and outlets everywhere in this house, some of which were disconnected - it was a mess).

http://www.speedtest.net/result/3889673729.png (http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3889673729)

For some reason Speedtest reports speeds in the 20-35 Mbps range, when in practice I can download at 40-50 pretty regularly. Strange.

This is over wireless in the same room. The wired connection gives 18-20ms pings.

$29.99/month for the first year, $40ish for the second year, then $65ish after that. I'll see if I can call up and get it cheaper before the rate goes up next year.

CudaMan
November 6th, 2014, 12:44 PM
Compare to earlier this year... :)


Behold the wonders of ATT DSL. :smh:

http://www.speedtest.net/result/3495040615.png

thesameguy
November 6th, 2014, 12:53 PM
Do any of you guys know how to get a provider like Comcast to put an offer in writing? Get this...

I can't say what you're experiencing is normal, but I'm about the last person on earth who could really put any weight behind that guess. The only way I deal with Comcast is via chat, where I can save the transcript and have it as evidence in the future. Frankly, I deal with all big business that way, because they are universally managing too many customers in too many places with too many promotion combos. The marketing is so aggressive it's apparently impossible to for anyone to keep straight. No worries - hop on chat, make them recite the exact terms of the deal, push it on through. Truly, all you're looking for is leverage, because you're not going to get useful, reliable information out of any corporate employee that you have the privilege of dealing with directly - whether phone, email, or chat. Those people are all uninformed, underpowered, and underpaid wrecks. But once a representative has represented something and you've captured those words, well, then you've got them.

George
November 6th, 2014, 01:36 PM
Truly, all you're looking for is leverage, because you're not going to get useful, reliable information out of any corporate employee that you have the privilege of dealing with directly - whether phone, email, or chat. Those people are all uninformed, underpowered, and underpaid wrecks. But once a representative has represented something and you've captured those words, well, then you've got them.

Agreed. I'm all those "un-" things in my job too, but I'm a detail freak of long habit when it comes to buying decisions and what things cost.

I'm amamzed that people sign up for Comcast service on just a say-so from a salesman.

Signed,

Former salesman turned bean-counting cube drone, which suits my personality much better

Oh, and Cuda, we had the same experience, only in reverse, when switching from Comcast to Qwest/CenturyLink. CenturyLink's internet is very unreliable in my house. I can always get a connection to the wireless network, but often the network can't find the internet. Sometimes unplugging and re-plugging the modem helps but we never had to do that with Comcast. It drives my wife nuts though, because she can't go too long between Facebook fixes before she gets the shakes.

Before having kids, I played an online FPS shooter called Tribes for about ten years and Comcast was awesome for that. Now as a father I have so little free time to do anything like gaming and TV-watching that I really don't care if the internet is slow, since all I do is check e-mail and a couple favorite forums, and CenturyLink is fine for that, when it's working.

I called Comcast's 800 number and "Keith" said he could see the deal in the computer from our cancelled installation and said he would email the details right over. That was about an hour ago. So far, no email. I'd like to think he has been too busy with other callers to send any emails, but I have a feeling it won't arrive. If that happens, I'll give the chat thing a try.


...the standard $50 install fee.

We were told there was no charge for the installation. I'll be studying the invoices carefully, IF we ever do this deal.

CudaMan
November 6th, 2014, 01:58 PM
I'm guessing they waive the install fee for a package combo deal. Us cheap bastards with internet only and rabbit ears behind the TV get an install fee. :p

I was able to negotiate with the chat rep pretty easily too. I had been looking at XFinity for a little while, and it was always $30 for the 50Mpbs speed tier. Even the night before I ordered it. The day I ordered it, the promotion went up to $40 for the same speed. But I had remembered the original $30 offer was valid thru January 2015. The rep gave me the $30 price after one mention.

There was a miscue on the install, which I scheduled for 5-6 days out. The tech arrived the very next day when I wasn't home. I missed him, so I called back and got an install time for the following day.

I don't see what the Comcast hate is all about... yet? ;) I'm completely satisfied except for the weird Speedtest numbers.

Alan P
November 6th, 2014, 04:51 PM
Make sure your Network is hosed down tight if you can connect to it from 2.5 houses away. Some sort of crazy assed network key is a must. Upper and Lower case numbers, maybe even a few funky symbols and numbers too. It may also be worth setting up a guest network for any friends that drop by while keeping the main wireless just for you and trusted associates. if teenagers in ten houses can see your network you can bet at least one will have at least a decent effort of trying to gain access. Mind you there's probably someone near your house who's still using WEP. Or, God forbid, has no security at all!

