ISP newbie help

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Ylona

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I know all I am about to ask must have been explained and mentioned on the forums but I just get confused and since I'm a total newbie on SA's version of broadband - please help and thank you.

Right - question is, which ISP to use and how many GB's to get.

In a perfect world I would download lets say the latest episodes of Prison Break and Greys anatomy once a week, some music etc.

Also was told mom and dad has suddenly caught the online casino bug so once a week they play on piggs peak online, not sure what that does with regards to the amount it uses etc and also mom browses a lot on international medical sites for her studies but that is also about once night in every two weeks.

Then just emails receiving and sending and lots of Instant Messaging via Yahoo and the odd Skype phone call.

I just dont understand what all of the uncapped capped local cap blah blah means. I am just used to turning the pc and having broadband at 1024speed and unlimited downloads any time any day so I am now confused since things in SA is different.

There just seem so many to choose from, i was just going to go with Telkom's 3GB at R250 but I dont know if there are any better options.
 
Ylona said:
i was just going to go with Telkom's 3GB at R250 but I dont know if there are any better options.
Click to expand...

PLEASE dont even think about going with them. There are plenty of other options that are far cheaper. Cybersmart has the same 3GB account for half the price. If 3GB is too much then use AXXESS at R59/GB. Go to www.hellkom.co.za for a complete list of all ISP's and their prices.

As to howmuch you gonna use we cant predict. How long is a piece of string? Start with a 1 GB account and see how long it lasts. Then buy more if you need it.

Unfortunately the grass is not greener in South Africa and here we do not have incredible speeds and unlimited downloads. We have slow speeds and you pay for what you download (and upload) per Gig.
 
Summary of Services:

High User
1) Uncapped from OpenWeb - www.openweb.co.za
2) TelkomInternet (SAIX) + WebAfrica (SAIX for this purpose) and optional OpenWeb Local Only (I.S)
3) WebAfrica 10GB - R490
www.telkomsa.net - www.webafrica.co.za - www.openweb.co.za

Pay As You Go
WebAfrica - 4GB or less - www.webafrica.co.za (SAIX)
Imaginet - 5GB or more - www.imaginet.co.za (SAIX)

Low Budget or 3GB users
Cybersmart - 3GB users - www.cybersmart.co.za (??SAIX?? - under correction)

Local Only Customers
OpenWeb Local Only Account - www.openweb.co.za (Internet Solutions)

Unshaped SAIX for Gaming/Latency Sensitive Applications
WebAfrica Unshaped Prepaid or Postpaid - www.webafrica.co.za (SAIX)
Axxess R99 per gig accounts - www.axxess.co.za (SAIX)
 
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Telkomhater said:
PLEASE dont even think about going with them. There are plenty of other options that are far cheaper. Cybersmart has the same 3GB account for half the price. If 3GB is too much then use AXXESS at R59/GB.
Click to expand...

The user just specified that he/she would like to download some episodes of Prison Break and other favourites from the internet. 3GB would not be enough in my personal opinion, also kindly dont shut TelkomInternet down without knowing another option would cost less and be better for the forumites usage pattern, if you are a high user that just doesnt have enough cash for uncapped, TelkomInternet may be the best option for you.

If you are able to get me another ISP that gets me 30GB per month (last 3 months) for R498 let me know ;)
R249 x 2

Ylona said:
I know all I am about to ask must have been explained and mentioned on the forums but I just get confused and since I'm a total newbie on SA's version of broadband - please help and thank you.

Right - question is, which ISP to use and how many GB's to get.

In a perfect world I would download lets say the latest episodes of Prison Break and Greys anatomy once a week, some music etc.

Also was told mom and dad has suddenly caught the online casino bug so once a week they play on piggs peak online, not sure what that does with regards to the amount it uses etc and also mom browses a lot on international medical sites for her studies but that is also about once night in every two weeks.

Then just emails receiving and sending and lots of Instant Messaging via Yahoo and the odd Skype phone call.

I just dont understand what all of the uncapped capped local cap blah blah means. I am just used to turning the pc and having broadband at 1024speed and unlimited downloads any time any day so I am now confused since things in SA is different.

There just seem so many to choose from, i was just going to go with Telkom's 3GB at R250 but I dont know if there are any better options.
Click to expand...

You would probably be looking at somewhere in the region on 10GB of usage to be comfortable. R490 for 10GB WebAfrica might work, and that is the choice of thoe that are TelkomInternet haters, but in my personal experience you get 10GB with 1 TelkomInternet for R249, I just use a pay as you go WebAfrica account for backup.

I have been using 2x TelkomInternet and cant find a better ISP to give me the same usage. Local Only access, OpenWeb is the place, pay as you go for a gig or two WebAfrica is the place, 5GB - 20GB of usage TelkomInternet, more get Uncapped from a Internet Solutions reseller.

Hope the info helps. I made the following recommendation based on you needing international access, bandwidth for 1 episode of say 3 shows per week (and incase you get fake torrentz etc) seam music/download music here and there.
 
