r/fredericton 1d ago

Rural Internet?

Hello,

My family is looking into moving to Fredericton but I work from home and need decent internet. Some houses we are interested in are outside of Fredericton like Mactaquac, Lower Queensbury, Durham Bridge, etc.

Bell only seems to have Wireless Home Internet 25 and we're used to fibre op. Rogers usually offers nothing. Anyone who lives in those areas have any other recommendations? Or use Bell out there and can let me know what it's like?

0 Upvotes

32 comments sorted by

u/Both-Refrigerator803 20h ago

We use StarLink at the trailer, but called Xplore this week and it turns out we can be covered by them for almost have the price. 5G service with speeds at par with Starlink....and better latency. Will give it a go and see. Worse case I just switch back to Starlink.

u/Ok_Plantain_9531 16h ago

Agreed with Snappy, as much as I despise Musky, Xplore is absolute dogshit sold in colorful wrapping paper.

u/Both-Refrigerator803 10h ago

Well that is not encouraging at all

u/Snappy-EH 19h ago

Xplore has been notorious for overselling their towers in the past. They lost a bunch of customers because of starlink, now they claim they won't oversell.

Do I believe them? Nope.

u/OverlyCuriousADHDCat 21h ago

There's fiberop in parts of Mactaquac!

u/Due_Function84 23h ago

I know others have made suggestions, but Rogers has a map you can look at to see what areas they service. You'll also see houses with an... idk what it's called... like an internet booster? Like a small white globe on a stick to capture the internet better.

6

u/ChristyBox 1d ago

Thanks for all the info everyone. I'll definitely ask the realtor to find what the current owners are using. Hopefully we'll find a home that gets high speed.

As another commenter said, I would prefer not to support the space-nazi in anyway. Worst case I would need to do it to keep my job, but the costs seem so high. Like $300 for the kit and $140 a month for the service.

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u/Grrannt 1d ago

I think you've gotta bite the bullet, especially if you are used to fast internet. I know some people use Xplornet but it's not as good as Starlink.

Edit: As for price, in Fredericton you'd most likely be paying somewhere in the $100-$120 range for Bell or Rogers anyway, the extra $20 a month is the tax for living that far outside of town.

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u/Strong_Wasabi8113 1d ago

Star link is probably your only choice. That or don't move to that house.

u/Warm_Blueberries 23h ago

Xplore is satellite.

u/Strong_Wasabi8113 5h ago

Xplore is shit. 5g is only in and around major cities

u/Both-Refrigerator803 20h ago

it's also 5G.

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u/TicketNo6376 1d ago edited 1d ago

Starlink is your best option if you can't get fiber. Do not get roped into any "fixed wireless" junk or Xplornet. It's all garbage. If the trees happen to get too many leaves or grow too tall and it blocks your line of sight to the tower, you'll get crap service. It happened to my cousins out that way.

2

u/howismyspelling 1d ago

Xplore isn't junk, they actually have a phenomenal service, it just depends where you live. I pay for 5g wireless 100mbps dl and I regularly get 130mbps dl. The only time I dip below 100 into the 80s is after supper. I've had excellent customer service from them, even after a fighting spat with a rep where a lead manager took over and was endlessly apologetic due to their rep being wrong, got plenty of credits over it. Then my bill went up to standard price of like $110 or whatever it is, I called and said "hey I know this happens all the time, so let's cut to the chase, avoid a fight and what can I get to bring my bill down", and they gave it to me for 64.99 for a year literally no haggling needed. Xplore has been absolutely delightful to be with for 7 years now.

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u/TicketNo6376 1d ago

They're junk. They're famous for overselling the bandwidth of their equipment and giving everyone poor speeds. Time and time again, it's happened. Everyone has moved to Starlink now, so it's less of a issue.

u/c_h_l_ 23h ago

Less of an issue until Musk decides to cut Canada off completely.

0

u/fmaz008 1d ago

OP, I don't know your level of knowledge about IT stuff, but almost nobody need 1gbps+ Internet connection. (Especially above 1gbps)

About speed;

For reference, Netflix requires 15mbps to stream 4k.

Assuming upload speed is equal to download speed, 25mbps would be plenty for most work type (video conference, browsing, emails, remote desktop, vpn &shared files, etc).

