Whether you need Internet services to communicate with family or friends or you need it for work purposes, chances are that you’re going to look into some sort of broadband Internet option.
Whereas dial-up services can be quite slow and lags severely behind, broadband Internet can provide anywhere from 30 to 100 or more times greater speeds than dial-up can anyway.
Traditional Options for Broadband Internet
When you’re looking for basic broadband Internet packages, you’re going to find several major options and distinctions among the services that companies offer.
Some cable companies make it mandatory that you bundle Internet with another service like phone, while others do not. Likewise, the second option is ADSL2+, which is DSL Internet.
Traditionally, getting residential DSL broadband connections in your home requires a phoneline, however, there’s a way to subscribe to the Internet service without the phoneline.
You do have options for paying for broadband Internet without a phone line or cable connections. This means that you can subscribe solely to Internet services, which essentially means that you can separate your Internet, phoneline and cable providers.
Naked DSL
The first option is naked DSL. Also referred to as standalone DSL, this option gives you the ability to pay for DSL broadband without a home phone. The way this works is that you still pay the phone company or DSL provider a fee for transferring the copper wire connection to your home, but you have no dial tone for a home phone.
Since you’re not paying for a dial tone, this also means that you cannot make emergency 9-1-1 calls, if needed, and that you won’t have your home phone to rely on. On the other hand, this means you don’t have to pay for a service you don’t use and don’t have to pay any federally-regulated fees, surcharges or taxes that are normally a part of subscribing to a home phone service.
Fiber Optic
Fiber optic allows you to get residential broadband Internet into your home without paying for a phone line or some other traditional cable product. These services are sometimes called Fiber To The Home, or FTTH. Paying for fiber optic Internet connections is really advantageous if you’re a heavy Internet user and want the extra speeds that this technology can provide.
Fiber optic Internet is composed of long, thin tiny strands of glass, about the thickness of human hair. These strands are arranged in bundles or “optical cables,” along which data can travel faster than the speed of light.
The data speeds you obtain with fiber optic far surpass any you can obtain with dial-up, DSL and even cable broadband. Fiber optic can provide up to 50 Mbps or more in download speeds. Although you can pay for smaller fiber optic packages, the options offered by FTTH providers vary and usually start out at around $50 per month, which is more expensive than other broadband Internet connections, on average.
Residential Wireless Broadband
Wireless broadband is another option you have for getting broadband Internet into your home if you don’t want to pay for a phoneline or cable. Wireless broadband is simplified than other cable or DSL services as well as you don’t need a direct wire connection to your Internet Service Provider.
On the contrary, you’re given a wireless modem to which you place on your windowsill or near the edge of your home. The modem connects wirelessly to the Internet company’s cellular towers that provide the signal.
Though you don’t pay a phoneline subscription, you can typically subscribe to a VoIP service if you want voice communications. Since VoIP services use your broadband Internet connection, calls are usually cheaper, meaning less expensive monthly plans.
Mobile Broadband Options
You can subscribe to mobile broadband packages in a similar way as you can to residential wireless broadband, although you’ll typically find more companies that offer this service. Mobile broadband gives you Internet services either on your Smartphone, mobile phone or laptop or netbook.
With a Smartphone or mobile phone, the device already contains a built-in modem that can act as a link to the carrier’s cellular network. All you need to do is “activate” the modem by paying for a data plan.
With a laptop or netbook you can get mobile broadband services also by paying for a data plan. The data plan gives you a modem in the form of either a PC Card or mobile dongle. When you connect the PC Card or dongle into your laptop and install the carrier’s software, your laptop is able to find the carrier’s broadband WiFi signal and connect to it.
Satellite Internet
Another broadband Internet method in which you can get online without paying for a phoneline or cable connection, satellite Internet requires you to install a physical satellite dish outside your home.
This installation is usually provided for free from the satellite company. You’re also given a modem, which connects directly to the dish outside. The satellite broadband connects wirelessly to the signals emitted from satellites in the sky, which transfers the connection back to your home computer.
Though satellite Internet usually requires no phoneline or cable, you might be required to purchase a digital television package. Satellite Internet connections are also typically slower than a cable broadband service, yet also more expensive. You only obtain speeds that rival, or are slightly better than, DSL broadband services.
As you can see, there are several options you have if you don’t want to pay for a home phone line or cable subscription. From purchasing a laptop data plan that you can connect to the Internet from inside your home to naked DSL or wireless broadband, a variety of services are available.
Mail this postGetting an Internet connection on your laptop, especially if you’re on-the-go and traveling from place to place, isn’t always easy. Though you might have a superb WiFi card already installed in your laptop, you still might have to sit in awkward positions or hold your laptop up high to even barely detect a WiFi signal from an open network.
However, open and unsecured WiFi networks are not always the safest ones to connect to as crackers, hackers and packet sniffers may be lurking just to get their hands on your passwords and other sensitive data.
One of the best things to do in this situation is to leave open networks alone and opt for subscribing to a wireless broadband network where you’re guaranteed a connection whether you’re in your car or in the back yard as long as you’re in range of your wireless carrier.
How Wireless Broadband Carriers Operate
When you sign up for a wireless broadband carrier, you’re paying for a data plan that gives you permission to connect to the carrier’s network. You can connect to the network as long as you can receive a signal from the carrier’s cellular towers.
Though you usually don’t need to attach any extra hardware to your mobile phone or Smartphone in order to do this, you do need either a WiFi PC Card or wireless USB modem if you’re going to connect through a laptop.
When you plug the WiFi PC Card or USB modem into your laptop, you must then usually install a piece of software. Together, the software and the PC Card or wireless USB modem finds and connects your laptop to your carrier’s network, assuming you’re in range.
When you’re signed up with such a plan, you usually don’t need to worry about losing a signal whether you’re indoors or out, although the reception indoors may be weaker than outside.
Cellular and wireless carriers typically have several cellular towers throughout the city and specific geographic region in which you’re located, but may not have as many in outlying areas like country or rural areas. In these cases, your signal may be weaker as well.
