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Wireless broadband in Sydney

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Old Apr 30, 2008 | 02:32 PM
  #1  
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Default Wireless broadband in Sydney

I need to connect to teh interwebs so I can play around on the web at night- let's call it low to mid-range usage. I live in inner east Sydney. I rent and have a laptop so wireless seems to be the go. I started doing some research on the various servies providers, but of course there's bucketloads of them.

So- it's over to the peanut gallery. Which service provider and plan should I go with?

cheers
FD
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Old Apr 30, 2008 | 03:08 PM
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I'm interested in this also. Not sure if I'll be living where I am in 6-12 months so I don't want to set up wired I think.

Fisty, I would've thought in your line of work you'd always be in a city so most wired providers would be able to transfer your service between addresses if you had to move?
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Old Apr 30, 2008 | 06:31 PM
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The first think you have to understand is that the latency of a wireless connection pretty much renders it useless for video calls and just bearable for voip calls REGARDLESS of the dl/up speeds. Your mileage may vary but you have to lower any expectations in that area.

Other than that I have seen my share of providers in action and it all comes down to reception. Just like a mobile phone you can have one provider give you excellent reception in the living room whilst another gives you no reception in the exact same spot. Also you should consider whether or not you want to share the connection with other people in the house. In that case your options are limited to those ISPs that offer a modem that is able to be connected to a router (no PCMCIA cards or usb Dongles), something like Iburst, Unwired or Virgin.

Pricewise Virgins seems like a good deal but that is the one I haven't seen in action. Chilli (iburst) has better plans than Bigair (another Iburst reseller) but the connections seem a tad slower in my experience.

Something based on 3G has a good chance of giving better reception but will probably have more expensive plans and less quota.

If you want to try out Iburst or Unwired without signing up you can rent a modem for a week (you have to google this as I can recall the name of the place). I know Telstra and Virgin have a demo PCMCIA card, for corporate clients at least.

Just Remember: Reception Reception Reception... everything else is secundary with wireless internet.

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Old Apr 30, 2008 | 06:33 PM
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Oh,, and lookup the whirlpool forums.
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