Verizon Fios vs. Broadband (Comcast)

[ajcllc]

I just ordered Verizon Fios: internet, phone, and cable. Has anyone made the switch to the this? What differences have you noticed in it compared to your former provider(s)? It seems to be a good value and offers some pretty good savings.

[Guest " "]

I switched from roadrunner internet access to fios.

Roadrunner used to clog up different times of the day.

Fios has been high speed 24X7

seems like I get less virus stuff using fios compared to roadrunner...perhaps thats whats clogging up roadrunner.

[oldtimer]

Switched from Charter to Fios about a month ago. Charter tv was so bad, no spdif audio out, no hd, that there really is no comparison. Internet is faster, less glitchy and the phone upgrade is a nice bonus (had the old verizon copper line). This with two set-top boxes, one a dvr with hd and for a much better overall price (at least for now).

[Jay481985]

I switched from roadrunner internet access to fios.

Roadrunner used to clog up different times of the day.

Fios has been high speed 24X7

seems like I get less virus stuff using fios compared to roadrunner...perhaps thats whats clogging up roadrunner.

roadrunner and all cable is a shared network. What happens is that usually in city conditions the block would have shared network. Basically say there are 20 customers on the block they get about 30 meg download and upload so that equates to about 1.5 megs a person but they can exceed it and basically make everyone else's connection suffer that and they can technically get a 5 meg download but if 6 out of the 20 are spammers that run 24/7 high speed your internet will be miserable. Fios and DSL are different in that they do not share the network so your speed can hit the max speed without affecting anyone else.

Also I love how cablevision made a commercial that makes fun of fios. They said that road runner has been using fiberoptics for a long time..... that is partial true but that is between main relays, not to your modem. The fiberoptic is usually between city to city or block to block. once you get to the level of a city block you will be on copper cables. Fios uses a fiber cable till it hits you house circuitry. btw copper wires do pretty admirably being that they can do up to 20 megs a second sustained in optimal conditions while fiberoptics can do 100 or better. I think better as a person I worked with at a laboratory at a school is working on improving fiberoptic transmission speed using gold particles embedded into the wire. The results were promising.

Fios is unmatched and the price is great. BTW the biggest speed sucker in computers is the computer itself. I have a computer that is 6 years old (2001) and works faster than many new computers that have too much spyware, adware, viruses, etc. Everyone who is upgrading in wireless routers from B to G to that new N signal, I just laugh at. B optimal is 10 megs a second optimal, I saw 2 megs sustained. When was the last time you saw something download sustained speed of 2 megs?

[jacksonbart]

Comcast is a rip off in terms of cost finally they have some competition, so we don't have to bend over and take it in the keester.

[sunburnwilly]

Comcast is a rip off in terms of cost finally they have some competition, so we don't have to bend over and take it in the keester.

Comcast should at least send me flowers each month !

[jacksonbart]

Comcast is a rip off in terms of cost finally they have some competition, so we don't have to bend over and take it in the keester.

Comcast should at least send me flowers each month !

I would at least want flowers, dinner and for them to hold my hand, while they did it.

[thebes]

That's a very informative post Jay. I don't have the FIOS option only DSL. With DSL I'm too far from the switching station resulting in terrible speeds so I've had to drop it and go with Comcast. God they are an awful company. I'll drop 'em in a New York minute once Fios comes to my block.

[sunburnwilly]

Comcast is a rip off in terms of cost finally they have some competition, so we don't have to bend over and take it in the keester.

Comcast should at least send me flowers each month !

I would at least want flowers, dinner and for them to hold my hand, while they did it.

Heck , just the courtesy of a reach around would soothe the pain . Am I asking too much ?

[Jay481985]

That's a very informative post Jay. I don't have the FIOS option only DSL. With DSL I'm too far from the switching station resulting in terrible speeds so I've had to drop it and go with Comcast. God they are an awful company. I'll drop 'em in a New York minute once Fios comes to my block.

Dsl unfortunately degrades with the distance it is from the server. This is due to many factors. Straight line helps, when you start to deviate from straight line your signal gets worse.

Fiberoptics bypass this with relays that amplify the power (hence the commercial says its + whatever DB hot, I forgot the number)

Fios though is not in place in many cities, unless you live in a major place like NY where they spent alot of money renovating the copper wire. I live in a semi large community but since AT&T put up copper wires along time ago I doubt they will put Fios for a city like mine. Fios will come to mostly new cities and suburbs.

[oldtimer]

I don't know how we got so lucky in our town of 100,000. Maybe they targeted the opportunity because Charter is so bad. Down in the metroplex it has always been SW Bell and we had GTE (now verizon) up here, which seemed behind the curve until they ran fiber all over town. Maybe having two universities also helped.