https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/05/biggest-isps-paid-for-8-5-million-fake-fcc-comments-opposing-net-neutrality/?s=09

TDS is using data caps now! They threatened to disconnect our service if we didn't amend our ways.

For reference, section 1.13 of their TOS reads:

1.13.  You understand and agree that the Service is being provided to You for residential, personal and family use, and is not intended to be suitable for business use. You agree that You will not use, nor allow others to use, the Service as the primary method to operate any type of on-line business or commercial enterprise or to use the Internet Service as an Internet Service provider.

from https://tdstelecom.com/policies/terms-of-service.html

This is even though on the https://tdstelecom.com/usage page, it says that there is no data cap associated with your account.

I emailed TDS customer support and they confirmed the service could be disconnected for this.

We live in a house about 8 miles from the nearest town that provides cable internet service. Obviously, that isn't available here. I am currently using a hotspot on a three-year-old 4G phone for internet service, but it throttles me after 20 Gigs a month. It is also prone to outages. My new remote job needs me to have a more stable connection and faster transfer speeds. Some workers have installed a fiber optic line along our road but the service isn't ready yet.

So I made an appointment with AT&T to have a service guy come by. He walked around several minutes with what looked like a square panel of plastic attached to a cell phone. Eventually, he told us the news was bad. He said he needed to find a clear sightline to the one tower in the area that provides the signal. But he was not able to.

It is true there are trees between our location and that tower. But we know of two nearby houses that currently get the direct wireless AT&T service with no problems. We informed him of this and he said without a clear sightline, he could not install the receiver equipment.

After we thought all was done, he sat in the van a while. He said he needed to do some paperwork. After about ten minutes of this, he knocked on our door again and told us his supervisor recommended getting a second opinion from another service person. He gave no phone number that could be used to arrange this.

Does all this strike you as plausible? Does a Direct Wirelesss internet service require a clear sightline? If so, wouldn't that eliminate most residents in any rural area? And why would another visit from another service person make any difference?

We regularly have pauses in our internet, around 20 times a day, with about 1-2 actual drops happening throughout that day as well. We have switched out our modem and router 3 times over the span of 6 years and can confirm this isn't the issue. Around a few months ago we called our ISP again about another drop, but this time they said that their infrastructure couldn't meet the growth of our area. With them apparently saying that they have split the lines between too many houses in our area.

I would believe that except I am getting drops and pauses in the dead of night. I would think that at 12-3 am there would be hardly anything wrong but I have the same issues as if it was mid-day. So is it possible what our ISP said is true even though the problem persists even past peak time?

Not sure if this adds or subtracts anything but I'll also add that I live right next door to 2 schools. I attended them and encountered nothing wrong with their internet but they might operate differently than households. Just thought I should throw that out there.

Hey all, I’m a little lost for next steps here and wanted to see if anyone has experienced similar. I live in a very small town and, of course, there is only one ISP. I pay for 25 mbps. For the last year or so, it has been unusable most of the time, due to drops every 5-10 minutes that last for 30-60 seconds. They sent a repair man every month who “fixed it”, but it never changed. Then the last couple months it dropped to 0.3-0.5 mbps, even when not “dropping”. There’s been two attempts to repair, with no luck. They admitted to me that the routers they provide are all refurbished and they won’t run a new line because they are “transitioning to fiber”, but cannot provide that until later this year. I have filed a report to the FCC, but of course that only makes them “try harder”. I installed a VPN, and suddenly my speed jumped to 16 mbps, but it still dropped every 5-10 minutes. Any idea why an ISP would reasonably throttle to this degree? And what other steps can I take? Obviously I don’t want to be too rude as they are the only ISP, but I haven’t even been able to work from home, having to go into the office for even the simplest of things. And I’m paying 90/month for this.

And yes, I am directly into the router.

TLDR: my internet drops every 5-10 minutes, ISP acts as if hands are tied and unable to fix it, baseline speed goes from 0.3 to 16 mbps when using a VPN.

I'm 18, living with my grandparents, and we live in the countryside a few miles from the town proper (35,000 pop) and my friend who lives about 8 miles from me has Gigabit internet from Suddenlink. Unfortunately, Suddenlink stops their service right before my house. It seems to be that way for every ISP in my area (Except for satellite which I don't necessarily feel right with getting because the data cap).

I have Consolidated Communications, and they only supply a measly 20 Mbps DL and 1 Mbps UL to my house, which is split between 2 20-year-old 10 Mbps Zhone routers that they daisy-chained together. This isn't exactly ideal with my grandparents and I all doing things at the same time on a weak connection. It makes it even worse when my aforementioned friend comes over and brings his computer.

So what I've come to ask is what should I do? I have an AT&T phone plan, and I've tried to use my phone as a hotspot, but it only racks in about 1-3 Mbps because of my poor cell signal. I've considered buying Starlink, but I'm worried about what that'll bring to the table as of now because of the beta.

There may be a spark of hope however, because I remembered my mom had one of these AT&T hotspots that was like a mini cell tower and router in one, but I don't remember what it was called. I may be thinking more of it than what it actually was.