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Telkomhater said:
PLEASE dont even think about going with them. There are plenty of other options that are far cheaper. Cybersmart has the same 3GB account for half the price. If 3GB is too much then use AXXESS at R59/GB. Go to www.hellkom.co.za for a complete list of all ISP's and their prices.
Click to expand...
They do? Where do I sign up. You're absolutely sure they dont hard cap at 3gb right?

I thought constantly getting well over 6gb due to the pooled capping TelkomInternet utilises was decent but if I can get the same thing from them I'd be willing to give it a shot.
 
Guys I really dont want to play the high-horse here, but is it right to recommend an ISP to someone based on the fact that you get away with 'stealing' more than you are paying for.

Please, now I know you can justify your using more than you are paying for by whatever cleverly worded response you can think of - but the fact is you are purchasing 3 GIGs and deliberately using more than that.

For example if I go to SPUR restauarant and order a salad and the waiter says go help yourself at the salad bar but only one plate. Then you eat that plate and go back for three, four, five more plates and no one notices you STOLE the extra plates. Then you say to your friend, "Go to SPUR because you can get away with eating more than you payed for."

Is that right? The fact that you may or may not hate TELKOM bitterly is irrelevant.

I am not debating the ethics of hard capping or soft capping or whether capping is right or wrong. The fact is that this is the situation in SA at the moment. Are you not recommending Telkom because it is easier to steal from them than say another ISP? What says you?
 
Stealing bandwidth would be when I am using the accounts that were given to me by a MSN contact that is obtained from routers across the country without the account owners knowledge

TelkomInternet have publicly announced that their 3GB accounts are soft capped.

Quoted from website: Although TelkomInternet currently allow capped clients unrestricted access, TelkomInternet reserves the right to deny authentication to any ADSL user dependent on network usage over the prescribed cap.

TelkomInternet has a soft cap, not a hard cap, other ISP's have hard caps at xGB and then you pay more above that.

Using TelkomInternets feature of Relaxed capping is not stealing. They have service resets every 24 hours where they can disable my account from their network, if I found a way that they cannot disable my account and continue to make use of the account, then I am stealing.
 
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Telkomhater said:
Guys I really dont want to play the high-horse here, but is it right to recommend an ISP to someone based on the fact that you get away with 'stealing' more than you are paying for.

Please, now I know you can justify your using more than you are paying for by whatever cleverly worded response you can think of - but the fact is you are purchasing 3 GIGs and deliberately using more than that.

For example if I go to SPUR restauarant and order a salad and the waiter says go help yourself at the salad bar but only one plate. Then you eat that plate and go back for three, four, five more plates and no one notices you STOLE the extra plates. Then you say to your friend, "Go to SPUR because you can get away with eating more than you payed for."

Is that right? The fact that you may or may not hate TELKOM bitterly is irrelevant.

I am not debating the ethics of hard capping or soft capping or whether capping is right or wrong. The fact is that this is the situation in SA at the moment. Are you not recommending Telkom because it is easier to steal from them than say another ISP? What says you?
Click to expand...
Are you seriously that naive? They advertise being able to use more than the 3gb. Its a flipping selling point called shared service capping.

EDIT - Try to use analogies that actually fit the situation. Here's a better one - you go to that restaurant and the waiter says see that massive bowl of salad? Well that's for everyone and rather than throwing any leftovers away we've decided that any excess can be shared between those still hungry.
 
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bwana v.21 said:
Here's a better one - you go to that restaurant and the waiter says see that massive bowl of salad? Well that's for everyone and rather than throwing any leftovers away we've decided that any excess can be shared between those still hungry.
Click to expand...

Much better analogy.............
 
Interesting article. Bastard's they are!

Bwana's huge salad seems to change size every month.

Still I hate Telkom and have made the decision to use them as little as possible, even at my own expense it seems!
 
bwana v.21 said:
Hey, I'm just happy to see any analogy that doesnt revolve around cars! :D
Click to expand...

OOOOOOOOOO, lets say there is a petrol station that sells petrol by the litre, and you go there to fill up your car, but you only pay for 3 litres........................................................................

ok enough......must get back to work
 
Telkomhater said:
PLEASE dont even think about going with them. There are plenty of other options that are far cheaper. Cybersmart has the same 3GB account for half the price. If 3GB is too much then use AXXESS at R59/GB. Go to www.hellkom.co.za for a complete list of all ISP's and their prices.

As to howmuch you gonna use we cant predict. How long is a piece of string? Start with a 1 GB account and see how long it lasts. Then buy more if you need it.

Unfortunately the grass is not greener in South Africa and here we do not have incredible speeds and unlimited downloads. We have slow speeds and you pay for what you download (and upload) per Gig.
Click to expand...

Errr.. There is nothing wrong with telkoms package.. I got the 3gig package and im happy.. The nice thing about it is the soft capping, so i can get 10gigs out of my account before they cut me off.. I understand u people dont like telkom, there is nothing wrong with telkom its jst there pricing thats wrong, but nothing else :P
 
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