Life, music, technology

TWC Cable and Home Telephone gone

After some procrastination, most due to the real/actual lack of choice, today I cancelled my Time Warner Cable “All the best” subscription and switched to just Internet only. I’m replacing the TV part of the subscription with DISH network, using their Dish America package.

At least according to Time Warner Cable, my Internet will cost $62.10 for the Turbo Internet service, which is what I have now, and claims “Up to 20Mbps” download and “Upload speeds up to 2Mbps”. Once all the change is done, I’ll likely upgrade this to Extreme if the prices are as TWC say they are. I have to get an cable modem to save another $3 per month.

Depending on how DISH network works out, this will mean

$50.30
$62.10
--------
$112.40

versus my new TWC monthly bill of $202.70. The difference of $90.30 will be more than enough to pay for an unlimited data plan with tethering and wireless hotspot with t-mobile, which makes up for a basic TWC Home Phone service. Again, once all this is settled down, I’ll use set-up my Google Voice number as a home phone.

The final step will be to replace my Time Warner Cable Internet service. Currently there are no practical alternatives for my house in south central Austin.

  • AT&T do not provide DSL or similar;
  • Clear is available, but would be limiting when I want to watch or livestream HD and someone else wants to use Voice-over-IP;
  • Grande Communications to not provide service to my street
  • Verizon fios – unavailable in my zipcode

Frankly this lack of competition is appalling, in what is claimed to be one of Americas high tech cities, and allows Time Warner Cable to exist as a complete monopoly.

When the TWC Sales rep was trying to work a deal and keep me as an “All the best” customer, she repeatedly kept saying “I know you are working to a budget”, to which I’d say “No I am not, I can afford to pay for this, I just won’t, your services are good but just over priced”, she either didn’t get it, or her script didn’t have a response path.

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