Internet Connections - difficult choices

[pmrid (Peter)]

I'm wondering about the choice of service provider. The theory I'd like to explore is this: whether it would be better to go for a small player rather than one of the "names". The rationale is that the smaller player will not yet have oversold their slice of the bandwidth they have bought into: unlike the big players who seem to oversell by wide margins so that as soon as little Johhnie and Jane come home from school and want to live stream themselves doing their homework, the line speeds anywhere near their Node drop away dramatically.

Any thoughts?

peter

[The_bluester (Paul)]

I am not sure that it really works that way. They buy the bandwidth in blocks. It is not even a matter of being near the particular node either. It is the POI (Point of Interconnect) with the NBN, which thanks to the ACCC there are 140 odd or around the country instead of the 7 that NBN originally proposed.

If they do not buy enough capacity into your POI (Either backhaul to get to it or between themselves and the NBN within it) then you will see congestion.

NBN actually changed the way the services were sold some time back and it is likely to be less of an issue now.

[Camelopardalis (Dunk)]

Originally Posted by The_bluester

Actually I would argue with that definition of a modem. Once you go to light, you are not modulating anything any more. the Modulate Demodulate that the acronym stands for does not apply to optical services as it is meaning generating an analog waveform to represent a digital bitstream.

Granted, it wouldn’t apply to optical, but the number of domestic premises needing to use optical transceivers of some kind are far fewer that the advertising would infer...

[Sunfish (Ray)]

Get an ABN. Call yourself a business. Go with a big no nonsense provider and pay for installation with mobile backup for the base level speed.

My home phone was threatened with termination if I did not NBN. Then it did not work. And it did not work ....and it did not work, after a year of off and on The wires in the street were repaired. Again my business wires were faultless and except for the older relatives I would have cancelled the home spam phone.

Where the old self powered system was foolproof. Shame we could not have NBN for those who wanted internet, and the old self powered phone for those who did not. The installation was free , but then so was the pain.

Originally Posted by pmrid

I'm wondering about the choice of service provider. The theory I'd like to explore is this: whether it would be better to go for a small player rather than one of the "names". The rationale is that the smaller player will not yet have oversold their slice of the bandwidth they have bought into: unlike the big players who seem to oversell by wide margins so that as soon as little Johhnie and Jane come home from school and want to live stream themselves doing their homework, the line speeds anywhere near their Node drop away dramatically.

Any thoughts?

peter

[pmrid (Peter)]

Again, my thanks to those offering advice and making suggestions. All appreciated. I've decided to go down the Aussie broadband road for $69 a month. It seems the middle ground in the field of thousands.
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Peter

[lazjen (Chris)]

Peter, Aussie Broadband is actually one of the better choices at this time, mostly because they tend to provision their services properly (i.e. get adequate bandwidth). So far I've found them to be pretty good and overall better than TPG I was with previously.