I am back on my former ISP Surewest.com with 20mbps upload and download capabilities. Since I host my own website and Internet radio station at home (http://www.dhoytt.com/snake-ice-radio-blog/ ) it is extremely important to have not only a good download speed but a good upload speed for my site visitors.
My radio station has been choked off the last few months while I was with the other ISP. Why in this computer/telephony driven world would an ISP who has fiber to homes only offer .786mbps upload & 6 mbps download over fiber at higher prices is beyond me.
Upload speeds have become very important for even the casual user as they place images on photo sharing sites or send them to friends and families around the Internet. There is the proliferation of chat and online classes at work and schools that need better upload speeds.
People are streaming video and playing games that require more two way communications so a decent upload as well as download need to be used to judge ISP speeds and usability.
My continuous lobbying of my Home Owners Association paid off and we now have a nice alternative in our community that I had previously been with since their initial inception when they were called Winfirst telecommunications. I had Winfirst/Surewest in my former residence and the last few months without them have really made me appreciate them. Surewest is not perfect but they try to give the best service they can which is far superior to other ISP’s.
Surewest’s prices are substantially less for a lot more product. Having Surewest is like buying Internet bandwidth wholesale, not to mention they have video on demand for their TV product and their phone service is just as good if not better. Their support, installers and field personnel are customer friendly and know what they are doing. They don’t charge you every time you switch your service either. Like I said not perfect but this is what we call old fashioned good service.
In the Sacramento/Roseville, California area people actually mark their calendars for the day when Surewest will be coming to their neighborhood! People in areas without Surewest fiber service actually have committed to memory the date Surewest will begin fiber connectivity construction in their neighborhood. Even my super technology challenged parents query me about when Surewest will be in their area.
No I don’t work or have any other affiliation with Surewest or anyone at Surewest but I like their model and hope they keep it up and wish that other Telco’s would follow their lead.
I’m actually seriously contemplating moving but the ISP issues in other parts of the country concern me and with my involvement in technology that is a serious concern. Not many ISP’s have fiber to the home and even if they do they offer copper bandwidth at outrageous prices compared to what I have.
Bottom line I’m glad I have my 20mbps service back and I will soon be making other serious changes to my site to take advantage of this bandwidth.
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