Google Fiber’s wireless plans take shape with purchase of a gigabit ISP

Webpass, the acquisition target, offers both fiber and point-to-point wireless.

Read the whole story

 

[THavoc]

I'd still prefer wired over wireless but if it helps to give a swift kick in the butt to the monopolistic ISPs, I'll take what I can get.

 

[DarkSkyForever]

THavoc[/url]":3tnyw1ri]I'd still prefer wired over wireless but if it helps to give a swift kick in the butt to the monopolistic ISPs, I'll take what I can get.

Yep. If you can get wireless for ~$55 @ anywhere between 500Mbps-1Gbps, the only advantage wired would have is latency and maybe reliability... so they'll have to compete with that if they want to.

Swift kick in the butt indeed.

 

[jonnan001]

Currently paying >$90/month for 5mbps DSl and they're the *cheap* solution where I'm at.

So anytime you feel ready webpass.

 

[Iphtashu Fitz]

beebee[/url]":2a64mwg6]If only it wasn't Google.

I honestly don't care who it is. They're introducing much needed competition to the ISP marketplace. The more places they offer service the more pressure it puts on the incumbent ISPs to improve their offerings and keep prices low.

I'm somewhat lucky because I live in a suburb just outside Boston where I have both FiOS and Comcast. Given I almost have line of sight to downtown Boston I'm really curious to see if this might eventually become yet another option for me. Having 3 ISPs to pit against one another when choosing one would be awesome.

 

[recursivecrow777]

beebee[/url]":2madyp4a]If only it wasn't Google.

I take it you would rather have AT&T's free deep packet inspection advertising included with your GigaPower package.

 

[glarfsquared]

Price/speed/convenience sounds great. But the latency is a problem for gaming. I don't like to play against others but considering that more and more games like Destiny or the Division are online only even when playing PvE, and so many PvP only games to boot, I wonder what the adoption of this would be like. Certainly where there is no other option (or no decent option anyway) this is great, but while the choice component would potentially depress prices, I can't switch if it means I can't play.

Any figures on what the latency is really like?

 

[jbrodkin]

glarfsquared[/url]":32rcvwkd]Price/speed/convenience sounds great. But the latency is a problem for gaming. I don't like to play against others but considering that more and more games like Destiny or the Division are online only even when playing PvE, and so many PvP only games to boot, I wonder what the adoption of this would be like. Certainly where there is no other option (or no decent option anyway) this is great, but while the choice component would potentially depress prices, I can't switch if it means I can't play.

Any figures on what the latency is really like?

They claim it's the same as fiber: https://webpass.net/about_network (I've added a link to the story.)

I can't say if that's completely true, but they do build a pretty dense network with lots of radios so the radio serving a building wouldn't be incredibly far away (certainly it's nothing like satellite).

 

[recursivecrow777]

glarfsquared[/url]":2b9jz1vr]Price/speed/convenience sounds great. But the latency is a problem for gaming. I don't like to play against others but considering that more and more games like Destiny or the Division are online only even when playing PvE, and so many PvP only games to boot, I wonder what the adoption of this would be like. Certainly where there is no other option (or no decent option anyway) this is great, but while the choice component would potentially depress prices, I can't switch if it means I can't play.

Any figures on what the latency is really like?

http://www.alexras.info/blog/2013/11/09 ... -logs.html

 

[THavoc]

DarkSkyForever[/url]":df1zpkbl]

THavoc[/url]":df1zpkbl]I'd still prefer wired over wireless but if it helps to give a swift kick in the butt to the monopolistic ISPs, I'll take what I can get.

Yep. If you can get wireless for ~$55 @ anywhere between 500Mbps-1Gbps, the only advantage wired would have is latency and maybe reliability... so they'll have to compete with that if they want to.

Swift kick in the butt indeed.

Reliability is more of my concern. I'd expect the prices to be competitive tho. I haven't seen any indication Google would try to pull a Comcast and offer 1G speeds for ridiculous prices.

