Home telephone service through Comcast

[Icarus]

I just checked my cable download speed and am at 15,476 kbps. I don't know how anyone could live with dial-up at 3900 kbps.

DSL isn't dial-up. 4Gb/Sec is pretty fast. Your raw speed of 15Gb/second is impressive.

I looked up the results in Makawao, HI where I live, and roadrunner is slightly faster than Hawaiian Tel DSL. Either way, latency to the mainland is pretty long from here.

Once you get over 100Mb/sec, you probably can't distribute that around your house, unless you have gigabit switches and a cable modem that supports connecting at 1Gb/second. If you are using WiFi, it's much less than that.

A better test would be to download actual large files and see what sort of real-life throughput you can get with them.

Latency to the mainland is what kills me.

-David

 

[T_R_Oglodyte]

DSL isn't dial-up. 4Gb/Sec is pretty fast. Your raw speed of 15Gb/second is impressive.

Isn't Ken's speed 15 Mbps, not 15 Gbps?

 

[Icarus]

Isn't Ken's speed 15 Mbps, not 15 Gbps?

You're correct. It's 4Mb/sec and 15Mb/Sec.

And in that case, if you actually get that sort of throughput, it would make a difference with 100Mb/sec infrastructure.

-David

 

[Kal]

My numbers are thru a router, so there's some built-in delay. The home network is hard-wired and other machines on the network get the same result. Of course there is some variability from one day to the next. It would not be uncommon to get numbers in the 11,000 kbps vicinity. In any case it's a real treat to download incredibly large files. I wonder how this relates to a T1 connection?

 

[Lee B]

Just to set one point straight, Comcast digital phone service is not VoIP. They use their own pipes, so should be more reliable than usually-reliable VoIP. I dunno about other cable company phone service.

I'm glad to hear so many Comcast users liking their phone service. I too thought that phone companies are used to being reliable while cable TV companies are not.

Lee

 

[Icarus]

It would not be uncommon to get numbers in the 11,000 kbps vicinity. In any case it's a real treat to download incredibly large files. I wonder how this relates to a T1 connection?

I just checked Hawaiian Tel's web site. They offer 3 DSL speeds. 3Mb/sec, 7Mb/sec and 11Mb/sec. The most expensive one is $49.99 a month. I guess I have the cheapest one.

I need to call them to switch my entire service around. They offer what I have now for about half the price of what I'm paying.

-David

 

[Kal]

Just to set one point straight, Comcast digital phone service is not VoIP. They use their own pipes, so should be more reliable than usually-reliable VoIP....Lee

What does "their own pipes" mean? It really does sound like just sales speak. I've got one cable into the house and one cable modem. The internet phone provider is by someone other than Comcast.

Comcast is a quality internet phone provider, but their price is outrageously high.

 

[dmharris]

I would like to bundle our service with our local cable company, but we both have consulting businesses out of the home, two home offices, three phone lines (one for fax and old dial up and I'm uncomfortable letting it go as some clients still fax), and seven phones in the house (big house). When we converted to DSL it failed because it messed up our phones lines hardwired together - too technical for me- but we switched to the cable internet and stayed with phone company phones. It is expensive, but when on the phone with people who have VOIP they sometimes "break up" and I cannot have that on a business call. Bummer.

 

[Lee B]

The Internet is a huge cooperative that distributes packets from point A to point B by whatever path is available when one arrives at a node en route, of which there are many. Your packets may scatter all over the country before arriving to their Internet destination near your other party. The ones that arrive late get dropped because it's too late to insert their teeny clip of sound into the real-time conversation.

Comcast is so big that they own or control fiber to carry their stuff without needing the co-op.

I like VoIP because it's reliable enough and, when it is crummy I can use my cellphone or a calling card over the POTS (plain old telephone system). I might go with Comcast if their service, while expensive, is cheaper than the POTS (i.e. long distance) and I need the added quality. That isn't true today.

"Their own pipes" was from a piece I just read in a trade magazine called Internet Telephony, where the author corrected himself. He, too, had assumed that Comcast Digital was VoIP. You probably can find it with a search.

What does "their own pipes" mean? It really does sound like just sales speak. I've got one cable into the house and one cable modem. The internet phone provider is by someone other than Comcast.

Comcast is a quality internet phone provider, but their price is outrageously high.

 

[T_R_Oglodyte]

I would like to bundle our service with our local cable company, but we both have consulting businesses out of the home, two home offices, three phone lines (one for fax and old dial up and I'm uncomfortable letting it go as some clients still fax), and seven phones in the house (big house). When we converted to DSL it failed because it messed up our phones lines hardwired together - too technical for me- but we switched to the cable internet and stayed with phone company phones. It is expensive, but when on the phone with people who have VOIP they sometimes "break up" and I cannot have that on a business call. Bummer.

I operate a home business with Vonage VOIP - would never go back to land line.

For less than a single barebones land line, I have two phone lines - one of which is may fax line, full featured voice mail, e-mail notification when I have a message in my mailbox (with a copy of the message attached to my e-mail), 3-way calling, call transfer, automatic call forwarding. If the system goes down I designate another phone number to which calls automatically routed (I use my cell phone for that.)

If I'm traveling and the hotel I'm staying in has broadband in the room, I connect my adapter to the broadband and I have all of my business phone in my room. It even works if you travel outside the US - hook up the router in your room if you have broadband and you can deal with your clients as if you were sitting in your office at home.

I've been on Vonage for three years. Over that period my uptime has been >99.99 percent. Essentially, I lose service only when I lose internet service. And when that happens I still have my cell phone.

There's almost no reason I can see why a small home business operator should stay with land lines if they have decent broadband service available.