Deciding on a WiFi Provider
All other things being equal, you do need to consider three different issues when signing up with a wireless carrier and connecting a WiFi PC Card to your laptop. The first is signal strength. Several of the major wireless broadband carriers in the United States include Cricket, T-Mobile, Verizon and AT&T.
Though all these carriers provide coverage to many places throughout the United States, especially in metropolitan areas, you need to check whether wireless coverage is specifically available in your area.
You need to ask if the carrier has an abundance of towers where you live or whether signal strength might be weak. In many cases, you can go to the company’s website and check for coverage maps, which are usually color-coded corresponding to where you’ll receive the best wireless signals with your WiFi PC Card or wireless USB modem.
The second and third issues go hand-in-hand when looking for a wireless PC Card data plan. These two issues include the price of the monthly package versus how much data usage you’re allowed. Wireless carriers have various service offerings for laptops and mobile phones.
You need to choose a plan that will allow you sufficient data usage for email-checking, downloading as well as general surfing. To help you assess how much data usage you’ll need, AT&T is one company that provides a free data calculator on its website.
With this calculator, you can specify how many emails you’ll be sending, how much downloading you’ll be doing, how many hours of streaming music and video you’ll be listening to and viewing online all on either a monthly or weekly basis.
Once you know the size of the data package you want for your laptop, you need to inquire about price. Generally, wireless broadband plans range anywhere from $20 to $50 or more per month, depending on which data carrier you’re using.
AT&T DataConnect
As one of the largest wireless carriers in the United States, AT&T has several wireless broadband plans for laptops. The company first offers a series of five different wireless USB modems that can be used on your laptop, each with a different name like “Adrenaline,” “Shockwave” and “Turbo.” The company only offers one WiFi PC Card, the Sierra Wireless AirCard.
Depending on which one you get for your laptop, you can either connect to AT&T’s 3G or 4G wireless networks. Some of the wireless devices, including the WiFi PC Card, come with a built-in GPS receiver.
As far as AT&T’s DataConnect Plans go, however, the company only offers two basic monthly plans. The first plan gives you 200MB of data usage and costs $35 per month. The other is a $60 plan and offers 5GB of data usage.
Cricket Wireless Laptop Plans
Cricket is another major telecom service provider that offers laptop plans. Unlike AT&T, however, Cricket does not have any WiFi PC Cards for modems. Instead, it offers several different types and styles of wireless USB modems as well as the Cricket Crosswave WiFi Hotspot device, a small device that acts as a WiFi hotspot to which you can connect your WiFi-enabled laptop or mobile device.
Cricket offers three different laptop plans at $40, $50 and $60 per month. They all connect your laptop with 1.4Mbps download speeds and you’re allowed 2.5GB, 5GB and 7.5GB data usage, respectively, for each plan.
Other wireless carriers also offer similar plans for your laptop or mobile devices. Whether you’re using a WiFi PC Card, wireless USB modem or pocket WiFi hotspot device, you’ll receive Internet connectivity on your laptop and will be able to surf the Internet and get online whenever you’re in the presence of the carrier’s cellular towers and network.
Connecting your laptop to a wireless carrier is simply better, more convenient and safer than relying on free, unsecured public networks.
Mail this postGetting high-speed Internet into your home has never been easier as of January 2011. All you must do to order an Internet service is either call a simple phone number or prepare your package and pay for it online.
However, the question of whether you have an Internet provider in your area is not an issue anymore as it may have been in years past. On the contrary, the question today is what type of Internet you want to order.
Many Internet products exist, including dial-up, DSL, naked DSL, cable, satellite, fiber optic, mobile broadband and even WiMAX. The one service that has generated an increasing interest over the past year or two is naked DSL. Naked DSL is a DSL Internet product you can order without a phone service.
How DSL Without Phone Works
The way DSL without phone, or naked or standalone DSL, works is quite simple. Like traditional DSL Internet, a copper wire must travel from the phone or Internet company to your residential property.
The reason you must have the copper wire is because the data from Digital Subscriber Line Internet must traverse the same type of wire, albeit a different and lower frequency, as voice communications from a landline phone. So when you order DSL without phone or dry loop DSL, you still have the same integral components as traditional DSL, even the wall-jack in your home to which your DSL modem can be plugged.
The only difference with dry loop or naked DSL as compared with the traditional service is that the dedicated line you pay in order for the Internet to come into your home is not associated with a telephone number. For this reason, you’ll receive no dial tone even if you connect a landline phone to the wall-jack. In other words, since you’re not paying for the dial tone, you won’t receive one either.
The Cost of DSL With No Phone
Though most DSL companies market DSL without phone as a way to save money over the bundled option that you traditionally order with regular DSL, let’s take a look at the basic rate plans associated with each naked DSL package.
Verizon Communications, one company that offers standalone DSL without phone service, offers a basic plan for $30 per month for up to 1 Mbps download speeds. The most expensive package, which gives you around 10 to 15 Mbps download speeds, costs $55 per month without a home phone.
AT&T, another company that provides nationwide DSL services without a home phone, offers a basic package for $30 per month that gives 1.5 Mbps download speeds. Other companies that offer naked DSL also offer it at about the same cost as Verizon and AT&T.
In contrast to bundling DSL with a home phone, naked DSL actually costs more at retail value. Before naked DSL arrived in 2004 or 2005, most DSL packages were not marketed as Internet service “bundled” with home phone. Instead, the fact that you had to pay for a regular landline phone line was usually assumed, a requirement of the Digital Subscriber Line.
When the FCC began regulating DSL and forcing phone companies to unbundle the home phone from the Internet service, retail prices for naked DSL rose slightly.
For example, you pay only $20 per month at Verizon if you decide to bundle the DSL Internet with your home phone, making the naked DSL cost $10 more than the regular package. This is also true of most companies: naked DSL costs around $5 to $10 more when you don’t bundle it with a phone service.