 

[Deleted member 192806]

Wireless would be good as a back-haul as well.

 

[panchito401]

jbrodkin[/url]":3n9jl5sw]

glarfsquared[/url]":3n9jl5sw]Price/speed/convenience sounds great. But the latency is a problem for gaming. I don't like to play against others but considering that more and more games like Destiny or the Division are online only even when playing PvE, and so many PvP only games to boot, I wonder what the adoption of this would be like. Certainly where there is no other option (or no decent option anyway) this is great, but while the choice component would potentially depress prices, I can't switch if it means I can't play.

Any figures on what the latency is really like?

They claim it's the same as fiber: https://webpass.net/about_network (I've added a link to the story.)

I can't say if that's completely true, but they do build a pretty dense network with lots of radios so the radio serving a building wouldn't be incredibly far away (certainly it's nothing like satellite).

The bandwidth is there, but there are some weather affects to take into consideration. The radios nowadays to an incredible job of compensating for degraded signal (rain fade) compared to even 5 years ago. A well engineered link should not have reliability issues with any of the current gear.

Where fixed wireless really hits it's stride is when you talk about latency. The bits are traveling 'as the crow flies' back to a tier 1 provider handoff vs. taking a sometimes multi-mile coax/fiber path under streets back to a tier 1.

edit: bad spellah

 

[bcarpe]

I really hope the concept of wireless ISPs takes off. It seems to me that the required amount of real estate access for wired broadband makes competition difficult.

 

[Deleted member 192806]

bcarpe[/url]":39xr80va]I really hope the concept of wireless ISPs takes off. It seems to me that the required amount of real estate access for wired broadband makes competition difficult.

Fiber still has a greater carrying capacity.

 

[waasoo]

DarkSkyForever[/url]":2ldu85zz]

THavoc[/url]":2ldu85zz]I'd still prefer wired over wireless but if it helps to give a swift kick in the butt to the monopolistic ISPs, I'll take what I can get.

Yep. If you can get wireless for ~$55 @ anywhere between 500Mbps-1Gbps, the only advantage wired would have is latency and maybe reliability... so they'll have to compete with that if they want to.

Swift kick in the butt indeed.

Is it really "anywhere" as you put it? It seems they use wireless to reach your building and then Ethernet from their building access point to individual homes and businesses.

 

[bcarpe]

Ostracus[/url]":v1rem0hx]

bcarpe[/url]":v1rem0hx]I really hope the concept of wireless ISPs takes off. It seems to me that the required amount of real estate access for wired broadband makes competition difficult.

Fiber still has a greater carrying capacity.

Apologies, I'm not sure what that term means in this context.

 

[Saikaici]

I'll be happy to see wireless radios take off a bit more mainstream, some rural areas have had them for 10+ years.

The main issue is Line of Sight, sometimes trees can make it tricky to get set up.

 

[THavoc]

Saikaici[/url]":6lwjt0vf]I'll be happy to see wireless radios take off a bit more mainstream, some rural areas have had them for 10+ years.

The main issue is Line of Sight, sometimes trees can make it tricky to get set up.

LoS wasn't much of an issue if you read the older article. They described how they had all the antennas set up in the (mostly) urban environment.

 

[Deleted member 192806]

bcarpe[/url]":t2hv5jn2]

Ostracus[/url]":t2hv5jn2]

bcarpe[/url]":t2hv5jn2]I really hope the concept of wireless ISPs takes off. It seems to me that the required amount of real estate access for wired broadband makes competition difficult.

Fiber still has a greater carrying capacity.

Apologies, I'm not sure what that term means in this context.

It's about weighing the advantages and disadvantages when making a decision were to go.

 

[Azethoth666]

beebee[/url]":250nrk75]If only it wasn't Google.

Bee bee is right. We should apply irrational prejudice against companies. For the love of God or Satan, let it not be Google that finally breaks the Comcast monopoly. It needs to be some other company because ... ok fine my imagination is failing me here. Is it because google is notorious for overcharging people for their free services? Is it because they are a great company to work for? No wait, it must be because they try to use green power for their data centers? No no no, it's because people comment on YouTube videos right?

