Internet Access on Meredith Neck?
 

We have a summer place out of Meredith Neck (all the way out) and are looking for Internet Access. Does anyone have a recommendation? We have cable, but I wanted to stay away from their high rates.

Thanks

Metrocast cable
 

They have a low rate that competes with DSL and is probably more reliable. Give them a call. I think it will be the best option. Otherwise it's dial-up. Verizon (or should I say Fairpoint) does offer DSL but depending on how far out the neck you are it might not be available to you.

DSL should be around $20 per month, although it's been a while since I priced it.

Add High Speed Basic* Metrocast...
1.5 Mbps x 256 Kbps and up to 2 e-mail addresses!
(Modem required) $29.95

Hidden Rate?
 

As your cable provider if they have a 256k service available? Time Warner does for abour $25.00 a month. The normal (average speed) is 780k and cost $40 to $60. You are paying for the SPEED. I Can down load a 4mg DBF file in 2 to 3 minuetes at 256k vs 20 minutes on a 56k dialup line.

WINNOCTURN

You can hook-up MSN TV on your TV for sixteen dollars a month. Cheap & easy for summer time IMO. The box only cost $150.00 & takes 5 minutes to install. You can get it at Circuit City in Concord.

My family has a house out on Meredith Neck as well. They use Metrocast for both cable and high-speed internet. Not sure about the cost, but I know they are happy with the service.

sprint broadband
 

I have a Sprint broadband with the the usb card. A few months ago when I was up there the coverage was dial up.... but they must have put up new tower bc they now have EV-DO up on the lake really really fast every where cant wait to sit out on the lake and have high speed. The best part is that you r not tied down with it, I hate to sound like an ad but I love it, youtube netflix, itunes, xmonline, all sitting on my boat, :)

Verizon
 

I use Verizon DSL. I think they charge about $25 a month.

Thanks - Great Ideas
 

Verizon said there was no DSL service. It must be because we are at the very end of the neck. The other ideas sound great and I will look into it. So far everyone I have tried to contact has said they don't have service.

We do have Metrocast, but only the basic service. I will call them.

Thanks again!

BTW, yesterday I saw chunks of ice floating by my dock. Spring is around the corner.

Basically, DSL will only work for about 18,000 feet from their central office, which is in downtown Meredith. This is feet of wire, and there can be no intervening equipment (such as SLICS) in the way. That would eliminate DSL as an option for you.

DSL gives the best price performance (if you can get it)

Cable gives the best bandwidth performance (actually, FIOS does, but its no where near this area) tho its slightly more expensive, but generally less expensive than those below.

If you can't get DSL or Cable, you can try getting a data card for your cell phone, tho I understand their 'unlimited' plans are not unlimited (for example: http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news0...unlimited.html )

OR, you can check out the classified section of this website, and there is a wireless provider in the area :)

Last, but not least is satellite internet, offered by the NHEC. Very expensive up front, throttling and latency issues, but if you can't get any of the aforementioned, its an option.

Dsl
 

That's odd, I live out Meredith Neck and have great DSL service from Verizon that works perfectly.

Taking my terrain maps out and measuring 4 miles, along the roadway from the center of town, gets me to almost Fish Cove. You are lucky to have a copper pair all that way, with no SLICs (those white boxes on cement pads you see scattered around) !!

I'm amazed!
 

My testing is complete and I've verified that I get 800 kbps (consistently) to 1.1 Mbps (occasionally) download rate using VZ wireless broadband on Cow Island. And, this is in an area that I barely get cell phone coverage! I'm using the USB727 modem and it seems to have pretty good receiver sensitivity.

The external antenna is a waste of money as it actually does worse with that. I just use a USB extender cable and plug the modem into that if I need to move it around, but it works just fine plugged into the laptop.

Best of all, I can use it anywhere on the lake, including in the boat. Using Google Earth Plus, and my Garmin GPS, I could get real-time positioning on the satellite imagery (If I really wanted to). We used it on the road on a recent trip to Florida. Good reception all the way down.

Who provides the wireless broadband on Cow? Do you get it from Direct TV?