Costs versus Benefits
When ordering , you typically pay around $10 to $15 more for the actual phone dial tone in addition to any surcharges, taxes and fees the government requires phone companies to collect.
For example, with Verizon’s bundled DSL package, you might pay anywhere from $30 to $35 in addition to the mandatory fees and taxes — which may only add two or three dollars onto the total — for the entire bundled package.
Overall, the cost of a basic DSL package without a phone costs $30 per month (using Verizon’s example) and the total bundled cost for DSL and phone stands at around $30 to $35, plus a few dollars for taxes and fees. In all, the total net savings you’d incur from stripping the Internet from your home phone is anywhere between $1 and $7 a month.
Cost Savings over a Year
Since saving money is saving money — and every little bit helps — it might benefit you to ditch the home phone service if you only want an Internet package.
This is especially true if you’re one of the many consumers in today’s technological society that uses his cell phone for daily use in the home and on-the-go. This would mean that, over a year’s time, you’d end up saving anywhere from $11 to $84, on average, depending on which phone company you order from.
On the other hand, you forgo being able to make calls through your landline to local phone numbers for free. Indeed, many phone companies that provide DSL give you unlimited local calling to your immediate city or geographic area since you must pay for a basic phone package with traditional DSL Internet.
If you use a cell phone regularly, this could turn into a cost savings over the overage charges you might incur for talking over your allotted monthly minutes.
When deciding whether to sign up with a DSL package with no phone, or one that is bundled with it, the deciding factor is ultimately the savings it might provide contrasted with the benefits of having a home phone line.
While you might pay a small to moderate amount less for DSL with no phone line over time, you don’t receive any of the benefits associated with having a dial tone, such as using a fax machine or making emergency 9-1-1 calls.
Mail this postOne of the reasons why you may need to pay for satellite Internet services on a monthly basis is if you live outside the coverage area of other Internet providers, such as cable or DSL.
This is often true of consumers that live in rural and backcountry areas where no amount of wiring would make Internet speeds worth the trouble or cost of installing wires and laying down the infrastructure needed to support it.
As satellite Internet is more costly than cable broadband, DSL and wireless Internet — the three most popular telecom services apart from satellite — you might want to think twice about ordering the services.
At the very least, it might be a good idea to explore alternatives for getting an Internet connection in your home or some other option, such as moving physically closer to a better connection area.
Nevertheless, whether you are forced to make a decision about satellite Internet providers because no other option exists or you simply prefer satellite broadband to other forms of Internet, you need to examine all your options carefully.
Making a hasty decision might mean you’re stuck paying a bill you don’t want and choosing a less-than-worthy satellite company may even ruin your entire experience with satellite.
Buying Internet through Satellite Companies Directly
The first option you have for obtaining a satellite Internet connection in your home is buying through a satellite Internet provider directly. These types of companies utilize no other third-party to deliver the satellite broadband and sell directly to you, the consumer and end-use of the Internet products.
This is often a better option than buying through a dealer so that you can cut out the middleman and deal with the satellite Internet provider’s representatives directly instead of a local dealer who may not have the answers you need.
HughesNet
One such satellite Internet provider that can deliver satellite to the home is HughesNet. The company was first created in the early 1970s as Hughes Electronics.
The company originally marketed Internet services to businesses and its brand was known as “DirecPC.” In 1996, however, it began offering satellite Internet services to the consumer market. It wasn’t until 2006 that the company officially changed the name of its brand to “HughesNet.”
They were one of the first to pioneer satellite Internet into business and consumer markets. As such, it provides satellite Internet to over 1.5 million residents and businesses all over the 48 contiguous states in the United States in addition to Alaska, Puerto Rico and Canada.
HughesNet offers three different packages for residential satellite Internet. The first package costs $60 per month and gives you 1 Mbps download speeds and up to 200 Kbps in upload speeds.
The “Power 150″ package offers 1.5 Mbps download speeds and costs $80 per month. The “Power 200″ option gives you 2 Mbps download speeds and costs $110 per month. For every HughesNet plan, you’re limited to the amount of downloads you put through the system on a daily basis.
The smallest plan affords you 200MB of downloads while the Power 200 allows 400MB of downloads. HughesNet regularly offers specials and discounts for each of its plans, such as the $20 per month mail-in-rebate you acquire when signing up.
Wild Blue
WildBlue Communications is another of the satellite Internet providers you have to choose from. WildBlue Communications was originally a subdivision of ViaSat, a communication company in California involved with satellite technology for military and commercial applications.
After it gained rights to a satellite in 2004, WildBlue launched as an independent company and began selling satellite Internet services directly to residential customers throughout the United States.
WildBlue is slightly more expensive than HughesNet as a whole. WildBlue’s Value Pak costs $50 per month, but only gives you up to 512 Kbps in download speeds. The Select Pak offers faster speeds up to 1.0 Mbps, but costs around $70 per month. The Pro Pak costs $80 per month and offers speeds up to 1.5 Mbps.
Dealers and Resellers of Satellite Internet
You can also buy satellite Internet through dealers and resellers of the satellite company’s products. For example, local dealers might set up shop, reselling the WildBlue or HughesNet Internet packages and then receive a commission or kickback for every customer they sign up to the company.
This kind of arrangement can also be seen with other service providers like Dish Network and DirecTV. Since DirecTV and Dish Network provide satellite TV services, a good complement to their services is satellite Internet.
These two companies routinely advertise special deals for satellite Internet for residents, powered by WildBlue or HughesNet. When you choose to bundle satellite Internet with satellite television, as is the case if you’re signing up through Dish or DirecTV, you’re often given discounts on the monthly package for Internet.
Questions to Ask Satellite Providers
Before signing up with any satellite Internet provider, you need to ask questions to make sure you’re getting the best deal possible.
For starters, you need to ask whether the installation is free or, if it costs, how much is required upfront. Installations of the satellite dish outside your home can cost upwards of $100, but some companies either give you a discount, waive the fee altogether or tack it onto future bills.