Wtf are you on about?

 

[DarkSkyForever]

waasoo[/url]":2jxm9fy1]

DarkSkyForever[/url]":2jxm9fy1]

THavoc[/url]":2jxm9fy1]I'd still prefer wired over wireless but if it helps to give a swift kick in the butt to the monopolistic ISPs, I'll take what I can get.

Yep. If you can get wireless for ~$55 @ anywhere between 500Mbps-1Gbps, the only advantage wired would have is latency and maybe reliability... so they'll have to compete with that if they want to.

Swift kick in the butt indeed.

Is it really "anywhere" as you put it? It seems they use wireless to reach your building and then Ethernet from their building access point to individual homes and businesses.

Yes - from the article (my 500Mbps was off by 400):

100Mbps to 1Gbps. Webpass charges the same price regardless of speed, which depends on the location of the building within the network

 

[Deleted member 192806]

Azethoth666[/url]":vblk7syr]

beebee[/url]":vblk7syr]If only it wasn't Google.

Bee bee is right. We should apply irrational prejudice against companies. For the love of God or Satan, let it not be Google that finally breaks the Comcast monopoly. It needs to be some other company because ... ok fine my imagination is failing me here. Is it because google is notorious for overcharging people for their free services? Is it because they are a great company to work for? No wait, it must be because they try to use green power for their data centers? No no no, it's because people comment on YouTube videos right?

Wtf are you on about?

Might be talking about the "arbitration" story on Ars front page?

 

[bcarpe]

Ostracus[/url]":3dk88lna]

bcarpe[/url]":3dk88lna]

Ostracus[/url]":3dk88lna]

bcarpe[/url]":3dk88lna]I really hope the concept of wireless ISPs takes off. It seems to me that the required amount of real estate access for wired broadband makes competition difficult.

Fiber still has a greater carrying capacity.

Apologies, I'm not sure what that term means in this context.

It's about weighing the advantages and disadvantages when making a decision were to go.

I did a little research, and (correct me if I'm wrong) what you're saying is just that you can get better throughput or latency with fiber. That's definitely a reasonable factor.

I would still like to see wireless ISPs become more mainstream though, because it seems to me that the infrastructure setup should be less involved (groundwork in only certain centralized locations, rather than needing to dig an unbroken line to every point that you want a connection), which means more players and more competition. Although the fact that it's not already mainstream would seem to imply that I'm wrong about that...

 

[Azethoth666]

Ostracus[/url]":2680rsfx]

Azethoth666[/url]":2680rsfx]

beebee[/url]":2680rsfx]If only it wasn't Google.

Bee bee is right. We should apply irrational prejudice against companies. For the love of God or Satan, let it not be Google that finally breaks the Comcast monopoly. It needs to be some other company because ... ok fine my imagination is failing me here. Is it because google is notorious for overcharging people for their free services? Is it because they are a great company to work for? No wait, it must be because they try to use green power for their data centers? No no no, it's because people comment on YouTube videos right?

Wtf are you on about?

Might be talking about the "arbitration" story on Ars front page?

Oh noes, Google is trying to stop expensive lawsuits over their cheap extremely high speed internet. Talk about a tempest in a a tiny teacup. I just don't see the harm in preventing some goddamned lawyer from making up some shit so they can sue Google in a get rich quick scheme. Worse yet, a class action lawsuit over some imagined harm that then transfers our money against our will to Google and then 3/4 of that to the lawyer netting them tens of millions and maybe $2.50 back to each of us if we can prove some unlikely set of facts from years ago.

Ugh, just not seeing the problem for this case.

 

[THavoc]

Ostracus[/url]":s4ut3eqc]

Azethoth666[/url]":s4ut3eqc]

beebee[/url]":s4ut3eqc]If only it wasn't Google.

