quote:

Originally posted by just1tym:


Great info all. PA, when you say watch out for the fees, are you talking about some kind of fee that they add on to the monthly bill?

Things like Sports fees (I watch 0.00% sports) and the Broadcast TV fee can add to your bill and they hit everyone with them (I think). Comcast/Xfinity LOVES their bullshit "fees" because they don't raise the base price of their packages; they are all add-ons.

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:

quote:

Originally posted by just1tym
Great info all. PA, when you say watch out for the fees, are you talking about some kind of fee that they add on to the monthly bill?

Things like Sports fees (I watch 0.00% sports) and the Broadcast TV fee can add to your bill and they hit everyone with them (I think). Comcast/Xfinity LOVES their bullshit "fees" because they don't raise the base price of their packages; they are all add-ons.

I was just looking at the offered Xfinity Triple Play and it's a 2yr agreement after that the plan goes to a normal rate of $133mo. I quit watching sports so thats doesn't need to be in the picture.

Do they offer a movie pay per view. AT&T charge an average of $5.99 for a 2 day rental. Does Xfinity have this also?

quote:

Originally posted by smschulz:
The grass is always greener with the other guy.
Having dealt with them all there is no true joy.
I have found Comcast is faster and ATT is more reliable.
After a certain speed most won't notice much of any bandwidth changes.
There are exceptions and circumstances but doing the "bandwidth test" is more for personal satisfaction and marketing than an effective measure of quality.
I use Comcast for TV, ATT for Internet with a modest speed and have no issues running my own servers including mail, FTP remote access and regular daily use.
Maybe more speed would help but I don't suffer any performance.
YMMV

Also most will "test" through a wifi connections and that is completely wrong and is not how to evaluate Internet bandwidth.

I'm not ruling AT&T out yet, I'm actually satisfied at the internet wifi and Direct TV reliability. I guess the only real way to get to the "greener" grass might be to cut the chord, eventually down the road and go the way of OTA and ROKU type thing. And keep AT&T for the internet.

Or, drop cable, use Comcast for Internet and lower the cell bill with Xfinity mobile.

*Disclaimer - Comcast employee.

I live just North of you in Pompano Beach. Xfinity the service is very good for both Internet and cable TV, with maybe an outage a month for a few hours.

HOWEVER, after the 12 or 24 month trial period your bill will shoot up like a Tesla rocket, just like direct tv. Also they charge you a rental fee for every box, the modem etc. Also, you will see random charges for paperview or some channel you never subscribed to and then have to call and deal with them on the phone, which is usually a pain in the rear.

That being said. Best bang for the buck is to get just the Xfinity internet at a deal, and then get yourself a Roku box and YouTube TV or another streaming TV. The YouTube is $55 total price a month for every channel you can think of except the pay ones (HBO/Cinemax, etc), includes free DVR and up to 6 devices (tablets included).

Otherwise you could always skip back and forth from xfinity to at+t every 2 years when your introductory rate is up.

Been with Comcast/Xfinity for over 15 years in 2 states. And have a Ring for the past 2-3yrs now. Service has been good. CS has been good. Speed is constantly being updated and increased by Xfinity with no additional charges. You can do pay per view. Connection with Ring is good. The issue with Ring is lag in their server end. And I have the original Ring, I’ve been told the 2 or newer respond faster.

You will have to renegotiate your terms every 1-2 years pending your original year terms you choose. But I always get as good if not more options for same money every 2 yrs. There are “additional” fees on your bill above the advertised prices. For ex. My mom as a new subscriber 2 months ago purchased Triple pkg, phone/internet/cable, for $140/mo. That’s $100 for services, $20 for all the “Fees”/taxes and $20 for equipment. DVR box is $10 and combo modem $10 per month.

Their main box will give you Apps and Games. Netflix and YouTube are main ones. Currently no Disney+ due to Xfinity and Disney being main rivals. But I’m sure eventually they will have Disney+.