Another question you need to ask concerns the lease fee for the satellite dish. The fee can range from around $5 to $10 per month, in most cases.
An important issue that also needs to be addressed involves the term of the contract, if one exists, and the monthly service charges. Many satellite companies advertise monthly payments as discounts to the regular price. In most cases, the “regular” price takes effect three to four or more months after you sign up. To get the best deal, you must find out the “regular” monthly price so you’re not surprised with a huge bill later on.
All things considered, the cost of satellite Internet is quite expensive compared to other high-speed Internet options like cable or fiber-optic. While satellite may be your only option in the specific geographic area for which you live, chances are that you’ll have at least a few satellite Internet providers from which to choose.
Making the decision comes down to not only price, but also the terms of your agreement, whether you can bundle any other telecommunication services and your overall impression with the satellite Internet provider you’re considering.
Mail this postStaying connected to the Internet in today’s world is becoming increasingly important as you need to stay in contact with family, friends, and even co-workers and managers in your workplace. When it comes to signing up with an Internet Service Provider, whether for your home or mobile use, you need to look at the features, price and most of all speeds that the company offers.
Internet speeds tell you not only how fast you’ll be able to connect to the Internet, which is a good indicator of the activities you’ll be able to accomplish while surfing or working.
If you’re looking for a wireless service provider, you have several different options whether you’re looking for residential or mobile service.
Residential Wireless
One issue at the top of the list is how you’ll stay connected while at home. You can choose from cable, satellite, DSL or even fiber optic connection methods, but all these services may not be availalbe in your specific region, especially if you live in the country or outlying areas.
One way of connecting to the Internet that’s gaining steam is doing so by way of residential wireless. Just as you can connect from the office or a car on your mobile phone to your Internet carrier’s towers, the same can be done from the comfort of your own home.
Residential wireless Internet Service Providers, or WISPs, rely on a standard called “WiMAX,” developed by the IEEE organization. WiMAX, or simply wireless Internet or wireless broadband, is based on the 802.11 protocol that WiFi networks use and has the qualtiy of service of cellular networks.
Not many nationwide providers of residential WiMAX exist, as of January 2011, but one company that continues to expand its service coverage is Clearwire. You can also find smaller WISP companies across the country that provide service to specific cities and municipalities.
Service providers use point-to-multi-point coverage for getting wireless Internet into the homes and businesses of those who need the service. The way this works, as alluded to above, is through the use of towers that send WiFi signals across a specific area.
These signals are often strong enough to reach miles away from the center of town, which is why residents in outlying areas or country-living atmospheres are able to receive the signal. Of course, just as with regular WiFi, the amount of distance that you’re located from an Internet tower may directly impact the signal strength you receieve.
However, many people who subscribe to WiMAX plans don’t typically find this aspect of coverage to be a problem. Ineed, WiMAX broadband signals can reach anywhere from 3 to 10 miles for mobile stations and up to 30 miles for fixed stations. In comparison, the Internet signal that you might receive from your school or work’s local area network (LAN) only extends to around 100 or so feet.
Where Can you Get WiMAX?
As mentioned, Clearwire is effectively the only company that has deployed a nationwide network of WiMAX coverage to cities and residential areas across the United States. In fact, the company provides services to nearly 50 million people, as of the end of 2010 and markets its services both under the Clearwire name and the “Clear” brand.
Several other telecommunications companies that have partnered with Clearwire to spread the company’s WiMAX infrastructure include DirecTV, Time Warner Cable, Sprint and Comcast.
Looking for a Wireless Broadband Service Provider
Though you may not live in a Clearwire coverage area, you may live in an area covered by another local WiMAX provider. However, coverage varies from state to state and simply depends on the location of the wireless Internet service provider. In Southern California, you can contact Antelecom, Inc, for residential wireless services in Southern Kern and North Los Angeles counties.
If you live in Utah, you can get WiMAX coverage with River Canyon Wireless, a company that provides anywhere from 2 to 8Mbps speeds in Moab and Green River. The company 1Velocity has deployed wireless broadband to parts of California, Arizona, Nevada as well as other regions throughout the Southwest.
Several companies have entered the WiMAX market in the MidWestern United States. Xanadoo operates such a network in areas of Texas, Oklahoma and Illinois. DigitalBridge Communications launched in 2007 under the brand-name “BridgeMAXX” and current serves several regions in Montana and Wyoming, South Dakota, Indiana and Virginia.
Zing Networks operates in the Detroit metropolitan area. In Marquette, Michigan, students and faculty of Northern Michigan University can connect to the network that NMU has deployed across the city.
The popularity of WiMAX has been slowly and steadily growing since the early 2000s. Though Clearwire may have been the pioneer of the consumer WiMAX market, many other companies have entered the playing field to provide an alternative to cable, DSL and other forms of Internet.
For example, Open Range Communications has deployed residential wireless Internet to portions of 17 different states, including some in the West like California and Colorado, the Midwest like Ohio, Illinois, Arkansas and Nebraska, and East Coast and Southern states like South Carolina, Delaware, Florida and New Jersey.
AT&T has also begun to enter the WiMAX industry by providing last-mile coverage in Anchorage and Juneau, Alaska, and has conducted trial-runs in a few other states.
Benefits of Wireless Internet
Choosing a residential wireless service provider over other Internet companies does have its advantages. For instance, you get to try out one of the newest 4G technologies that is supposed to provide faster speeds than both cable and DSL broadband connections.
Many WiMAX providers also don’t require you to sign a contract or, if they do, they offer month-to-month plans so that you can easily try out their service for a limited period. In addition, setting up the residential wireless Internet in your home is also more simpler than DSL or cable. Usually, no installation is needed from a technician as all you must do is set a WiMAX wireless modem or antenna outside of your home to receive the signal throughout your house.
Residential wireless service providers’ plans are also usually low-to-moderate in cost, which means that they are affordable to most all consumers. All in all, WiMAX and wireless Internet is certainly here to stay and will continue to grow for many years.