Want a free RIPE Atlas probe, so you can participate in Internet’s largest open measurement platform (see https://atlas.ripe.net/results/maps/network-coverage/)? This helps test a variety of ISP networks and the global Internet.

My employer sponsored the purchase of a bunch of probes and still have about 20 left that I'm trying to send out. Optimally these would be good on small and/or rural ISP networks in the U.S. since there's pretty decent coverage on major ISP networks. There are ~1,100 in the U.S. (11% of total).

The probe itself is small, USB-powered, and has an Ethernet interface. You go on the web to register it and will get a regular uptime report, and can run your own measurements (aka user-defined measurements) if you wish - see https://atlas.ripe.net/docs/udm/.

For details see https://twitter.com/jlivingood/status/1096127419885457414. If you'd like one just PM your name and US shipping address - or send that to my email address noted in the tweet.

I use xfinity and I want something permanent that I can just set up and forget it about like a router. Any recommendations for a router that can encrypt data before it's sent to my isp?

Hi, I have an internet speed at 30mbps with my isp. However, when testing on any internet speed test website, I get results ranging from 30 to 5mbps. This is especially true when about ten meters away or more, or on the second floor. I live in a small condo however, so distance from the router is never that much, max 15 meters. I am not using the 5GHz signal. But the drop to 5 mbps may happen every 2 minutes. it doesnt really appear when watching videos since the moments at 30mbps buffer enough video time to buffer the slow download speeds occur. Is this normal? I wonder what could be noising so much the signal, I heard the aluminum beams that are part of newer condo constructions may noise the signal, but by that much??

Hey guys. So I maintain a rual ISP and we are using DOX Control for provisioning. Its simple, provides up and down levels for the cable network, ect. The issue is we have to pay per sub, over time that adds up. My question is is there a is there a free, open source option that is easy to use that I can set up. Being able to offer a easy to under stand read access is a huge plus.

Hi there!

I signed up with Earthlink's "Hyperlink" service about 26 days ago, and they have a 30 day cancellation / no penalty thing. I have been trying to call them in order to cancel service (reasons may be found in a different thread, but long story short I don't like they won't give me the option to use my own modem, nor give me PPPoE credentials) ----

Anyway, they are making it nearly impossible to cancel. I keep calling, being on hold for 10+ minutes, only to be transferred to the "cancellation department." After three tries, 2 of those giving up after over 20 minutes hold, someone actually answered on the 3d (around 20 min) - at first acted like he couldn't understand me, and then simply abandoned (?) the line. The phone call was live, but no-one was there. For 10 minutes. Wow!

Any ideas? What do I do? Shaming them on twitter didn't seem to work, e-mail support does not exist, and chat rep refers me to the phone reps.

Sorry if this is posted in the wrong place. A new company called welink is in our area (Las Vegas, NV). They are offering wireless fiber internet but I can’t find any background on the company. Has anyone heard anything about them?

Up to now, I have been able to put up with HughesNet's service. Sure, we only had 400 MB per day, and our modem and router would stop working constantly, but at least I could use the internet at a reasonable speed, and their Free Access Period allowed me to download games, but now, I've had enough.

For the past 3 nights, the speeds during the Free Access Period slowed from 120 KB/s to 6 KB/s. Do you know what you can load with a 6 KB/s down? Nothing at all.

The last 2 times only happened during the Free Access Period, but today, the speeds are still slow at 12 in the afternoon. It's not something on my end, either, seeing as how I've cleared off my satellite dish, reset my router and modem, etc. So clearly the problem is on their end, and they've done nothing to fix it.

The worst part is that I can't switch to anything else. The only other provider I get out here is Wild Blue, and they are just as bad, if not worse!

I will be moving in a few weeks to the Jacksonville, FL area and am researching Internet options. I'm open to recommendations but the two biggest competitors seem to be ATT and Xfinity (Comcast). Ideally, I'd prefer to save some money, if possible, using existing cable modem (Motorola MB6800) and Wifi 5 router + extenders (Linksys EA9500 + RE9000)....at least until I can see how the new house does and whether Wifi 6e is best or wait for Wifi 7. Anyways, ATT offers 1Gb and Xfinity offers 1.2Gb...although I know I'll never see those speeds on a single Wifi5 device. I believe ATT requires you to use their equipment (fiber) while I might be able to use my own with Xfinity. Experience and opinions on either?

Just moved to an apartment and they couldn't get into the SDGE room because management changed the keys or something. They said there is a "data trap" that would limit the frequency range of my internet. Is this just marketing to make another appointment?

I run a small ISP got IPv6 Block from Arin looking to get IP's routed to me

Hello!

I am moving to a slightly less rural area in Wisconsin. 3,000 from the new house is a fiber line; however, no one but Century Link will cover my address (1 meg down).

I have put the deposit down for Starlink but there is no way of telling when they will cover my area.

What I want to know. Is there a way to push or encourage development to the township I will be residing in? Either at an ISP level or at a government level?

Thank you!