Voice control on main box also. My kids like it.

I have always used their equipment with no major issues. The DVR main box and their modem. Their modem is a modem and router in one. Dual band. If it ever has issues you just walk into a Xfinity store and swap it for a new one no charge. Also comes with unlimited tech support if needed. I’ve had to troubleshoot a few times over the 15yrs and all issues have been corrected within a timely manner. You can also swap out remotes anytime for free also at the stores. Along with any cable boxes, again if needed.

I have had the “Blast” for years now and every year once or twice they increase the speeds with no additional charges. They are constantly improving their services.

In my area, outside Atlanta, we haven’t had any outages that I can remember in the past 8 yrs. No weather outages. And we have all the seasons and all the weather issues here.

They also have a satisfaction guarantee of iirc 60 days. So try it and if u don’t like turn it all back in.

Side note....if you want a 2nd or more tv to receive cable you can do one of two things.
1- pay for a jumper box at $10/mo
2- use a ROKU and use the Xfinity app (ONLY through ROKU and it’s been in “Beta” for years now. No issues though) to have the same access on any TV in house as you do with the main DVR box. I have done this for 3 yrs now with no issues and I’ve saved over $700 by doing so. I have two extra tv’s and about to add a 3rd now.

I say give them a try, I’m sure you’ll enjoy it.

quote:

Originally posted by just1tym:

I'm not ruling AT&T out yet, I'm actually satisfied at the internet wifi and Direct TV reliability. I guess the only real way to get to the "greener" grass might be to cut the chord, eventually down the road and go the way of OTA and ROKU type thing. And keep AT&T for the internet.

I was in the same mindset until the local electric company ran fiber to my area. Right after they did I ditched AT&T and ripped that freakin' dish off my roof. My ISP is now through the electric company and all I have is Youtube TV. No separate OTA or DVR gear necessary and I've cut my bill in half.

I have internet from at&t.
Amazon firestick.
I WISH I HAD DONE THIS YEARS AGO !
TOO EASY.
My tv has nothing but a power cord and a stick attached.
I carry my 26" to different rooms even outside !

Im in west boca on Xfinity
Ping 15
Download 42.54
Upload 11.89

For internet, switch and never look back

Late to the party, but just to confirm that Comcast will add significant fees on top of the base package rate. And while the package rate is locked/guaranteed for the contract period, fees are not locked and will very likely go up, even during the contract period.

Example: I'm signed up on a 1-year contract Internet/TV package that even locks in the package rate for 2 years. Package is $90. On top of that they do charge

$6.99 service to additional TV with TV adapter
$9.95 DVR service

$13.65 Broadcast TV fee
$6.75 Regional Sports fee

$5.55 regulatory cost recovery, franchise fee
$3.44 sales tax

That's a total of $46.45 in additional fees (mostly) and taxes (very few). And despite me being in contract and them locking the package rate, they just raised the broadcast TV and regional sports fees an extra $4 this month.

^^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
"YOWSA"..now those fees are what I wanted to find out about, thanks. Was just my luck, or unlucky, my internet wifi connection failed at 3am with AT&T I called them up yesterday to get it fixed and couldn't really understand the first woman rep's language, so that was a wash, I just wanted to get cancelled and move on to Xfinity, she transferred me to another guy and I went thru the whole internet pricing deal and that I want to cut costs and cancel and go to infinity. He said, " I cannot help you. I'm a tech guy, you need to speak to somebody in retail" My head is exploding at this point, I just hang up to gather my wits.

After an hour I calm down and the phone rings, it's a guy named Greg, from AT&T who wants to hear what I have to tell him. I explain everything in detail, go over it for an hour and he lowers my charges to $97.99 for 212ch's, upgraded internet wifi speed and 6mos of free Showtime, which I really didn't want so I'll cancel that at 6mos. The tech is coming out Wed to upgrade my equipment and increase my wifi speeds so...I'm sucked in for another year and will stay on the green grass on this side of the fence for another year.