George
November 7th, 2014, 08:13 AM
Thanks Alan. Can you (or anyone) please recommend a website or other source to learn more about what you're talking about? I'm as clueless as can be. The guest network sounds like something we'll want in the future and I should probably learn about security, if the crazy assed network key (that means password, right?) isn't enough to keep people out.

Other than internet access, what could someone gain by hacking into a wifi network? If we had a computer on the network and up and running, could they read/write/delete files on the C: drive? Other than that possibility, and someone using our internet for free, what other danger is there?

Currently our home computers consist of two iPads and my wife's iPhone. We have two old PCs running Windows XP but these are seldom turned on these days since we got the iPads. Usually there's an iPad on the kitchen countertop, asleep. I'll grab it, glance at whatever I'm interested in for a minute or two, and then get on with other things. These things really have changed my idea of "I'm going to go sit down in front of the computer". I just don't do that anymore. I think my wife spends some time on Facebook and wherever else she goes on an iPad when the kids are in school, but we just don't have a network of machines up and running or anyting else that would interest a hacker...hopefully.

Drachen596
November 7th, 2014, 01:24 PM
fwiw, Comcasts weird numbers on the speedtest are likely do to their power boost tech they use. (if they still use it) it would give you a boost for actual downloading but would always show the 'standard' speed on speedtest.


By the way George, in my time at Comcast were were NEVER allowed to email anything to outside customers and you will likely never get the same answer out of two comcast reps.
as far as the contracts ending early, I never saw it unless a change was made on the account. do bear in mind they bill IN ADVANCE. the bill you get this month is for next months service and the first two bills usually show up a week or two apart for new service installs.


also bear in mind, they do have a lot of idiots working for them and i fixed many many issues over the phone that other people set up tech visits for when all that needed to be done is a specific box check marked and a signal sent to update the boxes.

Alan P
November 7th, 2014, 03:38 PM
Thanks Alan. Can you (or anyone) please recommend a website or other source to learn more about what you're talking about? I'm as clueless as can be. The guest network sounds like something we'll want in the future and I should probably learn about security, if the crazy assed network key (that means password, right?) isn't enough to keep people out.

Other than internet access, what could someone gain by hacking into a wifi network? If we had a computer on the network and up and running, could they read/write/delete files on the C: drive? Other than that possibility, and someone using our internet for free, what other danger is there?

Currently our home computers consist of two iPads and my wife's iPhone. We have two old PCs running Windows XP but these are seldom turned on these days since we got the iPads. Usually there's an iPad on the kitchen countertop, asleep. I'll grab it, glance at whatever I'm interested in for a minute or two, and then get on with other things. These things really have changed my idea of "I'm going to go sit down in front of the computer". I just don't do that anymore. I think my wife spends some time on Facebook and wherever else she goes on an iPad when the kids are in school, but we just don't have a network of machines up and running or anyting else that would interest a hacker...hopefully.

Without typing whole paragraphs you could do a lot worse than read this (http://www.cnet.com/how-to/home-networking-explained-part-1-heres-the-url-for-you/), especially part 6, although it is a bit out of date.

Freude am Fahren
January 6th, 2015, 11:20 AM
Just got a new provider. OpticalTel. Had never heard of them before. Fiber with DishTV services. Not excited about losing the TiVO service/equipment, which was great, as was Atlantic Broadband's TV service, other than a few missing channels. However, 5x down/10x up speed upgrade is nice, as is the fact that much more is included in my rent (for now at least).

http://www.speedtest.net/result/4038727504.png (http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/4038727504)

(my old result)http://www.speedtest.net/result/3334778416.png (http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3334778416)

21Kid
January 6th, 2015, 12:10 PM
5ms ping. :eek: Nice!

Random
February 19th, 2015, 04:09 PM
Any cable modems to particularly avoid or any that people particularly recommend?

I'm looking to drop our Comcastxfinity VOIP phone service, which would mean we could go with a 3rd party modem instead of paying $10/mo for one of Comcastxfinity's boxes.

CudaMan
February 19th, 2015, 11:12 PM
Been quite happy with our ARRIS / Motorola SB6141 so far. It seemed to get positive reviews online.

KillerB
March 4th, 2015, 03:17 PM
Looks like my bottleneck was the outdated WiFi in my old laptop. Now that I have a new one...

http://www.speedtest.net/result/4189575207.png

*drops the mic*

Yw-slayer
March 4th, 2015, 09:47 PM
Sweet.

Kchrpm
March 5th, 2015, 08:59 AM
Holy hell. Wish my Time Warner acted like that.

KillerB
March 5th, 2015, 12:03 PM
Well, it's *supposed* to be 300Mbps down... I'm going to hardwirr into the modem and see if WiFi is still where I'm losing those last 100Mbps.