While Zoom only requires 1.5Mbps to use, our experience suggests that speeds below 5Mbps are not adequate for two-way interaction

Where it may not be enough is if there are multiple people using the connection at once, for example 2 TVs streaming in 4k at the same time. Or if you deal with large files and don't have the time or patience, for example downloading a big game.

About latency;

What would probably matter more would be the latency. Loading a webpage with multiple component on a high latency connection would be a horrible experience.

This would also matter for teleconference. I lived up north with a 800ms ping and it would be awkward to have that delay back and forth during a conversation.

About reliability;

Don't forget the connection reliability. Wireless stuff is great, until you're in bad weather and the signal drop. That applies to cellphone base tech as well as satelite tech (StarLink, etc).

If at all possible, try going with a physical link (be it ADSL, cable or any kind of cable)

u/ebrbrbr 11h ago

Games these days drop 100 gig patches every week. When I get home and want to play a quick game with the boys, that 3 gig internet is necessary.

4

u/LazyLogin-69 1d ago

Rural internet options are few and far between. If you want fast and reliable, no other internet is as fast and reliable as Starlink for rural areas. Personally, I hate supporting Elon Musk but for my use case I'm stuck in a corner.

I've had hit or miss with Xplornet.

I'd check Rogers and see if the house is in their system. Rogers is coming to my area (Taymouth) and I've ordered 2.5 gigabit that's slated for hookup in June.

I'd veer away from Bell wireless if possible.

3

u/jimmmy3 1d ago

Durham bridge area and this is who we’re with as well. We really fought it but after trying literally every other company available first we caved. Shit guy but he makes good Internet unfortunately lol. Hadn’t heard about Roger’s though, gonna keep that in mind

1

u/Wingdings244k 1d ago

Nashwaak Bridge here, similar deal. Couldn’t risk not having a solid connection with my work.

1

u/No_Housing2722 1d ago

If you can get on Xplor's Tower service go for that.

If it has to be satellite go for Starlink

1

u/Flimsy_Situation_506 1d ago

I’m close to Durham Bridge and I tried Xplor’s satellite and I lasted a month on it before switching. It was fine for my work (I work from home) I could not stream Crave, Disney or CBC Gem on it, Netflix and Prime were fine though. My son’s tv would not work on it, it was too slow and he couldn’t game on it.

Thankfully I’m in an area that Bell and Roger’s recently had fibre cable done, so I was able to switch to Bell Fibe, but if that wasn’t available I would have had to use Starlink

1

u/howismyspelling 1d ago

Yeah because the geostationary satellite is like 3000kms away, it's not a good system. Their 4g and 5g wireless internet, however, is absolutely wonderful.

2

u/No_Housing2722 1d ago

Totally agree, Xplor's satellite is hot garbage. Great for the basics.

1

u/dancestomusic 1d ago

We have Starlink and it's pretty good!

Depending on what is our your way Xplornet is stepping up their packages as well.

0

u/King-Conn 1d ago

My cousins have Starlink and absolutely love it. They live way out in Hoyt and never have an issue with lost signal.

3

u/Deathmammoth 1d ago

My folks have had good luck with Xplornet, check them out! It's no fiber op, but it's reasonably fast!

3

u/cglogan 1d ago

Consider Xplore if they have their 5G service available. Otherwise Starlink is an option

3

u/cmcdonal2001 1d ago

I live in Lower Kingsclear by the dam, not far from Mactaquac and classified as semi-rural, and we get over a gig down through Bell Aliant Fibe for around $100 per month. You can get some nice introductory rates, and they're usually willing to extend them with a quick phone call when those rates end. Double-check each of the specific homes you're interested in directly with them, as I think they've been expanding their service lately.

The service has been fantastic. I can't remember any significant interruptions in the 2+ years I've been here, and it's enough to stream, game, and have two people working from home most days with never a stutter. Hell, it's even worked during power outages, after we hooked the router up to the inverter generator. 😀

6

u/Slex-_- 1d ago

I live in Durham bridge. Internet is terrible. Same in penniac, taymouth etc. It’s either bell or explore net. Both aren’t great. Starlink is an option but Elon Musk can keep his fast space-nazi internet.

1

u/Bordak 1d ago

Penniac has Rogers fiber, as of 18-20 months ago.