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Comment by Analemma_ | Hacker News Reader

> I imagine the 20 Mbps upload target is useless for most of us, even those on asymmetric cable

I wish this were true. I'm in Seattle and Xfinity will only sell me 5 Mbps up, even at 480 down, unless I pay out the ass for a symmetric gigabit connection I don't need. Very much looking forward to the FCC forcing at least 20.

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Where do you live? It's possible to get gigabit service from a handful of different non Comcast ISPs in most of the city.

Comments said they don't want to pay more for gigabit (that they don't need) just to get reasonable upload speed.

I’m also in Seattle and get symmetric gigabit for $49.99 all in, I’d be surprised if they’re getting 480 from comcast for cheaper. I think my provider is only available for apartment buildings but there’s likely competition from other providers that at least offer symmetric speeds.

Unfortunately Comcast is the only option in my 14-unit condo, which AIUI is not unusual for this size of building in this area.

The worst part is that the much larger condo right next to us has Google Fiber :(

That's the worst, and usual require board approval to change, which you can't get.

Dang, assuming you can get the HOA to sign on you might be able to get in with GFiber Webpass or Atlas (I personally have Atlas) since they’re both microwave providers. There’s no fiber to lay so all they need to do is put a dish on top and integrate it into the distribution system.

I'd recommend looking into the 5G home internet services all the major cell carriers offer. They're all cheaper than I was paying Spectrum for their minimum tier. None are offered at my address unfortunately but being in Seattle I'd bet you could get one.

I had fiber installed this summer and until they finally sent a staff engineer out it was going down 2-5 times a day. I work from home so I had to tether to my phone for Teams meetings to make sure I'd stay connected. It was actually completely fine and I only get 2 bars of LTE at home.

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