Broadband service comparison

September 7, 2006 8:46 AM

How much does broadband service cost in your country (non-U.S.)? I would like to find out about both hardwire and cellular service.

I was speaking with a German guy last month and when he was describing his broadband package it was both faster and cheaper than mine. I had package envy. I am definitely interested in specifics. Upload/Download speed (in Kilo/Mega BYTES, not bits). Bandwidth quotas. Can you request static IPs? Cost per month. Cost of hardware. Especially state if the service is provided by a state entity or a private entity.

For example, in Colorado. I pay about $30 per month for cable modem (which will rise to $60/month in December). I have no quota and apparently the speed is 800KBps. I haven't tested upload speed and I get a dynamically generated IP.

For cellular, I pay almost $45 for unlimited data (Verizon) at 300KBps.

posted by kookywon to Computers & Internet (23 answers total)

In Russia, if you're not in Moscow or St. Petersburg, you will pay by the megabyte, between 6 and 25 cents, depending on the time of day.

You pay a monthly fee (80$) for 1 gigabyte of traffic, and then you pay an additional 40$ fee for "line service". In your flat, the connection comes as an RJ-11 connector, which is 10 or 100mbit depending on the building, and connects with a link in Moscow.

Each additional gigabyte gets a little cheaper, but not enough to justify downloading 5 more GB.

Your down/upload speeds will be slower than domestic American DSL. I'm not about to waste the bandwidth to test them but they're said to be 256/128.

Most ISPs in smaller regions like where I am have an internal warez server. I don't pirate software myself, but they have an incredible selection and keep it very up-to-date, including English language e-books. The music selection is vast but whoever downloads the stuff has terrible taste.

Internal traffic is cheap, on the order of a half-cent a megabyte. Whenever possible with music videos and stuff linked on MeFi, I check the LAN first.

There are other ISPs in this town, with them you pay more per-megabyte but you prepay. So at my friend's house he might have 300rubles (10$) on his account, and he knows he can get x megabytes out of that before they turn it off and he has to pay more. The system I first described is most common for broadband.

As you can imagine, most people use dialup. Moscow and St. Petersburg both have "unlimited" plans with stream.ru. They're not really unlimited, but they're much better than what I'm dealing with and on the order of 25-60$/month. AFAIK it's real DSL unlike the LAN I'm on.
posted by fake at 9:04 AM on September 7, 2006

I pay $44CAD per month in Vancouver. My provider (Shaw) has various packages that run from an introductory $19.95 up to $55.
posted by timeistight at 9:08 AM on September 7, 2006

With Telewest/blueyonder I get 10Mb/s down, 384Kb/s up (~1.2MB/s, 38KB/s) for £35 (~$70) per month. No limits on bandwidth, the cable modem is free, and the IP is dynamic.
posted by Orange Goblin at 9:10 AM on September 7, 2006

With Bulldog Comms in the UK, I get 16Mb/s down and 1Mb/s up for about £30 per month. IP is dynamic. It's pretty stable, too.

You have to take the landline phone service for an additional £10 per month but local and national calls are free.
posted by mooders at 9:30 AM on September 7, 2006

I pay $9.95 CDN per month for "Up to 6.0 Mbps," although I don't think I've ever gone that high.
I'm in Canada with 3Web. Recently switched from the big corporate Rogers, who have caps and throttling and all around horrible customer service.
posted by chococat at 9:33 AM on September 7, 2006

I forgot to say the 3Web is 9.95 for 3 months, then it's 24.95.
Still cheaper than Rogers, for which I was paying around $50.
posted by chococat at 9:37 AM on September 7, 2006

Norway - 300 kr per month for 2mb line. In Oslo now you can get ADSL2+ 20MB connection for around 600kroner. Mobile 3g service on any network is around 450kr per month.

Set up fees vary between carriers. The current exchange rate on the US dollar is 6.22 Kroner to 1 USD.

Hope that helps.
posted by Funmonkey1 at 9:46 AM on September 7, 2006

Norway - 350 kr/month for my 2 MB cable line, unlimited bandwidth usage.
You can get free installation on whatever specail offer is running, I could even get the cost reduced about 2% if I wanted to commit to a 2-3 yr period.
posted by arcticseal at 11:10 AM on September 7, 2006

In the UK, I pay £17.99 (roughly $35) a month for an unlimited 1 meg connection. Supposedly, I'm getting a free upgrade to 2 megs within the next year.

That's with NTL, and although there are cheaper deals around, I've never had any trouble with NTL and I like the fact I can download as much as I want without any hassle.
posted by afx237vi at 11:14 AM on September 7, 2006

I've got 2 megs download and approx. 250kbps/min upload from NDO (Namesco) for £19.99. There's a 10GB monthly cap on up/downloads, but I never come anywhere near that on my usage, which sort of surprises me, because I'm online a lot. But I don't torrent or game online.

There's no cable access where I live, and 2 megs is the maximum my phone line will support. Suits me fine.

Namesco's service is superb. I could probably get a cheaper provider, but I'd rather pay a little more and have a reliable service.
posted by essexjan at 11:26 AM on September 7, 2006

The Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp is offereing a full 100mbps (up and down) fiberoptic connection in Japan for only ¥4,200 ($36) per month. Read here via digg.

After a bit if research I discovered that NTT also owns 63% of Japan's dominant cellular carrier, nttdocomo, but the wireless services are priced per packet or by connection time.
posted by |n$eCur3 at 11:30 AM on September 7, 2006

I'm paying 17.99 a month to Virgin in Central London for their 8MBs dl / 512kps ul / 6GB monthly cap package. Originally I signed up for their 2MBs package (same price), but got a free upgrade to 8MBs about one month ago.

