Who is your broadband internet provider? Rate them?
I can vouch for both Internode and Iinet. Both have really good speeds and reliability.
One BIG benefit of internode is you don’t have to join on a long-term contract. On a pay-as-you-go account (or whatever its called) you pay just a touch more than you would on a 12 or 24 month contract, but if you’re gonna be spending half the year in aus and half the year OS, it might be worth considering :D
Sorry for the delay from me, I was at the parents last night. This is just a basic rundown. Some places you may just want to go with what you can get… And service might vary where you are.
Cheap and Nasty
TPG - Good plans, cheap cost but if things break, fix it yourself or wait 2 hours on the phone for their 1 Indian lady to try to help by asking you to turn on and off
Dodo - Just NO! Cheap as chips but hidden costs, bad bandwidth and problems all the time
Exetel - Good but they can change your plan and charge you more as said earlier. If there is issues, they can literally kill your internet for weeks.
Choice of them - TPG. They are cheaper and don’t change plans as often. If you are just browsing the internet this works. If you upload / play games / torrent / stream a lot, then expect things to break.
Good but Overpriced
Telstra - Generally 1/3rd the quota for the same price as others. Very reliable though.
Optus - Not bad but a bit overpriced and reliability is not as good
iiNet - 2nd biggest in Australia, Bit overpriced but not as bad as Telstra. Very reliable
Choice of these - iiNet. Reliability is good, BOB plan is very good if you use a home phone. Useless if you dont.
Middle of the barrel
Internode - Owned by iiNet and therefore reliability is pretty good. Their plans are generally a bit cheaper as well and give good quotas
iPrimus - Generally a bit more expensive than Internode but still good deals. If you can find a good plan in your area, I’d give them a go.
Adam / Spintel / Westnet / Eftel - Regional area providers in most cases. Good but generally overpriced with avg quotas… but generally much better than Telstra if you are in an area with low internet options (I.E. Jindabyne / Wagga Wagga etc)
Choice of these - Internode. iiNet service without the gimmicks and you don’t pay for TV advertising etc.
Final say: Internode if you can get it and get a good deal. If you just browse BW and Facebook, then save some money and go TPG. Also, if you are getting prepaid mobile, try TPG, their deals are insane and they use Telstra infrastructure…
I’ve never had a price increase on my Exetel!
I’ve never had a price increase on my Exetel!
Price hike and bad drop outs was why I left them for Internode.
I used iinet and found them to be great. Was going to get internode also, i think those two are quite similar. I don’t download much at all so i just got the basic plans.
Where i am now uses bigpond and i hate it. Speeds are terrible, had plenty of problems with connections and went through a 2 month period trying to get them to correct the bills.
TPG is good if u are close to you exchange, Jez if u want come past my place and test it out, You are more then welcome
But more or less you need to find out how far u are from ur exchange if u are close to it u will get good speed, now that
I am 100 meters from exchange I get almost full speed of adsl2.
Choice of them - TPG. They are cheaper and don’t change plans as often. If you are just browsing the internet this works. If you upload / play games / torrent / stream a lot, then expect things to break.
i torrent almost daily, play xbox online daily and stream a few times a week and have never had anything go wrong with my tpg internet in 13 months…
Have a look at Whirlpool
I don’t suppose you are within cable modem area? I have found cable to be superior to ADSL, however you are limited to Telstra or Optus except in some rural areas that have little cable ISPs. I am on Telstra cable.
but be warned, with cable you are locked into 2 year contracts (well it was the last time i was looking it was)
hence why i decided against going with optus cable internet, i got a 6 month tpg contract which is now just month by month for the last 7 months
but be warned, with cable you are locked into 2 year contracts (well it was the last time i was looking it was)
hence why i decided against going with optus cable internet, i got a 6 month tpg contract which is now just month by month for the last 7 months
Yeah that’s a good point, especially for someone like Jez who isn’t in Aus all year. The best deals with cable are usually when you bundle them with other stuff like phone and Foxtel.
Results from http://www.adsl2exchanges.com.au/ :
You are 827 m from BOND as the crow flies.
Estimated cable length of 1323.2 m.
Estimated speed of 18666
Zone 1
TPG’s 6 month plan is looking rather appealing right now.
TJ, I checked out Internode. They seem expensive? Would they be that much better than TPG?
If you only have to get a 6mth plan I would go with them. They wont be that bad surely (or even at all) and at least you can change at the end of the 6mths.
They would use the same exchange anyway, so there should be no difference in speeds?????
I reckon that if ya happy with the terms and conditions, why not give them a burl?????
Yeah just go with TPG if you are happy with the prices. I think you’re putting too much thought into it. It’s incredibly hard to go wrong with ADSL2+ these days and if you do simply churn once the contract period is up (mobile broadband is another kettle of fish). There is absolutely no way I could justify the overpriced internode. The “cheap/nasty” options will do essentially the same job at a fraction of the price.
Also with that approximate line length you should probably consider a trendchip based modem/router
Thanks for all your help, everyone. I think we will give the TPG 6 month contact a go.
drc13, would you mind explaining about the trendchip modem/router? 