Speed Matters: In Search Of High-Speed Internet Outside Of A Major Metro
Small Business Insights: Techincal
Originally posted in 2009
For literally years I looked forward to the UVERSE network upgrade that inched slowly-ever so slowly-toward my Little Rock suburb. I checked ‘availability’ about once a month (using an online tool) and even called in from time to time trying to glean even the most modest pearls of information. Have you ever seen an AT&T truck with the semi-rhetorical marketing slogan “Ask Me About UVERSE”? Well not once, but twice I did when coming across a technician in my neighborhood.
Jump ahead about 3 years and finally, the day came. I made the appointment and within a week, I was enjoying an 18 mps download speed, fiber-optic television courtesy of UVERSE! We decided to go ‘all cell’ and didn’t install the voice service. Finally, the curse of storm-induced DishTV outages was over and better yet, I now had BBC America.
After two weeks, I called AT&T and dramatically downgraded my services. Here are the highlights behind the decision to end this honeymoon so quickly
- On my HD TV, I was able to cite a clear downgrade in HD picture quality. Sure I can be a stickler over ‘all-things technical’, but my son noted the same, over-compressed HD signal as a sub-standard when compared to the DishTV picture. I know many folks can claim the opposite to be true but in my scrutinizing eyes the picture wasn’t as sharp
- The UVERSE DVR remote allowed users to “skip” forward (we seem to use that much more often than the fast forward option) but it subjected me to nevertheless watch the video. Sure it was in ‘fast forward’ mode, but the clear winner here is DishTV. The same DishTV remote feature simply takes the viewer 30 seconds ahead almost instantly. Translation, tapping the “skip” button 4 times in a row on DishTV remote lands me about 2 minutes deeper into a program. Doing the same multi-tap trick on a UVERSE simply doesn’t work as you have to ride out each “skip”, one at a time. You can’t “stack” the stick commands and it proved very tedious.
- Full and complete DVR features on two TVs: turns out it’s a DishTV exclusive (so I’m reading). While UVERSE allows up to four “satellite”‘ units to draw from the primary DVR, the secondary TVs can NOT pause live TV but can only pause/play/fast forward recorded programming. Within the scope of our decision to stay with DishTV, this ended up being a major factor.
- In my eyes, the 18 mps internet speed was the core feature of the upgrade. This was the cornerstone of my interest in UVERSE. Who would have ever guessed that tripling my internet speed (I was at 6 mps) would have been such a bland, milquetoast upgrade.
- Yes, FTP’ing large files or downloading new music on iTunes it was clearly faster–no argument there. But even though I spend 8 hours a day working online, it turns out I don’t make many uber-large file transactions. Hardly any in fact. But even sites like YouTube seemed to load fast enough with my 6 mps connection. I mean the movie may load faster but it didn’t START any faster. So having it pre-loaded is of questionable value.
- Emails with large attachments did not load any faster–Outlook seems to be immune to the speed upgrade. And for the most part, day to day browsing was likewise only modestly faster–at best. The one thing to remember about browsing the web is that you’re only as fast as your weakest link (the website you’re visiting).
- Speestest.net is a great site for measuring your connection speed. Using a variety of test servers I found my speeds clocking in as low as 8 mps, regularly at about 10-12 mps and once in a while in the 16-17 mps range.
- Cost to Value Ratio: This is what broke the back of UVERSE. Had the 18 mps rate cost less, I’d have kept it. But upgrading my monthly cost from $35 a month to $65 proved too much to stomach based on my modest enthusiasm for the speed and it’s real-life results. If you download games all day (5 gig demos) or regularly transfer crazy large files like billboard size images it’s a keeper. But even as the power-user that I am, I just didn’t see the difference that warranted doubling my monthly bill.
- For the total goobers: The gateway hardware is comically large (the size of a Mom’s photo album) and the interface for managing connections, security and MAC ID’s in pitiful if you’re used to a full-featured set of options. And as one that grew to love DD-WRT, I’m almost in tears.
If you were paying attention, you’ll recall that I didn’t CANCEL my UVERSE account but rather only downgraded it. One, in spite of the hulking breadbox gateway, it does provide consistent speeds–both upload and download. The promised speeds of 6 mps down and 1 mps up are effectively delivered. With my traditional DSL, I only got 650 kbps upload and about 4.5 to 5 mps down. The fiber-optic-based UVERSE clearly manages and maintains the speed more consistently. Additionally, keeping the new configuration gives me the option to change my mind down the road. You never know—prices and feature sets change all the time. So with the hardware in place, I’m one step ahead.
This product has major problems. I am very pleased with the Internet transfer speed and the TV picture quality. But in my view, there are serious shortcomings with this product. First, my existing ‘Picture-In-Picture’ feature of my television set no longer functions. I used this feature to watch one game, and keep abreast of a second game. When a worthwhile play occurs on the small display, a click of the button swaps the 2 stations and I can see the instant replay, then go back to the first game. Also, the capability to tape any game or show is gone. It is impossible to make a tape and then view it on another TV. I do this all the time to preview a show’s content before presenting the show in my classroom environment. And the handheld remote has major human engineering problems. Just picking up the device or putting it face down on the chair may very well start the ‘Record’ operation. And to scan through the program listings, sometimes you need to push the ‘+’ channel button to go higher numbered channels, and sometimes you need to press the ‘-‘ button to go to a higher numbered channel. And clearing out all the recorded shows requires a convoluted sequence of pressing the ‘Menu’, ‘OK’ and up/down keys. And I still have not found a comprehensive document to describe what all the keys on the remote are intended to use, let alone how to use the keys to accomplish a specific task.
