Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Rural Internet

This is a question for you guys living out in the sticks.

I am currently living on the edge of Cincinnati, Ohio and have bitchin' good internet service via Cincinnati Bell's Fioptics fiber. I'm planning a move to the country, SW Bracken County, KY in the future. Right now, I use a Verizon mobile broadband router when I'm down there, and it gives me 16 GB a month at roughly DSL speeds. That's good enough for a weekend away from it all, but for permanent living that will not be enough.

What I'm wondering is what y'all do for Internet service? How much does it cost? What speed? Do you have a limited amount of bandwidth available? What are your recommendations?

I switched from ATT Hotspot to Dishnet.

Dishnet is far, far better.

I have Hughes net. 50Gb peak (8am to 2am) and 50Gb off peak (2am till 8am). Also included is internet phone (VOIP) which necessarily has a delay but is tolerable.
Download speed is anywhere from 800kb to 3.2 Mb per second and is usually around 2 Mbps.

Cost is about $130 per mo.

We had dial-up service with this ISP Toast.net (based in OH) several years ago long before DSL was available in our area.
Was very satisfied with the service and especially their support staff.

We eventually had to go with Bell South (now AT&T) for DSL as they were our only option at the time or else I'd still be signed on with them.

Now that they do offer high speed service over a much wider area including many rural areas should we ever decide to switch to another ISP they would probably be my first choice based on our past good experience.

Might be worth giving them a shot to see if they offer anything in your area.

My off peak is unlimited with Dishnet.

Not sure how much it is, since I bundle all of it with TV satellite. Probably about the same as you, though.

Here in rural NSW we are on ADSL at 1500, in February we will have access to the NBN which changes all the rules and reduces costs significantly.

Interesting to see how quickly it takes terrorists to work out they can disrupt large sections of the economy with an axe.

For all you rural folks check if there is a WISP that serves your area.

http://www.wispa.org/Directories/Find-a-WISP






I was to far away from the switch when I was last living in MN and there was a WISP that covered my area problem solved.

For those inclined they are not overly expensive to set-up and might be an option for a group of people.

http://swiftfox.net/index.php/category/starting-a-wisp/

DSL, about 5Mbps, though it can vary depending on time. Unlimited download. About $50 a month.

That is a good deal.

I don't see how you guys can stand it at 3 to 5 Mbps. I'm getting 30 to 50 and sometimes that seems slow.

Every time I feel sorry about slower internet I just go to the back porch and fire off a 30 round magazine through my AR15.

AKA...Gotcha!

Me too, through verizon.

Living in the sticks, DSL is about the only option that doesn't have a limit on downloaded data. It runs about $50/month, but I normally have about 10 Mbps with a 0.75Mbps upload speed.

I just ran a speed test and I'm almost at 7Mbps.

I can watch Netflix etc about 99% of the time with no problems.

YES! Being able to shoot on your own property is a real plus. One of the little joys of country living...

My shooting bench is on the front porch, so I hear what you're saying. This move is going to be filled with tradeoffs. I have turkeys and deer sticking their heads in the bedroom window, but it takes an hour's driving to get to the nearest Kroger store. Elk come to visit occasionally, but getting friends to visit will be like pulling teeth. Still it is nice to go out with a cup of coffee in the morning and listen to turkeys gobble off your own front porch and eat your breakfast at the shooting bench. N'est pas?

I gladly traded slower (DSL) Internet for not having a neighbor closer than about 400 yards.

The hour drive to a Kroger store isn't all bad, it just requires better planning and bigger though less often trips to the store. Other than fresh milk, we could go for several weeks without needing a trip to town. Different mindset from the folks that have to stop in the store on a daily basis.

While I am not a "prepper," the farther you live from the city the better if we ever get into SHTF situation. In addition, having some fuel/ammo/food on hand isn't a bad idea. I hope you enjoy your country living!

Craig

Go satellite Internet but avoid Hughes net like the plague it functions horribly and customer service sucks asss.

What else is there?
We have Verizon DSL. They just flipped a switch one day and said you now have access to DSL. We live at the end of a private[gravel]road-1/2 mile and then our drive is another 3/8 mile. Our line[old thin copper] is almost buried. Fiber optic would be nice.
Speeds suck.

http://www.wildblue.com/ This is the DSL we have. 150 GB per month and have been very happy with it.

I have DishNet. It works about as good as I need it to. I'm think it's costing me around $60 a month. Only problem is I keep getting these emails telling me how much of my monthly allowance I've used, when I know I haven't been on it very much. I called Dish and they claim they have no idea what's going on. It could be better, but my options are limited where I live. I can't even get DSL.

When telephone service was rolled out Congress imposed the proper regulated monopoly utility paradigm on the phone companies. They were required to provide the same access at the same price everywhere in their protected market. So phones spread to farm homes as quickly as they spread to city phones.

If they had done the same thing with internet access, rural areas would have had reliable high speed internet long ago. And, just like the phone, it would have brought economic benefits along with it.

Get a couple cans and some string if you move there.

*

I like it. For me shooting takes a bit of a drive away from the house.

shaman,

I live in central Pendleton County, 3 miles SW of Falmouth. Might want to make a couple calls:

First to CinBell to see when they will have FiOptic in your area. I just got hooked up in December. 95MB down, 18MB up. CinBell's contractors are running trucks and cable spools all over the county. They did eastern Pendleton before they did my stretch. So, may already be close to your AO.

If Cin Bell is not scheduled to do your area soon, call BlueOne.Net in Lexington. 859-219-1654. That is the service I just gave up. They do point to point ISP off of water towers, etc. 2-3MB down, 0.3-0.5MB up on their old gear. Their new gear is supposed to be 2x to 3 x faster. I passed on the upgrade when the FiOptics crews showed up.

Cannot speak to current condition. However, BlueOne was significantly faster than Hughes Net at the time that I changed over to BlueOne several years ago.

Orion2000:

Ah! Howdy neighbor! That's just the kind of info I was looking for. I've got a while yet. There's no telling when I'll make the move, so maybe there will be fiber out there by then.

I also hope CinBell does a better job than they did connecting to my place at home. THey had 10 feet of grass and a neighbor's driveway to navigate before they got onto my property then my driveway and 40 yard of lawn to get into the house. It took them 2 months extra and they managed to cut Time Warner's fiber on the way in. At that rate, they'll finish SW Bracken County sometime before the second coming! I can't fault the service since the install.

Personal note:
I'm socked in until March 1 or so right now, so I won't be able to make El Paso until at least then. However, I have not forgotten. I started a new job 12/15 and it's been maximum effort ever since. The good news is that I'm driving 18 minutes to work instead of all the way to Walton KY every day. I get a small window where I can hunt turkeys in April and then they're doing an ERP migration to Oracle in May. Ah! It's fun to be busy again.

Lot of rain here, bad service when it rains

A few years ago we were considering a move to a small town in western OR. The only high speed service in the area at the time was Hughsnet. I looked at a lot of reviews they were almost universally NOT recommended.

Small world. Wrapping up my 13th or 14th Oracle EBS implementation as Project Manager. Current contract ends in Feb. Looking for a new gig. Shoot me a PM if they might be looking for assistance on the Project Management front...