You Help Me Get Broadband

[Alf™]

For the past few months I have been seriously thinking about getting Broadband internet connection. I currently have unlimited dial-up at $21 a month. But with the ever increasing phone bill due to dial-up, it probaly costs $40+ a month.
The problem is that I am very confused as to what "plan" I need. What speed do I need, how much downloading/uploading space etc etc. As I don't know how much I would download a month with broadband, it is very hard for me to gauge which plan I need and how much money I will need to spend a month.
I would use the internet for a fair bit of music/program downloading, as well as regular browsing.
I am wondering if anyone could point me in the right direction, and give me tips on looking for the best deal etc. Thanks.

[Let's Chop Cats!]

Well I don't know who your local companies are but it's most likely going to be a local phone company vs. a local cable company.

The average line is like 5megs down/1 meg up, but I know since Fios has been coming around the average line is being moved up to like 15/2.

Really just find your local companies and go by what you can afford. Any cable plan should be more than enough.

[Alf™]

What I mean, is like which, for example, of these plans would be suitable for me: http://www.optus.com.au/portal/site/personal/menuitem.ded28886f64e13141ff0a1108c8ac7a0/?vgnextoid=b561ed59e4054010VgnVCM10000029a67c0aRCR D&vgnextchannel=f5c0ed59e4054010VgnVCM10000029a67c0a RCRD&vgnextfmt=default

[Alf™]

Bump?

[Eccles]

unless $21 AUS is some incredibly small amount of money you're getting your *** screwed right off you.

[Alf™]

How? That seems pretty cheap.

[Eccles]

Well when i was on dial-up i paid £12.50 per month which gave me unlimited internet access for zero call charge, and that's about 3-4 years ago now.

[JohnXDoe]

I have DSL. It's 3mb down, 784-1.5 up. I average 350kbps downloads. That is for large downloads. Fairly speedy for $18 a month. And my service is through my phone company, which means my bill for dsl and local phone service monthly is $37 total. Pretty good. I was going to go cable, but decided to keep my home phone and didn't want my bills piling up. I used to have 1.5 down and 384up, and that was speedy, too. But this newer speed is better for streaming video, music, etc. And faster downloads, of course.

If your phone company offers dsl I would check with them to see if they have some sort of package deal. It's not as fast as cable, but it's fast enough. And of course surfing the web is a breeze with any high speed connection.

[Alf™]

Yes, all the packages are about $10-20 a month cheaper if you include your home phone with them.
But I need to know which package is suitable for me, as I don't want to get one, then go over their data limit, and having to use the dial-up speeds again till the end of the month.

[bradc1988]

Don't listen to those yanks and their really cheap internet.

I was in your position about 2 months ago where the phone bill was getting to high as I had to keep reconnecting, so I got broadband. I looked around a lot and I still reckon Optus is your best bet. It has free installation and connection, free modem and extra downloads when you bundle it with your home phone. I reckon you'd be fine with the 512k/128k speeds and 6G limit for $40/month.

I got the next one up which has speeds of 1.5mbps/256k with the 21G limit, which is only $10 extra a month, but I have never gotten over 400kps anyway but the 21G limit is sweet.

I think Telstra have this thing going at the moment where for the first 12 months you only pay half the monthly bill, but with Telstra if you go over your download limit you have to pay extra.

Hope that helps.

[Alf™]

Don't listen to those yanks and their really cheap internet.

I was in your position about 2 months ago where the phone bill was getting to high as I had to keep reconnecting, so I got broadband. I looked around a lot and I still reckon Optus is your best bet. It has free installation and connection, free modem and extra downloads when you bundle it with your home phone. I reckon you'd be fine with the 512k/128k speeds and 6G limit for $40/month.

I got the next one up which has speeds of 1.5mbps/256k with the 21G limit, which is only $10 extra a month, but I have never gotten over 400kps anyway but the 21G limit is sweet.

I think Telstra have this thing going at the moment where for the first 12 months you only pay half the monthly bill, but with Telstra if you go over your download limit you have to pay extra.

Hope that helps.
That's great advice, but on the Optus site, it only has a $40, 512/128k, 2GB plan or the $50, 1500/256k, 7GB plan.

[bradc1988]

Yeah ok let me explain it. You're planning to bundle right? Well it goes like this;

For the $40 plan you get 2GB worth of downloads from Midday-Midnight and you get another seperate 4GB of downloads from Midnight-Midday. So a total of 6GB basically.

For the $50 plan you get 7GB worth of downloads from Midday-Midnight and you get another seperate 14GB of downloads from Midnight-Midday. So a total of 21GB basically.

Ninja Edit: Oh and if you go over your Midday-Midnight limit your connection is slowed, but if you go over your Midnight-Midday limit your Midday-Midnight limit is used.

[Alf™]

Ok, I get it now. I think I may go for the $50 bundled plan. It seems like a better deal. Thankyou for your help.

One more thing: Is the line rental included in the $50? On dial-up right now, we pay something like a $30 line rental each month. Does this continue with broadband?

[bradc1988]

If you're with Optus already, then it will be $50/month for the ADSL and $30/month for the phoneline. You can always change to the $25/month plan for the phone line, but local calls are 30c.