My T-Mobile Home Internet Experience: 5 things I love and some things I can do without

Albuquerque, New Mexico. Green Chilean home, over 300 days of sunshine, international balloon fiesta… and painful internet. Home Internet It was a race with two horses Albuquerque For years: CenturyLink DSL and Xfinity cable. I spent decades in DSL and watched me Internet Speed ​​Test You will march slowly up to 20 megabits. A faster Xfinity friend stubbornly stuck with CenturyLink, lamenting the company’s customer service, data caps and prices. One day in the second half of 2022, T-Mobile Home Internet The gateway arrived at my house. After that, I finally called to cancel my CenturyLink.

Here’s why I switched to T-Mobile Home Internet:

I used T-Mobile for several reasons. The DSL was too late. My neighbor’s neighbor got T-Mobile home internet and rave about it. Coincidentally, CenturyLink wanted to charge $200 to replace my old router with a new one. I said “No” and changed 5G Home Internet.

My home internet life has improved in my post-DSL world, but it’s not all roses and happy dance. If you’re looking for TL, DR, go here: I’m still on the T-Mobile Home internet and probably stick to it until I can give Verizon 5G Home Internet Until the try or fiber finally appears on my block. My experience with 5G Home Internet is unique to my situation, so journeys with the same service may vary. This is what I like about my 5G home internet and the elements that might drive me Switch to another Internet Service Provider someday.

What I like about T-Mobile Home Internet

Before letting go of your complaints, sing the praises of T-Mobile Home Internet. The best features of the service are its simplicity and ease of use, representing an upgrade over the outdated DSL.

The price is correct

With CenturyLink, I paid $45 a month for downloads up to 20Mbps. With T-Mobile, my monthly bill is straight $50. It’s a sweet spot for me about home internet pricing. I was happy to pay more than CenturyLink for a higher standard of service, but my bargain hunting mindset would be all. I think Verizon 5G Home Internet is the same price, but rival services are not available at my address.

I hope that one day the textile will arrive, but I will scrutinise the pricing before changing it. The two providers that are most likely to serve my address are Ezee Fiber ($69 per month for a gig) and Vexus Fiber ($40 per month for a 500mbps, $50 per month for a gig). Vexus will raise the fees after the first year. When the time comes, I will weigh my soaked frugality against the performance of the textile.

It’s faster than DSL

While that may seem like a faint praise, T-Mobile offers far better speed than you get from the DSL. My best speed test results of 200mbps nettop download speed, 10 times more than what I got on a good day with DSL. Speeds vary depending on network congestion and gateway device placement. There are a few speed complaints, but we’ll explain them later.

The terminology is simple

When it comes to broadband plans, I don’t like complexity. I don’t want to calculate equipment rent or calculate excessive penalties for exceeding the following Data Cap. I don’t want to be special It was concluded with a contract. I just want a home internet and I’m free to try another ISP. T-Mobile checks the Simplicity box. There are no gear fees, data caps, or contracts.

Mom has approved

My mother lives six blocks away from me. She also had a CenturyLink DSL. I ran a speed test on her desktop computer and the best she could get was about 12Mbps. That’s not a typo. That’s the reality for some DSL customers. She paid over $60 a month and was frustrated every time she tried to call to discuss her bill. No problem, mom. I canceled her DSL and signed up with T-Mobile. She spotted a lovely perch at the gateway in the front window near her computer. With a strong signal, she can regularly slow down from 100-200Mbps. This is suitable for understated browsing and streaming needs. The only downside is that I receive a text message about the school closure to her gateway, which is leftover from someone who used the gateway’s phone number before her. It’s a slight inconvenience and I don’t have the same problem.

The gateway is easy

T-Mobile offers a free gateway device that combines modem and router functionality. I have a semi-affected silver Nokia Gateway called the “trash can.” The top-mounted display works although it’s a mild nuisance due to its troublesome location and gets hot. T-Mobile has a new model. My mother has a Sagemcom device with a front-mounted display that resembles a more refined trash can. The latest gateways are refined and look like Apple products. I had no issues setting up my Nokia Gateway and my mother’s Sagemcom. We got online within minutes and found out that the gateway was stable and there were no crashes or other hiccups to report. Wi-Fi works well and reaches the corner of a vintage home at a fairly fast speed.

Why isn’t everything about T-Mobile Home Internet good?

There’s a lot to do with T-Mobile Home Internet, but it’s not my dream broadband service. There are some areas that you can stumble.

Not faster than cables or fibers

Xfinity offers cable speeds up to 1,200Mbps in my home. Vexus fiber fiber, How much fiber And although the edgy fibers slowly spread across Albuquerque, it’s not yet in my historic neighborhood. Fiber customers have access to symmetric gig speeds, which is very envious of them. T-Mobile Home Internet offers typical speeds of 87-415Mbps, significantly below the offerings from local cable and fiber ISPs. The good news is that I’m not a gamer (ignoring Nintendo’s Wii obsession), so I need enough energy to surf and stream. Don’t worry about downloading or uploading Zippy for when you’re running big music, videos, and image files.

A strong signal may be elusive

T-Mobile’s 5G Internet services are subject to the same pitfalls as encountering telephone services. Sometimes you’re in a place where the traffic lights are weak. Sometimes the place is your own home. My neighbor, the first to board the 5G Home Internet, gets a strong signal on the west side of her house. Next to me is the best signal I can get. This will be two of the five bars on the gateway scale. In other words, I’m missing the top speed that can serve.

Speeds vary widely

My T-Mobile home internet speed is like the weather in Albuquerque. Wait 5 minutes to change. I just ran an internet speed test and got 16.7Mbps. It’s slow enough to give an unwelcome flashback to my DSL era. A few minutes later, I was 94.6mbps. Sometimes it exceeds 100Mbps. Usually I sit at about 80mbps. My speed test is on the entire map. Some of this could be due to my home’s 1939 construction materials and the inability to dial a good placement of the gateway to get a better signal. My CNET colleague Eli Blumenthal also ran into a speed issue when testing the service in 2022.. when CNET’s Joe Supan tried AT&T Internet Airhe also struggles to maintain a decent speed, so this issue could be more specific to the T-Mobile Home Internet-specific wireless services.

The layout of the windows is troublesome

T-Mobile I recommend it When I had the gateway “place near the window, or on the upper floor or on the bookcase.” My router was sitting in my home office on a nifty little custom shelf. It was inconspicuous and not intrusive. My T-Mobile Gateway visited every window in my house looking for a strong signal. Now it’s in my living room with a silver “trash can” that perched above the window. I still get solid Wi-Fi coverage around my home, but some of the internet equipment sitting in my window is not my ideal home decoration.

My T-Mobile Home Internet Experience: Farewell Thoughts

Are you thinking about dipping your toes into the T-Mobile Home Internet? Consider whether it is an upgrade to your current service. If you’re crawling with DSL, that might be a wise move. Focus on cables or fibers, especially if you want consistent speed and super-fast speeds, especially for gaming. I’m not a T-Mobile phone customer, but mobile users can bundle eligible phone plans to get extra savings on the internet at home. It may be sufficient to tip price-conscious shoppers towards 5G internet services.

There are elements of experiments using 5G Home Internet. You won’t know how well it will work until you try it, so take advantage of T-Mobile’s 15-day refund test. I’m not in love with the internet at home, but at least I like it. That’s a better relationship than DSL.