Bee bee is right. We should apply irrational prejudice against companies. For the love of God or Satan, let it not be Google that finally breaks the Comcast monopoly. It needs to be some other company because ... ok fine my imagination is failing me here. Is it because google is notorious for overcharging people for their free services? Is it because they are a great company to work for? No wait, it must be because they try to use green power for their data centers? No no no, it's because people comment on YouTube videos right?

Wtf are you on about?

Might be talking about the "arbitration" story on Ars front page?

Nah, it's probably the gathering of personal information for ads. That seems to be the biggest gripe most people have.

 

[Akemi]

DarkSkyForever[/url]":2eb7fr9a]

waasoo[/url]":2eb7fr9a]

DarkSkyForever[/url]":2eb7fr9a]

THavoc[/url]":2eb7fr9a]I'd still prefer wired over wireless but if it helps to give a swift kick in the butt to the monopolistic ISPs, I'll take what I can get.

Yep. If you can get wireless for ~$55 @ anywhere between 500Mbps-1Gbps, the only advantage wired would have is latency and maybe reliability... so they'll have to compete with that if they want to.

Swift kick in the butt indeed.

Is it really "anywhere" as you put it? It seems they use wireless to reach your building and then Ethernet from their building access point to individual homes and businesses.

Yes - from the article (my 500Mbps was off by 400):

100Mbps to 1Gbps. Webpass charges the same price regardless of speed, which depends on the location of the building within the network

I'd still take it. Now that my introductory rate is over, I'm paying Comcast $72/mo for 100Mb down and 12Mb up. $55/mo for even $100 Mb symmetrical is still an upgrade at a lower cost, plus it isn't Comcast getting my monies (which is a double super great bonus).

 

[THavoc]

bcarpe[/url]":35y436in]I did a little research, and (correct me if I'm wrong) what you're saying is just that you can get better throughput or latency with fiber. That's definitely a reasonable factor.

Typically, yes.

Additionally, wireless doesn't (didnt) handle as much data as a wire network would.

The real news is it seems this company has addressed the shortcomings of wireless 1G making it a decent competitor to traditional ISPs.

 

[wastrel]

Sadly, Google's pricing for Fiber is becoming more and more like every other ISP--remove the "low" speed options that offer only what people actually need in order to offer inflated speeds at inflated prices for the sake of inflated profits. The "free" option is gone. The $15 option is going away if not entirely gone yet. The cheapest you can expect now is $50 for 50mbps, which is 5X the speed that most individuals need. Being only a few dollars cheaper than Comcast or Verizon really isn't that much of a deal as far as competition is concerned, even if customer service is better.

 

[Akemi]

wastrel[/url]":1ntsctco]Sadly, Google's pricing for Fiber is becoming more and more like every other ISP--remove the "low" speed options that offer only what people actually need in order to offer inflated speeds at inflated prices for the sake of inflated profits. The "free" option is gone. The $15 option is going away if not entirely gone yet. The cheapest you can expect now is $50 for 50mbps, which is 5X the speed that most individuals need. Being only a few dollars cheaper than Comcast or Verizon really isn't that much of a deal as far as competition is concerned, even if customer service is better.

Repeat after me. No data caps. Those caps tend to drive up the price for service substantially. More importantly, some of us don't live alone, we have a household full of people and friends all wanting to make use of the Internet, and 50Mb would be painfully slow with 4+ people all trying to game, stream movies, and download large files simultaneously. The difference in the 6Mb DSL service I had and Comcast's 100Mb service was a Godsend to me just for my Steam library alone. Now I can delete games without fearing it will take the better part of a day if I want to play something I deleted last week when some titles require downloads as high as 60GB for an install (Quantum Break just pushed out a 25GB patch - A 25GB PATCH!).

 

[wicketr]

THavoc[/url]":1e0x2w92]I'd still prefer wired over wireless but if it helps to give a swift kick in the butt to the monopolistic ISPs, I'll take what I can get.