So far I’m not having any problem with my U-verse TV and yes you’re right their internet is pretty impressive.
U-verse has been installed at my house for about a week now. We have it on 4 tvs, no HD. We also got the 6mps internet service. We had Charter cable tv with one digital box and 5mps service before. I am pretty happy with U-verse right now. I love the consistent internet speeds. Cable internet sucks. I’m also pretty happy with the DVR. I’ve never had a DVR until now, so I’m probably easily impressed, but I’m impressed none the less.
The only issue that I have is with the limited number of streams available (4). Last night I was watching something while recording another show. Two other TVs were on at the time. I was shocked when my daughter turned on the TV in her room and all of the sets went black with a warning that I either had to turn a box off, or stop recording. She ended up not watching TV, so it didn’t matter. This is the first time this has happened in a week; it probably won’t happen that often, but it still sucks.
I am not missing regular cable tv or internet at all.
I continue to be pleased with the internet speeds–and yes, the connections are consistent and it’s never gone down (knock on wood; are you listening Comcast?) I especially appreciate the decent upload speeds. While not quite like those found overseas, it’s fine 99% of the time. But my friend–the DVR will change your life! LOL I’d still prefer a TiVO but cash is cash and this is a cheaper scenario. Enjoy the DVR ride; I was an early-DVR-adopter and now consider it a built in part of my television bill. There is no going back.
I hade AT&T UVERSE installed 3 weeks ago and have not gotten AT&T tecs to fix the problem of freezing and pixing. I’m hoping someone out there mabye has had the same problem and can give me some pointers. I’t just frustrating trying or planning to watch a program with this problem. I have reported it at least 4 times, they has sent someone out 3 times. I complained to AT&T , and they show on record of my problems with the system and ofered me $15.00 credit for my troubles. I am still having the same problems and reported it to them again but everytime need a tec to come out they give you this 5 hour window . Verrrry frustration.
Does U-verse transmit 1080p quality?
We just installed U-Verse and will be getting rid of Comcast. We’re in the west Houston area. Like all changes there’s plus and minus to the change. Reliability and picture quality is big improvement. You might find this incredible but to get HD we watched the BCS championship game on our old antenna array in the attic after some emergency surgery. To think last month I was thinking about putting out the old dinosaur. See creative procrastination does pay.
We’re still learning the in and outs put the feature and channel selection are better. It just looks pretty. Haven’t gotten the router/wireless going yet, added that at the last minute. I’m not into tech for tech’s sake but somehow we’ve evolved a network with about a dozen devices. I guess we’ll be getting an internet capable refrigerator one of these days. I hope AT&T has not dumb the router down to much.
My biggest disappointment is the reduced DVR functionality that the secondary TV’s have. I have an HDTV in the bedroom, which is my prime viewing spot while my wife and dog use the Home Theater System. For some amazing reason she finds the Science Channel boring and would rather watch Desperate House Wives. Go figure.
Back to my problem, I want to have a pause and rewind function on that second HDTV. Has anyone come up with an answer for this? I don’t want to be locked into a TiVo subscription. I doubt if it would work the U-verse system anyway. I’d like some thing like a single point Moxi with about 20G’s. Just enough to hold an hour’s worth of show. One HDMI in and one HDMI out. My price point would be below $200. (Really, it’s more like $120 but there’s no hope of that.)
Very very poor installation service! About 6 weeks age we decided to get ATT uverse installed. We already had the basic phone line. Five Saturdays ago the field tech came for the installation. He said that the outside line was Not good enough for data transmission and did not install the inside system. Four Saturdays ago two another techs arrived and said basicly the same thing. Yet the outside line had not been installed. Two weeks ago the new outside line was installed but last weekend the tech still did not show up install the inside system. Four days ago the original tech showed up and installed the inside system which took 6 hours. He only finished it up with me helping him pull three cables in the attic and walls. Now cable TV and internet is working but the phone is not working. How do they do that? As usual, we the consumer are screwed again and again.
We have wifi internet service from uverse. For the last week it’s been going down at about 6PM and staying down. I can access it all day long but at 6PM it dies. Could it be caused from overloading the system. Its been going on for about one week.
Obviously I can’t comment on that–it’s an odd network issue. I can say however that as a former Comcast user, the UVERSE (and AT&T “traditional” DSL service before that) has been air-tight. When Comcast ruled my connection, I became an ace at resetting my router due to fairly regular interruptions.
I plan to discontinue my uverse service as soon as I return home, it is totally unreliable!
Really? I’m only using the internet element of the service but as compared to my years with Comcast, it’s been rock solid specific to uptime.
What I learned about uverse is that they actually have two types of uverse. What they call the FTTP (fiber to the premises) and FTTN (fiber to the node). If your home was built recently and it is in an AT&T area it would most likely have FTTP which is a full fiber optic connection. If your home is older then it was most likely has FTTN which means that you receive a fiber optic connection up to the node that services your particular neighborhood or block. From the node to your home, your TV and internet signal would travel via there telephone lines. Granted, if you have uverse that is FTTN, AT&T gaurantees that the amount of telephone wire used is less than 3,500 (less than a mile) but when it comes to HD service that may make a difference. I, for example have uverse and it is the best HD service i have ever had but I’m pretty sure my home has FTTP. As far as the DVR is concerned, the whole thing about not being able to pause live TV in my other rooms kind of irked me but the HD quality (in my area) made up for it.