Which Uncapped Wireless Provider?

[AchmatK]

My iBurst contract will come to an end in December and I am currently looking at moving over to a WISP.

I am looking at the following options but need some feedback from current users on how the network performed. What sort of throttling do they have on P2P? How much can you download before they consider it abuse?

I am currently getting between 80gigs and 90gig on my iBurst account using the uncapped after hours service and 64k VAS. I would most probaly average between 150gigs and 180gigs a month.

My options:

B360(www.b360.co.za)
At the moment they are my first choice. They seem to be reselling IS accounts. P2P is allowed on their network according to their website.
384kbps/R399 512kbps/R599 1024kbps/R799 4096kbps/R999

Kawuleza Connect(www.kawuleza.com)
Prices seem a bit high on the higher speed packages.
384kbps/R299 512kbps/R499 1024kbps/R1199 4096kbps/R2599

Amobia(www.amobia.com)
Thanks to Rouxenator for the feedback while he was using their service. I dont think I like the rolling threshold thing.
384kbps/R299 1024kbps/R499 2048kbps/R649 3072kbps/R799

Let me know if there are other WISPS that I can consider before making my final decision.

Also can the CPE device be used on different WISP accounts as it a big initial cost.

 

[blaaislaai]

Im also based in strand and is in your position as well, theres another WISP based in gordonsbay, but not gonna mention them as they are so expensive

 

[portcullis]

I trust you are aware of the fact that we have more access points in Strand than B360, Kawuleza and Amobia combined...

 

[jacksback]

Amobia no longer have a rolling usage threshold. I'm on their 3 meg uncapped package and it flies! I managed to pull 30gb in one day alone.

 

[slumdawg]

check out www.sonicwireless.co.za i use them and so far service has been good.

 

[AchmatK]

Amobia no longer have a rolling usage threshold. I'm on their 3 meg uncapped package and it flies! I managed to pull 30gb in one day alone.

Can you post speedtest results? If that is the case then Amobia just moved into the top of my list. I probably will not be doing that much. How is their throttling on torrents?

 

[sergie]

Amobia no longer have a rolling usage threshold.

Are you sure about that, I mean did you confirm it with them?
If not, you may get a warning or be throttled if you continue with that pace?
The rolling window information still shows up in the user data usage panel on their website.

 

[CranialBlaze]

I did my fair share of research onto the matter myself, Cape Connect is probably the best choice out there, true unshaped, unlimited usage with great service.

Definitely cant go wrong there.

 

[jacksback]

Can you post speedtest results? If that is the case then Amobia just moved into the top of my list. I probably will not be doing that much. How is their throttling on torrents?

Here is part of a daily mail I receive from them, note the amount of Mbytes burned every day
+------------+-------------+-----------------+--------------+
| date_used | sent_Mbytes | received_Mbytes | total_Mbytes |
+------------+-------------+-----------------+--------------+
| 2010-10-07 | 308.7967 | 10122.8177 | 10431.6144 |
| 2010-10-08 | 483.4450 | 18773.0425 | 19256.4875 |
| 2010-10-09 | 258.2027 | 7146.7993 | 7405.0019 |
| 2010-10-10 | 425.8912 | 14711.4854 | 15137.3766 |
| 2010-10-11 | 359.9504 | 13049.5709 | 13409.5213 |
| 2010-10-12 | 859.1666 | 29917.6368 | 30776.8035 |

No warning letters and I don't expect to receive any. Call their support desk to back up my claim

 

[CranialBlaze]

Pretty decent usage, but i stop looking the instant i see shaped. Cape Connect gives me totally unshaped and the 384k package which i am using is a whole R1 more than Amobia, so for R1 i rather take unshaped uncapped unlimited unthrottled. Full speed on News and Torrents all day everyday, added bonus is i have 4 friends with CC, they can also vouch for the unshaped unlimited uncapped unthrottledness of the network and we have the added bonus of being able to "LAN" with each other and even file share.

Personally never dealt with Amobia, but i will never deal with a provide that shapes so i cannot vouch for their QOS, but CC's is of the best i have ever seen.

 

[AchmatK]

Pretty decent usage, but i stop looking the instant i see shaped. Cape Connect gives me totally unshaped and the 384k package which i am using is a whole R1 more than Amobia, so for R1 i rather take unshaped uncapped unlimited unthrottled. Full speed on News and Torrents all day everyday, added bonus is i have 4 friends with CC, they can also vouch for the unshaped unlimited uncapped unthrottledness of the network and we have the added bonus of being able to "LAN" with each other and even file share.

Personally never dealt with Amobia, but i will never deal with a provide that shapes so i cannot vouch for their QOS, but CC's is of the best i have ever seen.

Going from 1024k with iBurst to 384k is not an option for me and considering that Amobia is offering a 3072k connection for R799 even with the shaping I should still hopefully get more than I would on a CC 1024k account at R750. I'm not looking to download the whole interwebz and will most likel do between 3 & 4 gigs per day on P2P and maybe more over the weekend.