Mail this postThere are many things to consider if you want mobile Internet on-the-go. Subscribing to mobile web services, or mobile broadband, can be much more convenient than waiting until you actually get home or to the office to check your email on a desktop computer, especially if staying in touch with your contacts translates into time and money as it does for many people.
To help you access email on your mobile phone, BlackBerry devices and other Smartphones like the Droid X, Samsung Focus or the Apple iPhone give you apps and other tools that have made it easier than ever to access new email communications from contacts..,
Choosing a Wireless Carrier
Perhaps the first thing you need to do before you access email on a mobile phone is to choose and sign up with a wireless carrier. The carrier you go way depends on a number of factors, including the availability of the Smartphone you want.
However, the cost of data plans in order to use the phone is an issue you should look at first as paying for a data plan is mandatory with most carriers. Data plan prices vary by carrier and all major carriers offer these as an option, including ATT, Verizon Wireless, Sprint and T-Mobile.
Generally, Smartphone data plans range from around $15 to around $50, depending on how much data usage you need. Two of the major carriers, Verizon Wireless and ATT, have rolled out $15 monthly plans you can buy along with your mobile phone. ATT’s DataPlus plan gives you 200MB of data while the similar $15 plan at Verizon gives you just 150MB of usage.
Though trying to figure out how much data usage you’ll actually need can be tricky, wireless carriers usually let you use a free data calculator to try to figure out which plan that you should sign up with.
On ATT’s website, the data usage calculator lets you input how many emails you’ll send and receive each day or month, the types of attachments you’ll send via email, the number of hours of streaming music you’ll listen to, the number of Web pages you’ll view and factors like social media and media downloading.
For ATT’s cheapest $15 plan with 200MB of usage, the company advertises that you should be able to send and receive over 1,000 emails per month, including some with attachments, view 400 Web pages, upload 50 pictures and view 20 minutes of streaming YouTube videos.
In addition to the cost for the data plan, you also need to consider the carrier’s voice plans, which is also a requirement to use the phone. Talk and text plans for Smartphones range in price just as data plans do, though generally hover around the $20 to $50 mark, depending on your exact needs.
Mobile Phone Models
Before you’re using your Smartphone or mobile phone on a daily basis for accessing email and Web surfing, you need to review the types of phones offered by your wireless carrier.
There are many different brands and Smartphone devices on the market today; each has something different to offer. In addition, each wireless carrier has different Smartphones and mobile phones to choose from. For example, ATT is home to both the Apple iPhone 3G and Apple iPhone 4.
ATT also lets you choose from a slew of BlackBerry devices, including the BlackBerry Curve and the Pearl. Other devices on the ATT network include the HP iPAQ Glisten, the HTC Pure, the Nuvifone G60 and the Samsung Jack. On the other hand, Verizon Wireless offers the Motorola Droid models and plenty of LG phones, such as the LG Vortex.
Operating Systems and Email Apps
Though there are many important features you want your Smartphone to have, two important features important for accessing email include the operating system your Smartphone or mobile phone runs on and the built-in apps it contains. For example, the Droid X runs on the Google Droid operating system while the Samsung Focus and LG Quantum both run on Windows 7. The BlackBerry operating system is the other major option.
The ease with which you can set up your email account on your Smartphone or mobile phone is also important. If you’re setting up access to company email, for example, the phone should be able to enroll you in a domain exchange so that it can automatically connect to domain resources to download your email. Many phones also contain “Mail” apps that you can set right on your Smartphone screen and tap or click when you’re ready to check for new emails.
Automatic Email Checking
Most Smartphones and mobile devices designed for email and productivity have built-in, automatic features that tell it to check for new email messages. Though this can be a convenient way to access email on your mobile phone, you can also turn this feature off so that you’ll have to check your email manually.
There are several advantages to doing this, such as saving the battery for talk time as continually synchronizing your Smartphone to automatically check email messages can quickly drain the battery’s charge.
As you can see, there are several things you should consider before investing in a mobile phone for daily email access. While it may be convenient and you may revel in the thought of being able to check your email on-the-go, you must consider the overall financial impact of a monthly data package.
Adding the data plan fees to the required talk and text packages, you may be approaching around $60 to $70 to maintain your Smartphone when you may have alternatives.
On the other hand, a Smartphone, BlackBerry or other mobile phone with Web access allows you to instantly receive and reply to communications from contacts no matter if you’re in the car, outside or in the office or at home. In this way, your mobile phone is an invaluable time-saving resource that can help you increase productivity.
Mail this postEven though some individuals have stuck with dial-up Internet because of its seemingly cheap rates, the number of broadband users is gradually increasing from month-to-month and year-to-year.
In fact, the most popular connection methods are cable broadband and the digital subscriber line, or DSL. Both offer affordable ways to get online without paying for an unnecessary phone line that you can’t use while surfing the Internet, such as the case with dial-up Internet.
Indeed, even though DSL typically requires you to invest in a phone service, you can now “unbundle” that phone from the DSL Internet the phone company offers. In this scenario, which is referred to as naked DSL or standalone DSL (because it strips the phone line from the package), you don’t pay so that you can have a dial tone that a landline phone requires.
Availability of Naked DSL
As of January 2011, naked DSL is offered in many countries throughout the world. In some cases, only a few major companies offer the service, but it is also offered nationwide in many countries as well. Naked DSL, or a variation of it, is offered in Australia, Canada, Germany, New Zealand, the Philippines, Switzerland, the United States and the United Kingdom.
In the UK, however, you can subscribe to a variation of naked DSL services from Virgin Media, who delivers broadband ADSL services over coaxial cable instead of regular telephone wires.
In the United States, naked DSL services arose out of regulations from the FCC. As a result of merger proceedings in 2005, the FCC mandated that both AT&T and Verizon Communications — the two largest providers of DSL broadband in the country — unbundle phone from the Internet for a period of two years.
