# Alternative ISP to Rogers



## jamiechese (Jul 13, 2010)

Hello everyone, I saw a thread about someone dropping Rogers and I am interested in doing the same thing although my dilema is based on the fact there is literally no other small ISP available in my area. I was hoping to see if anyone has any advice or if they know of an ISP that does provide in my town.
I have searched for an alternative myself but havent come across anything and was hoping someone else had some insight to my dilema.

I am located in Collingwood, Ontario.
Postal code is L9Y4W5

If you know of any ISP that is even marginally better than rogers or bell in my area I would greatly appreciate some recommendations as I am completely fed up with Rogers, their crappy bandwidth cap and their crap service.

Thanks!


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## CanadianCapitalist (Mar 31, 2009)

And we have a long thread on TekSavvy here:

http://www.canadianmoneyforum.com/showthread.php?t=3678


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## canadianbanks (Jun 5, 2009)

A friend of mine moved to TekSavvy about 2 months ago and he is very happy with their service. I'll do the same, because I'm tired of Rogers and especially their DNS servers that do not resolve many, many sites.


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## Jungle (Feb 17, 2010)

I'll be going through Roger's rententions for the third year in a row. My contract is up Dec 1. You must give 30 notice to Roger's to cancel. Once you tell them this, they will transfer you to the rententions department. You can not negotiate with anyone else, eg. csr, sales person, support, etc. 

The going rate is that Roger's is offering 30-35% off all services right now and may include extras, such as free HD PVR, free modem rental. Usually a one year contract must be verbally committed to. That's not too bad if you ask me. 

There is a large thread on this at RFD. Just a suggestion, I was going to switch to teksavvy but 30% off internet plus everything else is just as good if not better.


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## jamiechese (Jul 13, 2010)

Alright, I will definitely check TechSavvy out as I really am fed up with rogers, although the problem is I am not sure how much longer we have on our Rogers contract.

I really do like TekSavvy though as they have no Bandwidth caps, that if not anything else is well worth even a few extra costs.


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## m3s (Apr 3, 2010)

I think TekSavvy does have bandwidth caps but it's 200Gb or something at a more reasonable price

Teksavvy and other alternative are just less devious with marketing and hidden fees and contracts etc. They all work off the same infrastructure and I think a reasonable cap is good for the sake of preventing everyone from bogging down the system but it is mostly a cash grab (paying per Gb if you go over)


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## jamiechese (Jul 13, 2010)

Honestly I like TekSavvy's pricing structure and yes 200GB is pretty decent. 

For my rogers package i have 25mbps down 1mbps and yet only a 125GB BW limit per month. Its about 70$/month before tax which is bloody retarded.

I would much rather pay about 60$ a month for 15mbps down and 200GB Cap as even though less speed i can still dl a lot more.

Problem is I contacted TekSavvy yesterday and they informed me that they do not provide service in my area via Cable as Rogers has not yet released their lines for other companies to use. Although they do have ADSL at 5mbps download. Although honestly I think waiting for the cable package is a better idea seeing as my family is still locked into a Rogers contract.


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## Sherlock (Apr 18, 2010)

I think Acanac is available everywhere in Ontario.


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## jamiechese (Jul 13, 2010)

I actually did come across Acanac but their speeds arent the greatest, I wouldnt go for lower than 10mbps BECAUSE if I am in the middle of downloading and my brother is playing xbox then he complains.... I know its odd but ive always had that problem with rogers and I do assume it was a speed cap issue.


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## Sherlock (Apr 18, 2010)

You'll have that problem with even a 100 mbps connection. The solution is to set up QoS in your router.


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## jamiechese (Jul 13, 2010)

Naw, Ive only ever had the problem on a -9Mbps line. Usually its fine though but I would still rather play it safe....and I like faster speeds /


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## m3s (Apr 3, 2010)

Sherlock said:


> You'll have that problem with even a 100 mbps connection. The solution is to set up QoS in your router.


Correct

10 Mbps is plenty! A large family should easily be able to surf, dl, game, video chat and stream netflix simultaneously with that. With my QoS I can do far more than dl and game on a 5 mbps as the QoS will just prioritize the sensitive data such gaming or voice. Dl speed will not be affected it just won't be as "smooth" which is transparent to you


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## kenwood (Apr 18, 2009)

i believe all dsl providers have the same speed? no?


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## kcowan (Jul 1, 2010)

They have the same rated speed but by inspecting traffic, they can reduce the effective speed on a given job.


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## OhGreatGuru (May 24, 2009)

kenwood said:


> i believe all dsl providers have the same speed? no?


No. First of all, the actual speed you can obtain will depend on your distance from the switching centre, as well as volume of traffic on their networks. 
Secondly ISPs used to commonly offer different speeds for different monthly rates - 1.5Mbps, 2.0 Mbps, 3.0 Mbps, etc. I don't know if this is still common, or if they are gravitating towards one standard. But it doesn't seem right for them to charge for 5Mbps service if you are in a location where you can never get more than 3.5 Mbps.


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## m3s (Apr 3, 2010)

6 Mbps is the standard high speed I pay for at my "alternate" local ISP. I see 4-5 Mbps and it is plenty fast. I paid for 10 Mbps at the Olympics to share and saw 15+ Mbps which was plenty for 10+ people.

I am currently in Iceland and their Siminn telco is awesome. I bought a Sim card at the duty free for $18 CAD which included a local phone number and 3G internet. It could last for months. I think I paid Rogers $25 CAD just for a Sim card let alone any service (that is the equivalent of paying $25 for a chip debit card!). There is WiFi everywhere here and the interesting thing is they have unrestricted uploads. In Canada I am always limited to 1 Mbps upload which is the real restriction. Most things you do on the net now use upload just as much! Video chat, gaming etc is not 1 way


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## wheel (Jun 22, 2010)

ping <5ms. Holy cow.


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## jamiechese (Jul 13, 2010)

Wow mode, thats a damn nice up speed. Yea for rogers we currently have the 25mbps Down and 1mbps up, (actual speed is 3mbps or w.e). Honestly though its really annoying to have with only 125GB of BW....it really is pretty stupid.

Oh and I do know that I can slow down my brothers gaming if I am downloading a movie etc (when we had a 10mbps connection). I have a 100mbps server, so it allows me to max out my connection when I grab files from it, that is usually why I like a faster line so depending on what I am dling I can throttle it but still download it in a reasonable time .


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