Kchrpm
March 5th, 2015, 03:39 PM
Do you mind if I ask how much per month you pay for that? I think the most on offer for me is 50 MBps, but I don't trust them to deliver it consistently because I have 25 MBps right now and they say "oh, well during peak hours that's going to drop because so many people are on it."

KillerB
March 5th, 2015, 03:57 PM
I want to say it's $70 a month. No cable or phone, just their largest portion of sweet, sweet bandwidth.

Kchrpm
March 7th, 2015, 02:43 PM
Because of your post, I contacted TWC on Twitter asking about what's available in my area. Various discussion, speed tests and real world problems later, I got $20 more in discounts + upgrade in speed. :up:

http://www.speedtest.net/result/4197072581.png

KillerB
March 8th, 2015, 10:59 AM
Nice!

Kchrpm
January 10th, 2016, 08:23 AM
My internet has been up where it's supposed to be (as above) and down (under 1 Mbps down but with 6 Mbps up) a lot lately. TWC tech came over and couldn't find anything. His only suggestion, if it continues, was to have TWC come and run brand new cable, since the current coax is from the 80s or 90s and no longer used.

Jason
January 10th, 2016, 08:36 AM
http://www.speedtest.net/result/4985072851.png

As much as I bitch about Comcast being a shitty company (which they are), they can put out some good numbers :up:

21Kid
January 11th, 2016, 06:07 AM
How much does that cost. :o

Alan P
August 23rd, 2016, 05:27 PM
So I upgraded to the 80Meg package last week and it took a couple of days to go through but I now have 80Meg down and 20 Meg up.

Yw-slayer
August 24th, 2016, 02:28 AM
http://www.speedtest.net/result/5576121396.png

This is my 200/200 fibre connection at work.

At home I downgraded from 1000/1000 to 300/300. There was simply no point in having the former.

http://www.speedtest.net/result/5576381009.png

This is the 300/300 fibre connection at home.

21Kid
August 24th, 2016, 06:00 AM
Downgrade?!? :(
I have 25/3 at home. :(

Yw-slayer
August 24th, 2016, 06:04 AM
Yup. After my 1000/1000 contract expired. :D

21Kid
August 25th, 2016, 09:02 AM
MIT develops new Wi-Fi that's 330% faster and twice as big as existing tech


The latest development from MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) is a breakthrough we can all get excited about. A new wireless technology promises to more than triple Wi-Fi data speeds, and also double its reach. MegaMIMO 2.0 uses multiple transmitters and receivers working simultaneously, so many signals can be sent at the same time. During laptop tests, the system was able to boost data transfer speed by as much as 330 percent, and the new technology could solve the problem of “spectrum crunch” once and for all.

21Kid
April 6th, 2017, 06:49 AM
Using unused channels to boost wifi?

Portal Is Like an HOV Lane For Your Home Wi-Fi (http://gear.lifehacker.com/portal-is-like-an-hov-lane-for-your-home-wi-fi-1793539286)

The past few years have seen a deluge of Wi-Fi router innovation, but the Portal wifi router includes a key feature that’s basically unheard of in consumer technology.

The problem with Wi-Fi is that everyone has it. Almost all 5GHz Wi-Fi routers connect to your devices over the same narrow set of channels, meaning all of the web traffic in your apartment building is competing for the same spectrum. When your Netflix won’t stop buffering, there’s a decent chance that this interference, rather than a lack of range or signal-blocking obstacles, is to blame.

Here’s the secret though: There are a ton of extra channels that are normally reserved for weather radar and military use that aren’t beset with overcrowding, and Portal is one of the only routers that lets you use them. The “catch” is that it has to shift your devices to a different channel whenever it detects active radar in the area, but in practice, you don’t even notice this happening.

I bought Portal recently to replace my aging Apple AirPort Extreme, and I’ve been blown away. Before I upgraded, my iPad would struggle to stream live events in the kitchen, and videos on my bedroom Apple TV would frequently degrade to a pixelated mess, if they played at all. That’s all in the past now, and according to SpeedTests, it doubled or even tripled my download speeds in almost all areas of my house. Plus, it was dead-simple to set up, and easy to manage using a free smartphone app.

Sounds good if you are in an apartment complex or condo. I doubt it would be very useful in any other setting though.

Alan P
April 6th, 2017, 11:46 AM
I can't comment on the US and the FCC's thoughts on the matter but here in the UK such a device would likely be declared illegal to use.

21Kid
April 6th, 2017, 11:53 AM
That was the other thing I was wondering...

Yw-slayer
April 7th, 2017, 09:35 PM
I was setting up my new work notebook at home and managed to saturate my 300mb connection. Fml :(

GreatScawt
April 10th, 2017, 12:13 PM
#1%problems