Advantages and Disadvantages of Naked DSL
As with all telecommunications products, naked DSL also has its advantages and disadvantages.
For starters, many people cite not having to pay for a phone bill as part of the reason why they enjoy the standalone DSL offerings from Verizon, AT&T and others. While it’s true that you don’t have to pay for a phone bill, it’s also true that you’re paying for a standalone DSL Internet product at higher rates than if you “bundled” it with a phone package.
Some naked DSL providers, including both Verizon and AT&T in the United States, do increase the price of the Internet since you’re not “bundling” it with phone. In some cases, the little cost savings you do realize over time do not justify “losing” your landline.
Likewise, you also are not able to take advantage of any of the services or features that you can use with your phone line if you were paying for an actual telephone number. One example is that of a fax machine: you cannot use it if you’re subscribing only to naked DSL and not to both DSL and a phone line.
The same rule applies to emergency calls to 9-1-1 centers, point-of-sale machines and live home monitoring systems since all these devices and technologies use your active phone line.
Trying VoIP Services
One of the advantages of losing your landline with naked DSL is the fact that you can try Voice over Internet Protocol as your main home phone provider. Since the birth of consumer VoIP products in the early 2000s, many companies have developed and there is a vast market for this service.
With VoIP, you’re not paying for an actual phone line, but you’re connecting an adapter to a regular landline phone or handset so that you can use the service as a regular home phone service.
In reality, you can use VoIP services with your naked DSL because VoIP providers use your active Internet connection (not a hard-wired phone line) to send and receive voice communications.
Your voice is translated into bits of packet data that gets sent through your router and Internet connection to the receiving end. Even though VoIP has been known to be unreliable in years past, the technology has developed over the years so that call quality can even surpass that of a regular phone line.
Setting up Naked DSL
When you’re ready to set up naked DSL, the way you proceed in setting it up varies based on your home Internet network’s current configurations. For example, if you don’t have any Internet or phone line coming into the home, all you must do is call Verizon Communications, Qwest Communications, or even AT&T or another company to get started and order the service.
However, the way you go about is different if you have either a telephone line or bundled DSL Internet from a telephone company.
First and foremost, you don’t want to cancel your service if you’re currently paying for a local phone line and you wish to port your telephone number to a different service provider, such as a VoIP service provider.
To do this, you must first contact the service provider with whom you wish to order the voice product. Your current phone number will be ported to them. If you went ahead and canceled your current phone service, on the other hand, you wouldn’t get to keep your number.
You also need to ask your current DSL provider some questions before changing your plan to a “naked” one. For instance, you should ask if converting your services from a “bundled” package to a “naked” DSL package will cause any service interruptions.
While losing your landline with naked DSL can be a positive step to saving money over the long haul, you might also find it unnecessary. This is especially true if you plan to subscribe to VoIP after you switch from bundled to naked DSL. For example, the extra bill you’ll pay monthly to a VoIP service provider could have gone to the same company providing your DSL Internet.
On the other hand, ditching your phone line could be the best thing that’s ever happened to your wallet, especially if you use a mobile phone for all daily voice communications and avoid your phone line like the plague.
Naked DSL has its advantages, but you must consider if you actually want to forgo your landline in return for the small amount you might be able to save by not paying for the phone line.
Mail this postThe speeds at which you’re able to surf the Internet are directly related to the type of Internet Service Provider you have. For example, dial-up speeds are much slower than cable, which is also slower than Fiber To The Home services that use fiber optic cable to deliver the Internet.
One type of ISP, satellite Internet providers, can muster speeds that rival that of the Digital Subscriber Line, or DSL. Though Internet speeds may offer varying levels of performance, the way in which the Internet works is different for all types of companies.
How Satellite Internet Works
Satellite Internet services are often referred to as satellite broadband Internet. When you set up this type of Internet for the home, a satellite dish is typically connected outside your home and a satellite modem sits inside your house near the computer. Requests from the Internet are sent from the modem to the outside dish, from which sending signals are sent out to the satellites in the sky.
When the satellites in the sky verify the request, the signal travels back down to the Internet provider’s hub on Earth. From there, the signal gets transferred to your broadband modem, thus allowing you to view Web pages and other content online. Of course, all this takes place within the realm of a few seconds so that your Internet speeds don’t suffer.
Satellite Speeds
Satellite Internet is certainly faster than dial-up services — as practically all dial-up alternatives are — but slower than cable Internet and approximately equal to the speeds you can obtain with DSL. Packages vary and companies usually charge higher prices for an increasing amount of speeds.
In general, however, satellite Internet services can give you anywhere from 512Kbps to around 1.5Mbps (or slightly higher) in download speeds. When it comes to upload speeds, on the other hand, satellite can give you approximately only 10 to 25 percent of what it can in download speeds.
Satellite Providers
Unlike cable or DSL — where there may only be one company in the area that dominates the market — you’ll typically find that you have several companies to choose among when ordering satellite Internet services. For example, both nationwide providers Dish Network and DirecTV offer satellite Internet packages.
However, these companies are basically only resellers of WildBlue, a company that offers strictly satellite broadband services. In some cases, it may be more beneficial to go with Dish Network or DirecTV instead of a satellite Internet-only company, especially if you need digital television services, so that you can get the “bundled” price.
Alternatives to Satellite Internet Services
For many people, the Internet speeds offered by satellite Internet companies are simply not satisfactory enough to warrant offering the services. Yet, especially in rural areas, the options for residential Internet services are quite limited. In these cases, you might have one of two choices: mobile broadband or wireless broadband Internet.
Wireless broadband Internet services come in the form of a technology called WiMAX Internet. Like satellite Internet, WiMAX can travel long distances and is the type of technology that some whole cities use to spread wireless Internet to its residents and tourists. WiMAX is a form of wireless Internet and a protocol developed by the IEEE organization.
Though options for residential WiMAX are limited, Clearwire is one of the main companies that do provide such a product. When you sign up for WiMAX services, you get a modem from the Internet company, which picks up on a wireless signal from the company’s Internet towers nearby.
The other option you have for Internet is mobile broadband. Mobile broadband is a service that you can use from a cell phone carrier that gives you an Internet signal on your phone or laptop. For laptops, most mobile broadband companies offer packages that include either a PC Card or wireless USB stick that plugs into the laptop.
These wireless devices act as the modem, or connection, to the cellular tower operated by the carrier. In most cases, you should be able to use the Internet from inside your home, although your Internet speeds or signal strength to the carrier’s cellular tower may diminish somewhat.
Speed Versus Price
For many consumers, the debate about whether to sign up for satellite Internet services comes down to speeds offered versus price and the opportunity cost of subscribing to such a service. Overall, satellite Internet offers speeds at much greater rates than dial-up Internet, but not greater than services like cable, DSL or fiber optic.
However, satellite Internet subscribers also pay a much greater rate than those subscribing to dial-up services, cable and even DSL. In fact, retail prices for satellite Internet hovers around the prices that one might pay for fiber optic services, except without the added speeds.
For example, MyBlueDish offers a 1.5Mbps download speed package for around $80 per month, which is more than Verizon’s Fiber-to-the-Home package for $65 per month that offers speeds up to 25Mbps. Similarly, HughesNet’s 1.5Mbps satellite Internet plan costs $60 per month.
As you can see, the cost of satellite broadband far outweighs other types of Internet connections. Though you might enjoy the faster speeds that satellite can provide over dial-up, you might want to think about the cost savings dial-up offers.
In addition, it may behoove you to check into other alternative forms of Internet, such as residential WiMAX or mobile wireless, to see if you’re able to obtain this type of connection in your home.
All things considered, satellite Internet gives you the chance to experience the World Wide Web from the comfort of your own home even if you’re unable to enjoy a faster connection method like cable or fiber optic.
However, you might question paying more for Internet services than you have to, especially if you’re on a fixed income or tight monthly budget. When all other resources are exhausted, however, satellite offers a good option overall, especially if you combine it with digital television services in order to save money.
Mail this postThe number of mobile broadband subscriptions is growing, according to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). The ITU reported that, for 2010, the number of mobile broadband subscriptions jumped to over one billion where previously it stood at just 600 million for the previous year.
Indeed, cell phones can be used on-the-go if you subscribe to mobile broadband from your carrier, something which many college students, business users, corporate profiles and casual users alike love to do.
Whether you intend to use your Smartphone as a replacement for carrying a laptop or netbook while traveling or are physically connecting your cell phone to your computer, there are a few ways you can be accessing the Internet with your cell phone.
Tethering your Cell Phone via Cables and Bluetooth
The first method of accessing the Internet with a cell phone is tethering your cell phone to your laptop. Tethering your cell phone simply refers to physically or wirelessly connecting your mobile phone to your laptop with either a cord or through Bluetooth technology. Besides the phone and laptop, you also need a data plan to go along with both your mobile phone and your laptop.
Apart from using your phone to get your laptop online, paying for a data plan is usually a requirement with any cell phone carrier if you purchase a Smartphone or BlackBerry. The data plan for your laptop is one that allows for tethering your mobile phone. Using your mobile phone as a tether for your laptop without your carrier’s knowledge could result in penalties, fees and high data usage rates.
Some of the major wireless carriers provide you with the resources to tether your mobile web-enabled Smartphone to your laptop. ATT has a slew of mobile phones in its list of LaptopConnect compatible phones.
A few of the major models you can use with ATT include the Quickfire and ATT Tilt, HP’s iPAQ Glisten, the HTC Fuze, as well as both new and older model LG, Motorola, Nokias and BlackBerry devices, just to name a few. ATT allows you to tether your phone to your laptop either using Bluetooth or a cable, depending on your model of phone.
You also need the company’s Communication Manager Software, which runs on Windows and provides the interface through which you connect to the Internet.
Verizon Wireless also has Mobile Broadband Connect plans, which are similar to the plan options ATT offers. You need a capable BlackBerry or Smartphone, a USB cable as well as Verizon’s VZAccess Manager Software loaded on your laptop to make tethering your cell phone work.
Internet on your Phone without Tethering
If you don’t want to tether your cell phone to your laptop to get on the Internet, you do have several other options. For example, you could simply choose a data package from your carrier that would allow you to surf the Internet directly from your Smartphone.
Though this might be your only option if you absolutely must forgo your laptop while traveling, many people love the tethering idea simply because they get to enjoy the larger laptop screen while taking advantage of the Smartphone’s Internet capabilities.
Plans range in cost from around $20 to $50, on average, depending on your carrier and how much data usage you need. Generally, paying for 2GB of data usage is a sufficient plan for the average user, but you can also get plans that allow for 5GB and up as well as plans that offer unlimited data usage. There are also smaller plans that cost less than $20 for extremely “light” Internet users.
Alternatives to Cell Phone Internet
If you’re pressed for Internet while you’re traveling and you don’t want to pay for Internet on your cell phone, you can easily get the Internet if you have a WiFi-enabled laptop or netbook.
The first option is to use free and public WiFi hotspots on your laptop if you don’t want to use your cell phone to access the Internet. You can find hotspots that allow you to surf the Internet at any number of places, including airports, shopping malls, and citywide WiFi cafes and coffee shops.
The difference with using the Internet at a public hotspot is that you’re generally connecting to a wireless router or other public Internet source rather than connecting to a wireless carrier’s cellular tower, which is what you’d be doing if you used your cell phone to access the Internet.
One of the primary advantages of using your cell phone to access the Internet is that you can generally have online access no matter where you are in range of the carrier’s cellular tower.
However, tethering your phone to your laptop may not always be that convenient and interacting with Mobile Web on your phone may not always be that enjoyable, especially if you enjoy the bigger screen you can view with a laptop, as mentioned.
Another alternative that solves this problem is to subscribe to a monthly broadband wireless access plan specifically for your laptop apart from your cell phone. When you choose this option, you’ll usually receive either a small card that fits into your laptop’s PC Card slot or USB port.
