Rob AriasAs modern as the infrastructure in E’ville has become, I’ve never been impressed by the speed of the internet or the choices available. I’ve waited years for U-Verse to make its way to my neighborhood and finally switched to Comcast hoping the speeds were as fast they suggest in their advertising … they weren’t! When I could’t watch a YouTube video without buffer interruptions, I got serious about finding an alternative.
I first heard of WebPass listening to a local sports talk-show on the radio and decided to inquire with our HOA board about availability. Our Board president arranged a site audit that determined our building had the infrastructure to support it (Built/Renovated since 1995 and at least 20 units). WebPass absorbs the cost of equipment and installation, so bringing them in is cost neutral to your HOA. Instead of leasing/reselling bandwidth from AT&T as do companies like Sonic, WebPass uses a technology developed by MCI called point-to-point microwave radio. It’s a technology that’s been around for awhile but is just recently being used as a residential alternative to Cable & DSL. Adding bandwidth to a building is as simple as installing an additional conveniently-sized antennae.
Individual Installation in my unit was free and took about 30 minutes … and they were on time (none of the “four hour window” stuff)! I could not be more happy with the speed. No more spinning wheels or rotating hourglasses. You click, you’re there. The comparison graphic I created below shows why:
Monthly service is $50/mo. with an option for an annual rate that brings it down to $37.50/mo. There is no Modem required, so no need to lease or buy one (I was paying $7/mo. to Comcast). They’re a local, carbon-neutral company and their customer service is great. Most of their current availability in Emeryville centers around the Park Avenue District, but availability is growing fast. If you’d like to bring another internet option to your building, they have a simple 3-step process to determine if your building has the required infrastructure before arranging a site audit.
I never intended to use this blog to shill products, but I felt compelled to spread the word that there are alternatives to AT&T and Comcast out there. Oh, and by-the-way (Shameless plug), they happen to give out referral credits so if you’d like to “share the love”, that’s Robert Arias, Emeryville Warehouse #322 😉
I do not understand why this point to point microwave two way connection does not work with older buildings i.e. is not available to all San Francisco Bay areas. Could a small old building or residence make the necessary network installation on site, put the radio on the roof and have an alternative to Comcast / ATT duopoly?
older building most likely do have the newer wiring, mainly CAT5 ethernet type wiring. They use (speaking nerd now) they would use all 8 pairs of the wire within the CAT5 to transfer the high speeds of data. Newer construction have these homerun CAT5 cables going from a central MPOE to each unit (single point A to point B cable). At this point you pick the phone jack (not really looks like one but really a Ethernet port). Older buildings have 1 pair or 2 pair feeds not really enough to carry the data at higher speeds and most likely do not have central MPOE’s to set up the network.
[…] another consumer provider we’ve written about before that does not rely on underground cables but uses point-to-point wireless microwave technology. […]