If you can still use Sonic -- BE THANKFUL

[racerlupine]

Because Comcast sucks in more ways than I have time to tell about. I am forced to use Comcast in my new building and I am furious. BE THANKFUL.

RACER

[daniel15]

I strongly agree! I was forced to use Comcast in my previous apartment. The connection was reliable enough, but the upload speed was way too low, and so was the data cap. They provided a 1200Mbps connection but only 1.2TB per month, meaning I could use the entire month's worth of data in less than three hours if I were to constantly download at full speed

I hated dealing with the promotional pricing and having to keep signing up as a "new" customer to extend the good pricing (my wife and I kept alternating as "new customers" every year).

I recently bought a house and one of the major things I looked at when comparing houses was whether Sonic was available in the area. That's how much I wanted to get rid of Comcast (and AT&T, although they're nowhere near as bad). Redfin shows availability of internet providers which helped a lot. There were two houses that my wife and I liked, and we ended up choosing the one that had Sonic coming soon (got it installed around a month after we moved in).

[dane]

Thanks for the insight, I’m glad to hear folks appreciate what we’re doing.

Redfin shows ISPs including Sonic? Do they indicate if it’s fiber there?

[kintobor]

Make sure to search for internet provider choice ordinances in your area. They're in place now in Oakland and San Francisco, which make it so a property owner can't deny you installation of an alternative ISP if it's available.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/10/v ... -ordinance

[mbolling74]

Well I'd be thankful if I could use Sonic, I ordered the 10G fiber and was pleased as punch that it is only $29.95/month... unfortunately it's only now that I am realizing that them telling me "fiber is available in your area" really didn't mean much and that what I actually did was 'pre-order' fiber, so I guess if they get enough people pre-order I may get it meanwhile I am "stuck" with Comcast unfortunately I'm stuck at higher priced non-contracts because with my luck the day after I sign up for "guaranteed for 12 months with 1 year commitment" Sonic will tell me that they're going to run wires starting tomorrow.

[racerlupine]

Make sure to search for internet provider choice ordinances in your area. They're in place now in Oakland and San Francisco, which make it so a property owner can't deny you installation of an alternative ISP if it's available.

The critical caveat in the above is, of course, "if it's available". In my building, which is brand-new construction, Sonic is unavailable not because Sonic doesn't serve this area (it does with DSL on the ATT copper which I had in the old building) but because the new building has no copper wiring. All it has for comms is RJ45, which is fine as far as it goes...but. So I can't get Sonic because the building was constructed so that ONLY Comcast can connect. Now I realize that copper is 19th century tech and is being phased out but it works perfectly well for lots of things. Personally I'm not sure it's a good idea to put everyone's comm eggs in the same VOIP basket. That old copper can be a good backup system after all. There IS an internal telephone system here which I guess is some kind of VOIP on the management's intranet, since there's no copper...hmmm. You know that's something I need to investigate.

RACER
"grrrrr"

[dane]

Well I'd be thankful if I could use Sonic, I ordered the 10G fiber and was pleased as punch that it is only $29.95/month... unfortunately it's only now that I am realizing that them telling me "fiber is available in your area" really didn't mean much and that what I actually did was 'pre-order' fiber, so I guess if they get enough people pre-order I may get it meanwhile I am "stuck" with Comcast unfortunately I'm stuck at higher priced non-contracts because with my luck the day after I sign up for "guaranteed for 12 months with 1 year commitment" Sonic will tell me that they're going to run wires starting tomorrow.

Did you get an email with the estimated construction completion date?

[racerlupine]

..."fiber is available in your area" really didn't mean much...

Did you get an email with the estimated construction completion date?

ooooooooo! hey Dane, can I get one of those emails? I'd LOOOOOVE to have a genuine date for sonic fiber to reach me here in downtown San Francisco. I'm willing to do anything to make that happen no matter how sordid or depraved. In fact I would prefer sordid and depraved. After all a man needs to stick to what he's good at. <grin>

RACER

[dane]

The email with the status date only goes to locations where we have a preorder or current service and there is a defined fiber distribution area that covers it and a project build completion date has been set in our project management tools. But that’d be most preorder sites certainly.

I’m trying to get this info pushed into Member Tools so you don’t have to find an old email to check it later. The dates change quite a bit during the process, so being able to see where it’s currently at is nice.

[daniel15]

Redfin shows ISPs including Sonic? Do they indicate if it’s fiber there?

Yes!

Not for all homes, but a lot of them show an "Internet: High speed available" link in the utilities section under "Property Details":


It looks like they're sourcing data from a site called "BroadbandNow": https://www.redfin.com/guides/internet-access. Also, it seems like they haven't updated it for the 10Gbps rollout yet (which happened in November in my area). It shows 1Gbps service for Sonic, which is referring to the resold AT&T service.

This is what it shows for my house: