Broadband pricing comparison

Gatecrasher said:
... but you do get the option of a 64k throttled service after reaching your cap.

While comparison tables like this are entertaining and hopefully spur service providers to cut their prices, they do tend to overlook vital elements like:

The difference between theoretical speeds and actual speeds. Contract requirements. Choice of equipment (ie no ethernet with NeoConnect) . Choice of bandwidth options (uncapped, local only, competing ISPs, prepaid, data rollover, etc) Out of bundle costs and options. Coverage and availability.
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This is very true, but to combine all of these factors and then put it down in an easily consumable format is near impossible. And to not make comparisons is also not really an option...which leaves us with tables like the one in the article.
 
boswald said:
Nothing beats adsl. You can shop around for the best ISP prices. www.openweb.co.za always have brilliant options. The others are just not there yet. But I hope they get there soon so Telkom will drop their prices :)
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Sorry, but there is nothing on the nationet (local internet) that floats my boat. I need real internet.
 
The posting is useful but I can't see how you can compare committed info rates (like Wimax) with non-committed services. I haven't used the Wimax but I guess you could shout the odds if you didn't get the advertised rates. On the other hand, 3G is 'best effort' and I have yet to use my HSUPA card where I get anything more than a few 100 kilobits in occassional spikes. To get the same sustained speeds on 3G as Wimax, Vodacom and MTN would have to limit their subscriber numbers per site.
 
rpm said:
This is very true, but to combine all of these factors and then put it down in an easily consumable format is near impossible. And to not make comparisons is also not really an option...which leaves us with tables like the one in the article.
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Quite understandable, and the table is interesting. But for someone shopping for a service, it would be quite perilous drawing any conclusions from such a table. So even if an article does not go into great detail, it could at least warn that there are many other considerations and factors that sets services apart other than those being listed and compared.
 
entrepr said:
The posting is useful but I can't see how you can compare committed info rates (like Wimax) with non-committed services. I haven't used the Wimax but I guess you could shout the odds if you didn't get the advertised rates. On the other hand, 3G is 'best effort' and I have yet to use my HSUPA card where I get anything more than a few 100 kilobits in occassional spikes. To get the same sustained speeds on 3G as Wimax, Vodacom and MTN would have to limit their subscriber numbers per site.
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How about dividing by the contention ratio? Or if that's too skewed, use MaxBW/2 + (MaxBW/2)/Contention

That would at least separate identically spec'd services with different contention ratios.
 
I'm sorry but NOT ONCE have I ever experienced downlink speeds of more than 1200Kbps with Neotel and I'm in the best coverage area Neotel gives.
 
Gatecrasher said:
Quite understandable, and the table is interesting. But for someone shopping for a service, it would be quite perilous drawing any conclusions from such a table. So even if an article does not go into great detail, it could at least warn that there are many other considerations and factors that sets services apart other than those being listed and compared.
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Fair comment. I just feel uncomfortable telling readers to consider real world speeds without having any reference to those speeds. The broadband report does partly serve that purpose, but many of these services were not included in it.

But I agree that one could have added an additional paragrapgh or two with more differentiating factors.
 
marine1 said:
Why no MTN?
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They don't advertise here. Seriously, though, it is a very strange omission. Maybe it is because there is virtually no difference in VC and MTN pricing. If that is the reason, fine, but I just can't imagine VC ever being left out of a MyBB table.
 
Gatecrasher said:
They don't advertise here. Seriously, though, it is a very strange omission. Maybe it is because there is virtually no difference in VC and MTN pricing. If that is the reason, fine, but I just can't imagine VC ever being left out of a MyBB table.
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I agree, MTN has no free advertising at all here but yet Vodacom is punted all the time.
I would like to know why they have been left out please.
 
@rpm you need to slap R49 onto the Vodacom prices if you want the 3.6 service. Also, is their upload not currently limited to 1400?
 
ic said:
Took ages to get MTN's site to load, and then to find the following page:
http://www.mtn.co.za/FindaPlan/Pages/DataBun.aspx
there is no mention there of any 5GB or 10GB data bundles, so I assume the reason that MTN was not included is that MTN does not offer data bundles larger than 2GB which is then something I never knew before now.
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Weird, mine loads up instantly. Amazing how much more the out of bundle price is compared to MTN :rolleyes:
 
10GB telkom?

Sorry for my ignorance, but where does one get a 10GB Telkom DSL option as mentioned in the comparison? On the Telkomsa.net website, there are still the usual 3/4GB options, and this is what I have coming through on my phone bill each month.
 
Just a minor correction to the table:

The NeoConnect Prime service is nominally 2.4 Mbps downlink (as shown), and 153 kbps uplink (not 64 kbps as indicated). As with all services, these are the peak speeds, and average user experience is lower - details in our FAQs in the Neotel discussion group on this site.
 
Ye Neotel is cheaper, but they lock you into a 24 month contract so if pricing does go down you're screwed.
 
What id like to know is, when the seacom project is finally complete, will the 3g prices come down? i got the huwai modem or whatever it is and im connected with vodacom.
 
Ye Neotel is cheaper, but they lock you into a 24 month contract so if pricing does go down you're screwed.
 
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