I'm not up on what good speeds are for home internet. We just had fiber run this weekend and trying to decide what I need. What speeds are good for someone like me that works at home a lot and streams (wants to cut DIrectv)?
Internet speeds for Dummies
- Thread starter Cooterpoot
- Start date
What plans do they offer for you? With Att it’s either 500 or 1000 and 500 is plenty for streaming.
I have the Gigabit fibre from Cspire. The download runs from 400 to 900 usually. With that I get delays at times. If you get a solid 200mb I think you should be fine, but go as high as you can because it just isn't that solid.
I test mine all the time just to see what I'm getting. We regularly get between 200 and 250 mbps and rarely have issues with streaming 3-4 devices at once all on wi-fi. If any of the devices start buffering or skipping, I'll run the test and sure enough it's dropped to 150-175.
The guy who installed it told me that video games are the biggest users and having 1-2 of them going at a time plus any streaming video will bog up quick. No gamers in my house but if you've got any, pony up for the highest speed you can get. And then google "Internet Speed Test" and run the quick test and then hold their feet to the fire if you don't get what's advertised.
The guy who installed it told me that video games are the biggest users and having 1-2 of them going at a time plus any streaming video will bog up quick. No gamers in my house but if you've got any, pony up for the highest speed you can get. And then google "Internet Speed Test" and run the quick test and then hold their feet to the fire if you don't get what's advertised.
I'm paying $65 for 500mbps from 4 County. Only had it try to buffer on me once when there were internet issues. But I can watch TV and both my kids and wife and can be on their phones/tablets without any issue at all.
If you are gaming you'll want a low ping latency (ms) to go with a high download and upload speed (mbps). If you are just streaming a good download speed is probably all you need.
I pay MaxxSouth for "Up to 45 mbps" but have never seen more than 21 in Starkville. But we don't have any trouble w/ 2 or 3 people using phones, tablets, computers, and Rokus. Occasionally I'll notice it trying to buffer so I pull the plug on the modem/router and in about 1 minute its back up and normal again. Best thing I ever did was get a mesh router system and it improved a bunch after that. Its funny at our place in Brandon I get 200 mbps from ATT there and the 45 in Starkville is better than the 200 mbps from Comcast in Brandon
I'm paying WoW (cable internet) $65 for 1Gb, and at my main computer upstairs I typically get around 980 on ethernet. Even WiFi close to the main computer is 950 or so. Wifi (Eero 6+ 3 mesh system) gives me 250-300 downstairs (that's where my main television is) on 5 GHz and have never had a problem streaming anything. No gaming. It's a lot more than I need but also not expensive. My service is 50 MB upstream, and I typically get better than that even on Wifi.
There is a loooott of people that blame their internet connection for letting them down when it’s their budget router.
We have a long house and I only had the typical router right in the middle of the house and the rooms on the ends weren't covered well. The one I bought was a TP-Link Deco S4 on Amazon, $130 when I got it 18 months ago and its $150 now. I didn't know anything about hooking it up but it was pretty much plug and play, plug in 3 cylindrical tubes and they found each other and I was up and going. Went from 1 or 2 bars coverage on ends of house to 5
I'm on a 15mb wireless bridge. I stream 4K tv without issue. At times we may have 5 or 6 devices going at once, while 4 Echo's are eavesdropping, and I don't see any slowdown. #doingmorewithless
My 25 mb is slow as hell with multiple devices. Streaming quality is limited. It's trash.
I would go with 1G, or as high as you can afford. The advertised speed is going to be what your package will go up to, not what it will be all the time. So, if you get a 50Mb package, you're probably only going to see those speeds in off-peak hours.
Couple of other things. Streaming HD or esp. 4k TV are going to be the biggest uses of your internet's download speed. HD streaming will download about a gig an hour, where as streaming music or gaming will typically only use like 50Mbs an hour.
If your work from home involves a lot of teams or zoom calls, you are going to need a good upload speed.
Also, I would not trust Speedtest.net by Ookla. Most internet provides will have their IP tagged, so they will let that connection go full throttle when it recognizes it. It usually gives you an over-inflated speed test.
Couple of other things. Streaming HD or esp. 4k TV are going to be the biggest uses of your internet's download speed. HD streaming will download about a gig an hour, where as streaming music or gaming will typically only use like 50Mbs an hour.
If your work from home involves a lot of teams or zoom calls, you are going to need a good upload speed.
Also, I would not trust Speedtest.net by Ookla. Most internet provides will have their IP tagged, so they will let that connection go full throttle when it recognizes it. It usually gives you an over-inflated speed test.
Move to Noxubee County. AT&T (you know - the *COMMUNICATIONS * company) provides me a maximum of 3 meg service. Not 300 megs, not 30 megs, *3* megs. AT&T sucks to the Max. Oh yeah, 4-County is supposed to bring in high-speed internet in the Fall of 2023.
Ive got ATT, 1G. Want for nothing more. We can have 3 TVs streaming, devices, etc…no issues.
one caveat. I have an eero mesh router system(3 units) (bought before Amazon bought it), covering around 3,000sf two story house. I’m sure if I was just streaming off the ATT router (in a downstairs coat closet) results wouldn’t be as good.
Ed: I just ran a speed test on this iPad (multiple people in the house streaming/on devices) . I still run a VPN on my mobile devices and got 200+mbps up and down without VPN on. Got 30+ Mbps download connected to a VPN in Boston. Btm line…rarely ever have any issues.
one caveat. I have an eero mesh router system(3 units) (bought before Amazon bought it), covering around 3,000sf two story house. I’m sure if I was just streaming off the ATT router (in a downstairs coat closet) results wouldn’t be as good.
Ed: I just ran a speed test on this iPad (multiple people in the house streaming/on devices) . I still run a VPN on my mobile devices and got 200+mbps up and down without VPN on. Got 30+ Mbps download connected to a VPN in Boston. Btm line…rarely ever have any issues.
Last edited:
You don't have to move to Noxubee county for that discrimination. I get it right here in Clinton, MS city limits. AT&T is my neighborhoods only provider and we get 3 mg of service also. They say 5 but we have never tested out more than 3. Here is the kicker, last fall they ran fiber out Clinton Tinnin Road approximately 9 miles to Providence Hill Farms. By passed all the houses. I figured they would come back and connect the houses and neighborhoods they past to get to the rich folk. My wife and I have spoken with AT&T multiple times since then and they aren't planning to hook us up.
I feel your pain. They don't even say "5" here; "3" is what they claim and I'm lucky when I can get close to that.
Latest posts
Get unlimited access today.