Frankly this would be awesome for my parents house. They live 1/2 mile off the road on a farm and it's too far to run coax or fiber. They live in the city limits of a major city, so this would likely be perfect. Right now they're having to pay exhorbitant rates for 50GB package of AT&T LTE.

 

[THavoc]

wicketr[/url]":uuiau9zt]

THavoc[/url]":uuiau9zt]I'd still prefer wired over wireless but if it helps to give a swift kick in the butt to the monopolistic ISPs, I'll take what I can get.

Frankly this would be awesome for my parents house. They live 1/2 mile off the road on a farm and it's too far to run coax or fiber. They live in the city limits of a major city, so this would likely be perfect. Right now they're having to pay exhorbitant rates for 50GB package of AT&T LTE.

And sadly, there are a lot of others in the same situation as your parents.

 

[wicketr]

wastrel[/url]":r86d15va]Sadly, Google's pricing for Fiber is becoming more and more like every other ISP--remove the "low" speed options that offer only what people actually need in order to offer inflated speeds at inflated prices for the sake of inflated profits. The "free" option is gone. The $15 option is going away if not entirely gone yet. The cheapest you can expect now is $50 for 50mbps, which is 5X the speed that most individuals need. Being only a few dollars cheaper than Comcast or Verizon really isn't that much of a deal as far as competition is concerned, even if customer service is better.

Just checked Google Fiber's website and it looks like it's $50 for 100Mbps, not 50Mbps. I agree that it would be nice if there were more price points, but what they do offer is still BY FAR the best option around. Even if they offered the exact same cost as Comcast, I'd switch to them for the fact that they are bringing another option to the table, and they have had great customer service any time i've needed to use them.

 

[earthlingkc]

THavoc[/url]":2yd3d1vm]

Nah, it's probably the gathering of personal information for ads. That seems to be the biggest gripe most people have.

Though Google Fiber claims in the terms they don't target ads on the pipe itself. According to the terms they don't share raw pipe history with other Google services. They target ads with the services you run on top of the pipe, which is no different than any ISP (Gmail, Chrome, Youtube, etc). Technically you could use GF pipe with no Google services and not get targeted ads. Ars also did an article about it.

 

[panchito401]

THavoc[/url]":2wdbc146]

wicketr[/url]":2wdbc146]

THavoc[/url]":2wdbc146]I'd still prefer wired over wireless but if it helps to give a swift kick in the butt to the monopolistic ISPs, I'll take what I can get.

Frankly this would be awesome for my parents house. They live 1/2 mile off the road on a farm and it's too far to run coax or fiber. They live in the city limits of a major city, so this would likely be perfect. Right now they're having to pay exhorbitant rates for 50GB package of AT&T LTE.

And sadly, there are a lot of others in the same situation as your parents.

This is a great use case for fixed wireless.

What you could look into is 'borrowing' some bandwidth (and a small bit of rooftop real estate) from a friendly neighbor and installing a bridge between your parent's house and the neighbors (we call this a relay, and I know for a fact that Webpass does similar). This would allow you to share the bandwidth on the wired connection and split the bill.

Wireless Point to Point (PTP) links pricing has come down DRASTICALLY as of late and although you might have to spend upwards of a grand for the link, it definitely will be better than LTE with a data cap. For prosumer stuff, take a look at Ruckus PTP or one of their competitors.

Probably against the TOS of the wired provider, but the field techs usually don't give a shit.

 

[earthlingkc]

wicketr[/url]":1hed1nzt]

wastrel[/url]":1hed1nzt]Sadly, Google's pricing for Fiber is becoming more and more like every other ISP--remove the "low" speed options that offer only what people actually need in order to offer inflated speeds at inflated prices for the sake of inflated profits. The "free" option is gone. The $15 option is going away if not entirely gone yet. The cheapest you can expect now is $50 for 50mbps, which is 5X the speed that most individuals need. Being only a few dollars cheaper than Comcast or Verizon really isn't that much of a deal as far as competition is concerned, even if customer service is better.