Can the CPE device be reconfigured at a later stage for another WISP? I will already be stuck with an iBurst modem when I cancel and dont want to sit with another device if I need to change service provider. The advantage of ADSL is that everytime you change ISP its a simple matter of changing your username and password in the router settings. No need to buy a new and expensive modem evry time.

 

[CranialBlaze]

Going from 1024k with iBurst to 384k is not an option for me and considering that Amobia is offering a 3072k connection for R799 even with the shaping I should still hopefully get more than I would on a CC 1024k account at R750. I'm not looking to download the whole interwebz and will most likel do between 3 & 4 gigs per day on P2P and maybe more over the weekend.

Can the CPE device be reconfigured at a later stage for another WISP? I will already be stuck with an iBurst modem when I cancel and dont want to sit with another device if I need to change service provider. The advantage of ADSL is that everytime you change ISP its a simple matter of changing your username and password in the router settings. No need to buy a new and expensive modem evry time.

It also depends on who Amobia is using for their actual linkages and how the shaping actually affects you, if they using for example Mweb then the shaping is insane, with mweb you get single digit speeds on all p2p and nntp protocols between 8am and midnight 7 days a week. so yes you would get your 3-4gb, but personally i would not be able to accept such limitations, if i want to download a torrent at 10am, i would like it to download at a decent speed and not have to wait and entire day for a small file to finish. If its IS they use then the shaping is not as bad, but it can be as much as 80% shaped depending on the IS network load, and even on the high end packages IS still implements its shaping policies on high bandwidth users.

Both of these providers also shape certain HTTP channels including sites like youtube, rapidshare and many sites like them.

So yes CC may have higher pricing, but at least your getting a proper product with top quality hardware, at the end of the day you get what you pay for and if i needed the higher speeds id gladly pay for it, but for my downloading and usage 384k is all i need

As for reconfiguring the CPE, that depends on your provider and their agreement, but technically unless the agreements states otherwise they would be under no legal obligation to provide you with the root access details needed to make such changes and without those details moving to another WISP without replacing hardware will be impossible. Also different WISPs work with different hardware and frequency ranges so the actual hardware itself could limit you from using another WISP if the hardware does not have the required range or frequencies.

 

[portcullis]

There are big changes currently afoot as far as CPE goes.

In the Western Cape, there are three types of equipment being offered on 5GHz

WiFi
WiMax and
AirMax

WiFi is your good old MikroTik unit with an antenna or a Ubiquiti Nanostation or Bullet. Most WISPs offer connectivity to this platform. We are moving away from this and still only offer it from Gordon's Bay to Eersterivier.

WiMax is the best your money can get. We offer 5GHz WiMax off Tygerberg, but it's going to cost you in the region of R6K for the equipment that goes into your house or business. Needless to say we don't sell many, but the people who buy them are willing to pay the premium for the superior service. There's no such as interference from other providers and everything just works the way it's supposed to.

AirMax is the next big thing. We are providing it in Durbanville and Muizenberg and will soon be offering it into Blackheath / Stellenbosch with Eersterivier through to Gordon's Bay bringing up the rear. It's basically "peasant model WiMax" but it works very well. To the best of my knowledge Kawuleza are the only organisation currently offering it in the Helderberg basin. The speeds between the CPE and the access point are out of this world. 75Mb is about the standard for the cheapie equipment. 150Mb is the norm for the more expensive stuff, but here's the best part: A cheapie 75Mb CPE costs about half of what a MikroTik WiFi CFE costs.

So to connect to us, B360 or Amobia (and probably Sonic Wireless too) you'd need a 5GHz MikroTik type CPE. If you get fed up with one, it's simple enough to reload the operating system on the router and point it to another company,

Kawuleza need an AirMax CPE that's going to cost a lot less, but will limit your freedom of choice if you want to switch at some point down the line.

 

[Sonic Wireless Solutions]

AirMax is the next big thing

You mean was

Mikrotik recently released NV2 which uses TDMA ( Time Division Multiple Access ). It is still in beta so we currently do not make use of it for our clients. However, in theory it should prove to outperform airmax once a stable release is announced.

But I will agree with Portcullis, airmax currently does outperform traditional mikrotik CPE's ( for now )

 

[wise_guy]

Does anyone know which of these WISP's operate in Gauteng?I'm also looking to move from iburst to another wireless service or should I just wait for cell c.

 

[portcullis]

You mean was

Mikrotik recently released NV2 which uses TDMA ( Time Division Multiple Access ). It is still in beta so we currently do not make use of it for our clients. However, in theory it should prove to outperform airmax once a stable release is announced.

But I will agree with Portcullis, airmax currently does outperform traditional mikrotik CPE's ( for now )

We've also been looking at NV2. I'm hoping that MikroTik get it right on RouterOs production version 5.

 

[morris]

I have two connections with Kawuleza at two different sites and have had lots of problems with them over the last year. Constant disconnects which corrupt downloads, high latency problems especially for international connectivity (and even site to site connectivity) and poor feedback on support issues. I am desperately looking for anothe ISP that can provide a better connection using the same equipment. I had to pay for the equipment and am now stuck with it.