Additionally, early that night my internet goes out, I had to eventually dig behind all my audio cabinets to expose AT&T's boxes and reboot them to finally get my internet back up in running. Thats the first time I can remember my wifi internet service being down other than for an intermittent outage. It was 1-1/2days before I took it into my hands and unplugged everything to reboot.

Almost like AT&T took a shot across my bow as a warning

And y'all know what all these "fees" are paying for, right? Someone else's free shit, THAT'S what. Same thing with cellphone "fees"...remember the Crimson Kenyan phones?? Same principal applied here...

I just wish there was some real competition of ISPs in town. As it stands, my only other option is to get DSL service from the local phone provider, at a max. speed of 1.5Mbps. That's right, one-point-five.

The city has just started a 3-year project to get every household hooked up to 1Gbit (symmetric) fiber, for $60/month. Can't come soon enough. Add Hulu or YTTV, and we're all set.

quote:

Originally posted by maladat:

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:
Your high speed internet will be MUCH better and faster from Xfinity than anything AT&T could have given you.

<snip>

I get 100-150 Mbps consistently.

I have AT&T gigabit fiber and consistently get over 950 Mbps both up and down on computers with wired connections.

Even before I got fiber, I always got speeds well over 100 Mbps.

That’s to the ONT. I have the same service. Cat6 connected devices, if using Speedtest get a few hundred less mbps. It’s plenty but no where near advertised.

My advice, have both the LEC (ATT) and the MSO (cable company) wired to your house so you can switch. I had ATT install their fiber to the house last year because the price was right and if I ever sell the house listing fiber connected in the listing will attract younger buyers who are addicted to the internet. I get several discounts with ATT so it’s $70 a month but they’ll jack the rates up once the 24 months are up. I keep a cable modem and WiFi router in the office so I can switch on the fly. Going to retention doesn’t work like it used to so if they won’t play ball, I’ll call and connect the opposing service, then disconnect the other one. Flip/flop, every few years. That’s the only way you can keep them honest. I use Dish network for satellite and they are amicable with their pricing and what they force upon you. The internet gets switched out every 24 months.

quote:

Originally posted by Prefontaine:

quote:

Originally posted by maladat:

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:
Your high speed internet will be MUCH better and faster from Xfinity than anything AT&T could have given you.

<snip>

I get 100-150 Mbps consistently.

I have AT&T gigabit fiber and consistently get over 950 Mbps both up and down on computers with wired connections.

Even before I got fiber, I always got speeds well over 100 Mbps.

That’s to the ONT. I have the same service. Cat6 connected devices, if using Speedtest get a few hundred less mbps. It’s plenty but no where near advertised.

I get 950+ Mbps on my computer when it's plugged in rather than on WiFi.

quote:

Originally posted by maladat:


I get 950+ Mbps on my computer when it's plugged in rather than on WiFi.

Yeah if I use ATT's speed test on their app I'll get that, symmetrical speed at 950, but that's internal speed test on ATT's hardware. I'm wired so I never refer to mbps on 802.11, as it's pointless.

But testing to local servers..... Local server's are ATT and Frontier, and I'll hit 750-775 mbps down, and 700 ish up. And that's a more accurate test going over the net. There is always loss but not that much. The local CO where I'm testing to over the internet, is just a few miles from me and same carrier. So couldn't be any closer.

If you are in the Austin area they put in fiber down there to compete with Google's fiber. So perhaps it is faster. But I'm in comms for a living and work on fiber all day, every day, and I've checked the ATT Fiber DSL speeds around the country as I'm going to be using it for some SD-WAN at work, and I'm consistently seeing several hundred mbps slower than advertised. I used to work on D slams too, so it may be different by foot print. It's just a setting on the local hardware.

If you seeing 950/950 consistently, that's why I mentioned the ONT. That's exactly what I get on ATT's hardware, direct, not running over the net. That's via ATT's app.

Nope, it's using third-party speed tests.