Very solid, stable and fast connection - no problems.

I think Virgin upgraded folks to fend off competition from Carphone Warhouse's TalkTalk, which gives free broadband if you take their landline service.
posted by Mutant at 11:46 AM on September 7, 2006

Indiana, USA

Home: Cable modem from Comcast. 8Mbit/s down, 768Kbit/s up. $52.95-$10.00 promo = $42.95.

Wireless: T-Mobile USA Unlimited Internet for MDA with Hotspot (WiFi access at Starbucks and Borders): $29.99/mo. EDGE speeds: 30-40Kbit/s
posted by jeversol at 12:42 PM on September 7, 2006

€40 a month with Eircom in Ireland. 8MB down and 1Mb up if I recall correctly. There's cheaper about the place but they tend to be less reliable from what I can tell. Also broadband rollout is really shit in this country and pretty hard to get anywhere outside the major cities.
posted by TwoWordReview at 1:56 PM on September 7, 2006

Hahahah... yeah right, 8MB on Eircom for 40 euro? No way! The 40 euro package is 2MB down, 256k up. Plus line rental (it's DSL, you can't get it without a phone line) of... 25 euro a month? Something like that. 20GB download limit every month, though they don't seem to enforce it yet (fingers crossed).
posted by antifuse at 2:08 PM on September 7, 2006

$69 NZD (-$10 for long distance carrier) in Christchurch, NZ with iHug. 3.5Mb down 128kbs up, 10 GB limit during peak hours + 20 GB offpeak.
posted by arruns at 2:13 PM on September 7, 2006

I'm in Atlantic Canada and I have Aliant (Bell) Ultra High Speed DSL. My work pays for it but normally it costs $35CAD on a 12 month contract for guaranteed 2Mbps up to 5Mbps up and 640kbps down.

Rogers cable service is $51.95 Monthly Service Fee (plus $3.00/mth modem rental or $99.95 modem purchase plus taxes) for up to 6Mbps up and 800kbps down.
posted by ChazB at 4:28 PM on September 7, 2006

Last time I looked (although my dad may have upgraded my downloads without telling me) we pay $49.95/month for for 7GB with up to 9.9Mbps/ 128kbps. This is bundled with cable TV and phone so I think the full price might me $10-15 more.
This is in Sydney, Australia through optusnet.
posted by cholly at 11:50 PM on September 7, 2006

Actually, that's 9.9Mbps down and 256kbps up.
posted by cholly at 11:57 PM on September 7, 2006

Yup, you're right you're right antifuse. Je suis idiote! Think I may have confused download speed with download limit in my brain. (I think when we signed up the limit was only 8GB or 16GB depending on the package, but then we've just demonstrated that my brain is unreliable when it comes to these numbers!).
posted by TwoWordReview at 3:24 AM on September 8, 2006

Broadband Internet access worldwide on Wikipedia
posted by Sharcho at 3:29 AM on September 8, 2006

Italy: I use Telecom Italia, the former monopoly, because I have learned through my past work experience that while the sector has been deregulated in theory, Telecom still has the monopoly on the physical lines. One generally ends up paying more with the new guys as you still end up paying (via said new guys) the physical line to Telecom. Also jumping through red tape hoops to cancel a service/switch to a different one is not my idea of a fun time. Anywho...

For my home access I use the Alice Flat rate: unlimited access, up to 640 Kbps download/256 Kbps upload, €20 a month plus €15 a month for the phone line. Calls are extra. They used to "give" you a modem, but I see now they will start to charge new users €3,95 a month. No fixed IP, but I get around that with No-Ip.com

For the home packages they used bury "guaranteed" speeds somewhere near unfindable on the website/contract IIRC - it was a paltry amount anyway and only dorks like me are usually interested. Now they have disclaimer about no guaranteed speeds. Generally things are fairly zippy, though.

Business accounts I'm going by memory here: Was €250 every two months, unlimited access, minimum guaranteed speeds of 128 Kbps and up to 1,2 M downstream/512 Kbps upstream, fixed IP. If you wanted a router, the additional cost was something obscene.

Cable coverage for all and sundry has not yet reached the market. It took around two years for ISDN to be fully implemented, so I'm not holding my breath waiting. ADSL2+ has just arrived and home users pay around €40 a month ; as always, no minimum guaranteed speeds.

UMTS/GPRS navigation (TIM, Telecom's cellular unit) costs €19,95 a month for up to 500MB per month, 0,6 Euro cents/ KB after that, no guaranteed speeds.
posted by romakimmy at 5:10 AM on September 8, 2006

Italy: I use Telecom Italia, the former monopoly, because I have learned through my past work experience that while the sector has been deregulated in theory, Telecom still has the monopoly on the physical lines. One generally ends up paying more with the new guys as you still end up paying (via said new guys) the physical line to Telecom. Also jumping through red tape hoops to cancel a service/switch to a different one is not my idea of a fun time.

The situation in New Zealand is pretty much the same. Telecom NZ sets the speed, package and price and everyone else is just an onseller, so add their own cut (and/or make you use their shitty toll call packages). We use one of the midsize full speed Telecom plans for about $40 per month I think (just changed it, not sure which one to).

There's one wireless company that doesn't use the Telecom lines but I don't know anyone using them that's totally happy (or still using them for that matter) and it's slightly slower and no cheaper. There are two separate superfast wired networks which would be heaven to be on (run by Telstra Clear now I think). One is in central Wellington, so only those living there can use it, and one is being set up to join academic and research science institutes, which I'll soon have at work (hooray!).

For prices and plans it's all here: Broadband selector for NZ. Remember to do a currancy conversion because our money is worth a lot less than yours.
posted by shelleycat at 3:28 PM on September 9, 2006