 

[Kal]

The Internet is a huge cooperative that distributes packets from point A to point B by whatever path is available when one arrives at a node en route, of which there are many. Your packets may scatter all over the country before arriving to their Internet destination near your other party. The ones that arrive late get dropped because it's too late to insert their teeny clip of sound into the real-time conversation.

Comcast is so big that they own or control fiber to carry their stuff without needing the co-op.

I like VoIP because it's reliable enough and, when it is crummy I can use my cellphone or a calling card over the POTS (plain old telephone system). I might go with Comcast if their service, while expensive, is cheaper than the POTS (i.e. long distance) and I need the added quality. That isn't true today.

"Their own pipes" was from a piece I just read in a trade magazine called Internet Telephony, where the author corrected himself. He, too, had assumed that Comcast Digital was VoIP. You probably can find it with a search.

Is the author suggesting that Comcast doesn't tie into the internet "backbone"? They certainly don't have a separate and distinct internet system.

With regard to packet loss, you can check the losses and determine the quality level of any internet phone service. The check can be made to test calls all over the globe. The same packet loss occurs with any internet transmission. So if you have good bandwidth with an existing broadband provider, you will likely have good internet phone service thru a non-Comcast provider. I recently checked my internet phone service and the packet loss was very, very minor. For me, it's still a matter of cost. If anyone thinks Comcast has fair and reasonable pricing policies, it would be a first.

 

[dmharris]

There's almost no reason I can see why a small home business operator should stay with land lines if they have decent broadband service available.

And there is the rub. My cable provider is a relatively small company in western PA called Armstrong Cable. I will need to research some of the points brought up, especially the interesting facts about Comcast (which is in Pittsburgh I believe, but not where I live).

Now who will provide me the list of questions I need to ask my cable provider to assure myself their system is "state of the art" and won't have those outages I seem to experience with my internet from time to time?

 

[bogey21]

ick. even worse, keeping it strapped to you at all times. yikes, no way.

To each his/her own I guess. All I know is that my land line was running me about $50 per month (including long distance). Now it costs me zero and my cell phone bill has not increased. Let's see - Three years @ $50 x 36 months = $1,800. That $1,800 will buy me an "el-cheapo" Timeshare Week + three years of MFs, with a bit left over. So for keeping my cell in my pocket I get a free vacation every year!!

GEORGE

 

[The Conch Man]

I've been with Comcast down here in Southwest Florida for bout three years now, do I really want Comcast, no I don't, they own Southwest Florida. You can't get another cable provider in this area. They have tried to signed me up for all three but I tell them no for their phone. They are way-to-expensive, after the 1st year it goes way up. I have a separated long distance carrier in regards to my land line which I pay $26.00 per month plus an average of $5.00/per month for long distance, we don't make to many long distance calls. I pay less than $.04 per minute for my long distance. We also have one cell phone with Net10 during the three years we have been here.

As of today, We no longer have a land line or long distance carriers. We own two cell phones (Net10) that costs us $30.00 per month for two phones plus 300 minutes for two months but we aren't phone users. Its a lot cheaper for us to own two cell phone than one cell phone & a land line. Just thought I throw this out to you cause of this thread.

 

[Lee B]

Is the author suggesting that Comcast doesn't tie into the internet "backbone"? They certainly don't have a separate and distinct internet system.

He suggests that they have their own backbone for doing their business, which is distributing TV and carrying telephone calls. They do provide Internet connectivity to customers, of course.

I dunno whether they share their fiber with the Internet. Maybe so, but they probably give themselves a higher quality of service. Most of the time, that wouldn't affect the Internet users at all.

 

[Kal]

Maybe I'm missing something here. I am a Comcast subscriber for all the High Def digital options and my internet service is provided thru Comcast, but not "by Comcast". My internet phone service arrives thru that same cable and Comcast modem, but it is provided by another vendor at a much lower cost than Comcast charges. The quality of my internet phone service is perfect and it is not thru Comcast.

If indeed Comcast has a stand-alone telephonic system, any Comcast subscriber would only be able to speak to another party who is on the Comcast telephonic system. Otherwise, the Comcast system would have to be integrated into the internet and the standard internet telephone system, i.e. VOIP. Any provider can use cables (and fiber) installed and owned by Comcast.

 

[Lee B]

Any digital telephone system, whether VoIP, Comcast, some other one or a cellular system, must tie into the POTS in order to connect to a traditional service telephone.

A Comcast subscriber must tie into either an Internet telephone junction, a POTS juction or a cellular system in order to complete a phone call that way. The best quality of service probably would be for the subscriber's "company" to carry the "connection" as far as possible before completing the call to the called party's system. That would save them money, too, because they likely would have to pay for the "last mile" of the connection on the called party's system.

Probably all of these connection decisions are made based on the negotiations that the system proprietors made with each other. For example, "I'll let you use my system in Massachusetts if you let me use yours in Nevada." Perhaps at the end of a month, they compare minutes used in Nevada vs. minutes used in Massachusetts.

A VoIP company preps your packets and sends them out over the Internet cloud, rather than its own wires or optical fiber to one of its nodes or the node of a cooperating VoIP company that connects to the destination system.

By using Comcast broadband with a VoIP provider, you are dependent on the Internet for telephone connectivity and on your VoIP provider for its methods of carrying your calls (its compression method, for example, and whatever its clout in the Internet community is maybe; I'm really reaching now). There are fledgeling VoIP standards that many but not all VoIP providers are using.

I don't blame you for using VoIP instead of Comcast, when it saves you substantial money and serves your purposes. I would do the same. The magazine piece I saw implies that Comcast digital phone service can be better than VoIP under some circumstances. The TUGgers that have posted here seem to support that.