Monthly plans vary depending on the carrier, but generally range in price from around $15 to $50 per month, with the most expensive of plans giving you unlimited data usage. This type of plan gives you the ability to surf the Internet no matter where you’re in range of the cellular tower, just as if you purchased a data plan for your phone or tethered your cell phone to your laptop.
All things considered, using your cell phone to access the Internet can be convenient, especially if you enjoy surfing the mobile web pages or if you can wirelessly connect your phone your laptop via Bluetooth to get online access.
Cell phone Internet plans allow you to surf the Internet at your convenience, which is especially beneficial if you need to stay in touch with contacts or if you’re going to be away from your main computer for any length of time. Otherwise, there are a few alternatives for getting mobile broadband access on your laptop if you don’t want to use your cell phone for this purpose.
Mail this postOne of Australia’s largest providers of Internet and telephone services, iiNet holds approximately just over 12% of the market share as of early 2010.
Catering to several different markets, iiNet primary offers DSL broadband Internet, but also dial-up and other voice, telephone and TV packages. Through several different mergers and acquisitions of smaller Internet Service Providers and telecommunications companies, iiNet has expanded over the years and serves both residential and business-class customers throughout Australia.
The company is a reseller of Telstra Wholesale lines, but maintains its own broadband equipment on the Telstra telephone exchanges, which allows iiNet to offer several different DSL packages to customers.
Whether you’re interested in phone or Internet service from iiNet, perhaps the best value the company offers can be seen in its DSL packages. You can obtain DSL Internet bundled with the company’s telephone services.
However, you can also get iiNet DSL broadband with no phone service. This is a plan that’s also referred to as naked DSL and it’s a popular package that the company offers to attract those who don’t want to deal with separate phone line charges.
With naked DSL, you receive many of the same benefits as a regular DSL package, including the same or greater speeds. You also have the ability to get iiNet’s VoIP voice services if you sign up for the broadband with no phone package.
iiNet DSL Broadband Speeds
Perhaps one of the most important issues you need to think about before signing up with an iiNet broadband package with or without a phone line is the types of speeds you’ll obtain. The two basic rate plans you can sign up for are iiNet’s broadband1 and broadband2 packages.
To get the greatest ADSL2+ speeds, you need to subscribe to one of iiNet’s broadband2 packages. According to the company, more than half of customers who opt for broadband2+ are able to obtain speeds in excess of 20,000kbps with bursts of speeds possible up to 24,000kbps.
Of course, your actual realized surfing speeds depend on several factors. For starters, the quality of speeds depends on your distance from the exchange. It also depends on the quality of the copper line, the number of joins in the line, your signal strength and overall traffic congestion.
Voice Service Packages
Aside from getting DSL broadband from iiNet, you can sign up for a bundle, which entitles you to save money on your total bill. Signing up for either iiNet’s traditional phone service or Netphone — which is essentially VoIP — allows you to enjoy great rates on local or long-distance calling.
The company’s VoIP services are especially beneficial if you want the convenience of making calls through your broadband connection. There are four overall choices you have if you’re already signing up with an iiNet broadband package.
The first two options you have for voice services includes iiNet’s Phone1 and Phone2 package. These are traditional phone packages that you can sign up for, costing just around $30 for the monthly plan fee. The Phone2 package offers slightly lower per-minute rates for local and national calling.
The second two options you have for voice services both include iiNet’s Netphone service, which is the package you want to choose if you want no phone line with your broadband. Instead of having a traditional phone line with a dial tone, Netphone allows you to make cheap calls similar to any other VoIP service.
Netphone doesn’t use your phone line, but uses an ATA device, or adapter, to connect a regular handheld phone. For a monthly plan fee of only around $10 per month, the Netphone2 package allows you to call other Netphone number for free, and charges no per-minute usage for calling locally or nationally.
How Broadband with No Phone Affects Other Services
Even though iiNet’s broadband plans with no phone line have increased in popularity, before you sign up you must be aware that other services you use may be affected. Naked DSL doesn’t use your inside phone line as traditional broadband packages do, but instead use the outside copper wire infrastructures.
As mentioned, you’re not able to get a dial tone with a naked DSL plan. Because of this, services that residential and business customers use — that will be affected by signing up for broadband with no phone line — include fax machine services, digital pay TV, EFTPOS machines and vending machines, as well as VPN dialers.
A good example of another popular service that will be negatively affected is home monitoring and monitored alarm systems. When you use this type of service, your phone line sends updates to a security company in real time.
Since you don’t have a dial tone, thus no inside phone line access, home monitoring services no longer work with a naked DSL package. The same is true for digital pay TV as you need to use your phone line to call the television company to order the service.
Quality of iiNet’s VoIP Services
If you opt for broadband with no phone service and proceed to sign up with iiNet’s Netphone VoIP service, you’ll experience a difference in the overall call quality as compared with iiNet’s traditional phone service.
For starters, there is no Customer Service Guarantee with iiNet’s VoIP services, primarily because you’re using your broadband connection that can — at times — be unstable. In other words, if your broadband connection isn’t working properly, is experiencing interference or has low signal strength, the quality of your VoIP calls will decrease.
You do have several advantages if you sign up for iiNet’s Netphone and broadband with no phone line. You get to make cheap and free calls to any landline or cell phone throughout Australia.
You also get many of the same voice services that you would receive with a traditional phone line, including free voicemail, call waiting, and voice messaging to email. You also receive call forwarding options, a “do not disturb” feature, three-way chat, caller line ID delivery blocking and call return.
Whether you’re a residential or business-class customer, there are clear advantages and benefits to signing up for iiNet broadband with no phone line.
Though you don’t receive the traditional dial tone as with a regular phone, you can enjoy fast ADSL2+ speeds without the hassle of paying for a service you don’t use. If you want the ability to make calls from your home or office, you do have this option through iiNet’s VoIP Netphone service.
Mail this post