Just checked Google Fiber's website and it looks like it's $50 for 100Mbps, not 50Mbps. I agree that it would be nice if there were more price points, but what they do offer is still BY FAR the best option around. Even if they offered the exact same cost as Comcast, I'd switch to them for the fact that they are bringing another option to the table, and they have had great customer service any time i've needed to use them.

I agree that loss of lower tiers is a growing problem with all ISPs. GF can't really financially offer a lower tier because of the high expense of rolling out fiber from scratch. ISPs that have had infrastructure in place for decades is already fully depreciated, at least a big chunk of it. But the good news is that when GF is in your market, it causes the incumbent ISPs to lower prices. IE TWC in KC offers 50/5 for only $30.

More here on what real competition looks like...
https://www.dslreports.com/forum/r30784 ... ompetition

 

[THavoc]

earthlingkc[/url]":2mdf85ur]

THavoc[/url]":2mdf85ur]

Nah, it's probably the gathering of personal information for ads. That seems to be the biggest gripe most people have.

Though Google Fiber claims in the terms they don't target ads on the pipe itself. According to the terms they don't share raw pipe history with other Google services. They target ads with the services you run on top of the pipe, which is no different than any ISP (Gmail, Chrome, Youtube, etc). Technically you could use GF pipe with no Google services and not get targeted ads. Ars also did an article about it.

Agreed. I wasn't saying I believed they do that. Only that it seems to be the biggest issue others bring up.

 

[Boskone]

Having been on a WISP before, and using a lot of wireless at work, here's my $0.02:

Wired is in most respects better. However, wireless is vastly easier to deploy, and in most applications perfectly suitable. The biggest issue with most wireless providers is the provider themselves; cheap, poorly-aimed equipment just doesn't perform worth a damn.

Anecdote time: I used to room in a house at which a local WISP was the only option (despite both SuddenLink and Verizon claiming they offered internet, but that's a slightly different problem). It was expensive, slow, and capped (though practically we couldn't hit the cap). It was, however, better than cellular. A larger (but still kinda shitty) WISP moved in, with better technicians and equipment; it was a marked improvement, like going from the late 90s to 2010 or so.

Webpass seems well-regarded by most of its customers, and Google's pretty serious about deploying broadband. Taken all together, it seems like at least a good transitional step.

I could see initial deployments being wireless, then once an area reaches a sufficiently high density fttp being run.

 

[caspar347]

It's important to remember that the kind of wireless used by WISPs is very different from wireless used by cell carriers.

A phone carrier wireless network is built to handle a random number of users at any given time ranging from one to a few hundred per cell at varying signal strengths ranging from great to awful.

A WISP network is built to handle a static number of users at (relatively) static signal levels. WISP client devices are a lot more predictable and as a result it's a lot easier to garauntee speeds. You're not gonna have three dozen people suddenly move from one cell to another because there's a static number of houses/buildings paying for your service in a cell. Also, WISP equipment is typically set up such that since it is not in motion, it is mounted in a position where it has a consistently strong connection to the WISP network.

Plus a WISP carrier will usually be using larger spectrum pipes than wireless carriers in higher frequency ranges so higher speeds and lower latencies are possible. Assuming Google doesn't cheap out on equipment (very unlikely), latency will be comparable to traditional wired latency.

So, yes, fiber can handle several orders of magnitude more traffic than wireless, but be aware that the variable speed and latency concerns of cell phone wireless are not as big of a problem as one might expect for WISPs.

 

[Huacanacha]

This is not wireless in the WiFi sense. It's a point to point (directed) millimetre wave signal. As long as the connection is robust, which it is under most conditions, data is travelling at the speed of electromagnetic radiation through a sparse medium... i.e. basically the speed of light. Latency comes through processing the signal at either end, which is minimal, and error correction, which is only very very occasionally an issue. For the most part latency is equivalent to fiber.

Source: happy ex-webpass customer who talked to their techs, plus their website.