Moving to St. George in mid-December: Internet Question (crime, lawyers)

[skysnake]

Hi everyone. We are moving to St. George from Las Vegas, NV this December. We will be moving to a new home in Little Valley, on the east side of town. I have been shopping around for TV and Internet providers and would love to get some local opinions. I am a major football fan so I have excluded Baja Broadband for my TV provider because they don't offer the NFL network (I'm addicted to the NFL Redzone channel). For TV, I guess I'm stuck with one of the satellite providers.

What are your opinions regarding Internet choices? Baja, Infowest, any others? Baja claims to have 100mbps. I don't need that crazy speed but do need fast enough Internet to stream live video, Netflix, etc.

Thanks a million for your help. We are really excited to be away from the nightly ritual of police helicopters hovering over our house, gunshots going off at 2 AM and home invasions.

I hope to see you around town!

Chris

[GoOutsideAndPlay]

Chris,

We moved to the same general area a year ago. For TV - at the time, DirecTV did not carry local network channels in HD (and may still not - you willwant to verify if that's important to you). Since we watch mainly the local ABC, NBC, CBS and FOX channels, that was not an option for us. So, we went with DISH. Very happy with the price, service and install (used a local provider for that). They have NFL Network, Red Zone, and we really like the Hopper. Very few people here have DirecTV (except the die hard Sunday Ticket folks). We came from Comcast and I was worried about service interruptions with Dish. But, even with the crazy heavy rain over the past few weeks, we never lost signal.

Internet - that's a little tougher. We were new construction, so Baja could not figure out if they had run lines. So, we went with CenturyLink (as do many). They have the 5 year guarantee of $19.95 (but only if you bundle with a land line) with speeds up to 12mbps - which we did since we have kids and I prefer to talk on a regular phone instead of my cell when possible. Total before taxes/fees is $65 ($85 with). The speed is just so/so but is fast enough for Netflix/XBOX Live etc. However, as a result of your post, I called to see if they had higher speeds available and they are hooking me up with 20mbps (an extra $5 a month) but have a 12 month promo of $10 off. So, I'll have 20mbps service and actually save $5 from what I'm paying now. So thanks for asking this question, you just got me faster internet and saved me $.

Good luck!

[irman]

Regardless of what they *promise* in the contract about internet speed, keep in mind they always state *Up To xxx * (aka legal mumbo jumbo)
*Up To* means anything from *really sucks* to *pretty close* to what they promise

We have Century Link and got the 5 year no increase with combined cell phone billing.
Speed checks show only about *half* the speed they promise ...
Their *explanation* --- depends on where you live ...

[GoOutsideAndPlay]

Agree irman. My own tests show a difference by time of day, browser choice and speed test sites, although the majority of time we're in the 8-12 mbps range dowload (.8 - 1 upload) - perhaps due to newer lines and fewer neighbors sharing bandwith. I just tested and am at 11-13 mbps right now. I've also heard that ISP's throttle up initial speeds to improve their results on these short ping speed tests. But, since they all do it, who knows what you're really getting. At a minimum, I saved $5, even if the speed doesn't jump up much. Point taken though.

[irman]

Originally Posted by GoOutsideAndPlay

At a minimum, I saved $5, even if the speed doesn't jump up much. Point taken though.

When we went to the combined billing (Centry Link and Verizon are sister companies),
the total bill per month, actually dropped 30 dollars !! No kidding !
AND ... , we were upped the next speed up !!
What happened was that the girl was nice enough to give us the *new customer* discount,
and ... , we got a new *dumb* phone ! (we do not need a smart phone)
Squeeky wheel syndrome ?? (I complained about dropped connections)
We also dumped satellite dish (80/month) and went Netflix (8/month)
So in total we are not doing half bad ...
We NEVER had streaming problems with Netflix ... yet ... !
No dropped connections when banking !

BTW, the new modem router we got is really nice.
5 hard-wire outlets, and really good WiFi (at least on our total property - almost an acre)

Moral of the story -
Try to get the most of the deal !!!!
Like buying a dang car !!!

[silverspoons]

Do not go with Baja for internet. I have yet to meet a person that gets what they paid for with Baja internet. I worked for centurtylink back in the days of USWEST, Qwest and I worked on earlier isdn and dsl development in the area. I never thought I would use Centurylink again but after 4 years of Baja digging up my yard and trying everything only to get hundreds of outages and low speeds I gave up. I live in the desert hills area so I have the same CO as little valley. Centurylink cost more but I'm okay because it has been reliable. All the middle school and high school textbooks so far have been online only so you have to have good internet if you have kids over 12.

The cable/dish are a personal choice. Many areas have PUDS that make you take Baja(cable). I never had any issues with basic Baja cable and I liked that I could have as many TV's as I wanted(like guests rooms, playroom). Now Baja is going all digital so you will need a box just like dish in every room so it is no savings. I just have the bare bones Baja basic right now and hula (and get amazon prime for free via my husband's job) and we are fine. Now if you want certain channels or sports then you have to go with dish/direct tv.

Just so you know , while st George is safer and desert hills/little valley is the best area IMO for schools there are still drugs and crime. I live in a lovely neighborhood near the high middle/school and my neighbor's rented thier home (due to job loss) and is a party drug house and very little is being done. 10 months of looking into it. I thought by moving into an area with large nice homes and near great school , and my neighbors were a mix of law enforcement and professionals like dr's and lawyers) I would never half to worry. I have lived in big cities (in Ny/Mass) and never experienced living with so much crime with so little done.

[Townie33]

Ahhhh, the plethora of choices for internet and television providers. But is there really that many options?

We asked the same questions a couple of years ago when we too moved into Little Valley. I had to have DirecTV simply because of the Sunday Ticket feature, and the wife didn't want to "learn" a new system. I have been a customer for what seems like forever. I do miss (and do not understand why they can't get) the local affiliates in HD. But for me it is a very, very small trade off. And of course you can wheel and deal to get the cost down for starters.

As for our internet provider we have Skywire. It is a local company (I believe they recently joined up with another group). Their connection has been very good, and customer support has been top notch. We have an Amazon Prime account, so we stream a number of things through that particular app via our DVD player. We rarely have any issues. Plus I usually am running a computer or a couple of iPads at the same time. I have enjoyed having their service.

Best of luck!