ISPs/high speed access in Sonoma County

mikel_cook at agilent.com mikel_cook at agilent.com
Mon Jun 18 11:48:02 PDT 2001


I live in Sebastopol and have Pac Bell ADSL with Pac Bell ISP.  The last I
checked, cable modem is not an option in Sebastopol.  I agree with ME that
Sonic beats Pac Bell as ISP.  As an added note of caution about signing up
for PacBell ISP -- they don't let you switch later without dropping your
current ADSL set up and waiting for a new one to be set up.  The PacBell ISP
email has been plagued with outages and major delivery delays.  Some of the
delays are not their fault, but Sonic has multiple redundant connections
across several networks.  Mo' beddah.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: ME [mailto:dugan at passwall.com]
> Sent: 16 Jun, 2001 12:29 AM
> To: talk at nblug.org
> Subject: Re: ISPs/high speed access in Sonoma County
> 
> 
> On Fri, 15 Jun 2001, Jeff Miller wrote:
> > It's likely I'll be relocating to Sonoma County in the next 
> few months,
> > and I wondered if anyone had any thoughts or suggestions on 
> ISPs or esp. 
> > on high speed access.  My possible destinations include 
> Sebastopol, Santa
> > Rosa, possibly Cotati or Penngrove. 
> 
> There are several options available in many parts of Sonoma 
> County, but
> you should pre-check availability at the location you wish to 
> move before
> making assumptions. Even places across the street from one 
> another may go
> from offering xDSL at speed up to 6.0Mbps to not having any 
> xDSL work at
> all. (Wired ADSL is available in many places of Petaluma, 
> Cotati, Rohnert
> Park, and Santa Rosa. Sebastapol is filled with people that 
> don't really
> want growth, new buildings, expansion, and may not have so much DSL
> development. It has more oif a small-town feel and a more varied
> population politically with many people more active in Sebastapol than
> other cities. I don't know about DSL or cable modem access there, but
> would not expect too much. I am not sure about Penngrove, but would
> expect it to be as probable for xDSL availablity as Sebastapol.)
> 
> A few options:
> For the most part PacBell is the only wired Data Link layer 
> xDSL provider
> "in town" even though there are one or two other data 
> providers of xDSL
> for businesses but are too pricy for residential.
> 
> Broadlink offers WDSL, and sonic.net can offer itself as an 
> ISP over t hat
> or PacBell DSL.
> 
> Once you have an xDSL provider available, you may often 
> choose an ISP to
> carry service through that xDSL provider. Earthlink, AT&T (I 
> think) and
> Sonic.net provide ISP service over other's xDSL lines and can 
> charge you
> separately. PacBell can also offer you ISP service as well as 
> DSL access.
> (These are not the only ones that offer high speed access. 
> See links at
> end for more info.)
> 
> I am preferrential to using sonic.net instead of PacBell for 
> my ISP as I
> have had nothing but problems with them even setting up my telephones
> every time I have moved. A friend of mine has PacBell for DSl 
> and ISP and
> clais it takes for ever to get PacBell to fix some of the 
> problems with
> the ISP side of things and billing. Sonic also offer shell access to a
> linux box, web space and better responses to fixing more 
> advanced requests
> than PacBell. (I do use PacBell for my wired ADSL, but 
> sonic.net for my
> ISP over the PacBell DSL link: $29 (PacBell) + $20 
> (Sonic.net). Sonic has
> also been more Linux inclusive than the "big" ISPs (PacBell, etc.)
> 
> A neighbor has and uses Earthlink as an ISP over PacBell's 
> DSL and they
> like it. Dont know anyone that has or uses AT&T as an ISP 
> with xDSL around
> here.
> 
> I also can't remember anyone that has or uses WDSL around here.
> 
> ISDN is too expensive and slow for your dollar and is not as 
> popular as
> xDSL when it is available.
> 
> Cable modems are also avilable in Petaluma and parts of Santa Rosa (I
> think) but not so much in Rohnert Park and Cotati. (Not sure 
> on this since
> my data is about 2 years old.) Rohnert Park's cable system provider
> claimed they would "have cable modems later this year" each 
> year that I
> called them starting 5 years ago, but never made them available AFAIK.
> Someone said they were being bought out a while back and the 
> new owners
> were going to start offering cable modems, but after several years of
> "later this year", I gave up on them.
> 
> Petaluma had cable modems but there was an issue in the city 
> council where
> the city wanted to impose a tax on all users, but the cable 
> provider said
> they would not include it in the bill, but instead would pass a bil to
> them to be paid directly to the city and leave it up to the city to
> collect the money and taxes. Bad blood between the city of 
> Petaluma and
> the cable company there has created rifts. Cable modems 
> are/were also not
> available in all parts of Petaluma, someone gave me spotty information
> suggesting they were looking into terminating new cable modem 
> service in
> petalums or eliminating it, but I am not sure where that went 
> or if it was
> just an untrue rumor.
> 
> I understand Santa Rosa has many more places with cable modem 
> acces and
> ADSL, SDSL, and WDSL available.
> 
> PacBell offers different kinds of DSL connections. Their standard
> residential is something like 384/1.544Mbps download and 128/384kbps 
> upload (ranges of throughput based on distance, line quality, use,
> etc.) Just the DSL part is about $29/month I think and ISP 
> costs added to
> that from $10 to $30 /month.
> 
> Another one for ~$200 if available at your location is 
> 1.544/6.0Mbps DSL
> for DL and 128/384 upload.
> 
> Higher speeds are also available from T1 through to DS3 and beyond but
> they will cost much more and are often targeted more for business
> customers.
> 
> Anyone else have suggestions and thoughts on local ISPs, and 
> high speed
> access? (I do not work for any of these ISPs, or gain 
> anything if you use
> them.)
> 
> Must still stress:
> Check with the appropriate data-link provider and the address 
> of te place
> you wish to move before you move in.
> Make arrangements to install the product about 3 weeks ahead 
> of time and
> earlier if possible. PacBell has been as far as 6 weeks behind in DSL
> installation, but might be doing better now.
> 
> Useful links on this:
> http://www.sonic.net/sales/index.shtml
> http://www.pacbell.com/DSL (note availability link top right, 
> but you may
>  need to call them and give them an address since most availability
>  systems at pacbell either use vague generalizations based on 
> city name,
>  or your actual phone number at the residence - which you 
> won't have if
>  you have not moved in yet.
> 
> http://www.searchsonoma.com/computers/providers/
> 
> Hope this helps...
> 
> -ME
> 
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