Getting rid of internet at home?

[Tradd]

Has anyone else considered getting rid of/gotten rid of home internet?

I pay $60 a month for AT&T basic home phone ($27) and DSL ($33). DSL only doesn't exist for the condo complex where I rent. I'd have to get the U-verse stuff, which is a lot more expensive. Comcast offers internet only, but it's something like $30 a month/12 months right now, and frankly, I hear horror stories about the way Comcast raises prices once the promo price period is over.

I don't have a TV. The only TV I watch is the occasional PBS series online - Downton Abbey, Call the Midwife, and some of the history programs. I listen to the radio a lot.

I don't use my home phone at all. I use my smartphone, which will be pried out of my cold, dead hands. :|( I pay $110/month for wireless, unlimited talk and text, 2G of data (Verizon).

I can tether my phone to my computer to get online. I did that (with a different phone) for several weeks a year ago when I had to be out of my unit due to some major foundation work and I didn't have internet where I was staying. It worked out pretty well. I'd like to have the ability to get online at home, if needed.

I occasionally have to work at home some, via access to my company's industry-specific system. But that's a rare occurrence.

I used to take a lot of pictures, but I've cut down - a lot. And they're almost always taken with my phone (Galaxy S3 has a pretty darned good camera). I can always upload pics to my online albums on wifi at library.

I think it would work out cheaper to buy the occasional DVD of the PBS series I like ($30 or so, 1-2 times a year) and bump up my mobile data plan to 4G a month ($10 extra). The smartphone contract is new since the fall, so it's not going anywhere.

Thoughts?

[cdttmm]

Your internet speed will definitely be slower from your tethered phone than what you are used to on DSL. If you're cool with that, then I think your proposed plan could work out pretty well.

[Tradd]

cdttmm (by the way, I love your kitty pic!), I mostly access internet on my phone these days, so some slowness wouldn't be too much of an issue. My DSL is pretty slow, anyway!

[pinkytoe]

How about just dropping the landline? We did that with our ATT package and they kept DSL only at the same price.

[Tradd]

How about just dropping the landline? We did that with our ATT package and they kept DSL only at the same price.

That's not available for my address. I checked. My only option would be the U-verse.

[ctg492]

At one time my statement was; I will eat beans and rice before I give up my home high speed internet. Now I do not feel we would ever not have it since I am only half of the house. But today I could say yes I could be without it since I have an iPhone.

[Tussiemussies]

We gave up our landline phone and use Ooma which goes through the computer and you still talk on your regular phone set. It is great so far but you can't use directory assistance on there. With Ooma you pay licenses and taxes monthly which come to approx$4.00 per month. You can also call anywhere in the us too. :(

[Tradd]

Tussie, I only use my cell phone for calls. It's been at least 18 months since I used my landline phone.

[awakenedsoul]

I canceled my phone lines (business and personal,) with A.T.&T. I just use my Jitterbug cell phone now. I have the $19.99 per month plan, and I buy extra mins. at 10 cents a minute. (I got 1000 for the year.) I have A.T.&T. Uverse for $27.00 a month. I had to jump through a lot of hoops to get it, but I do really like using the Internet at home. They just gave me a slightly slower speed, but I still like it.
It sounds like you have it all worked out. Those little savings add up!

[SteveinMN]

I don't use my home phone at all. I use my smartphone, which will be pried out of my cold, dead hands. :|( I pay $110/month for wireless, unlimited talk and text, 2G of data (Verizon).

I can tether my phone to my computer to get online. I did that (with a different phone) for several weeks a year ago when I had to be out of my unit due to some major foundation work and I didn't have internet where I was staying. It worked out pretty well. I'd like to have the ability to get online at home, if needed.
My thought is that this can work okay for a patient Internet user that's not spending much time on sites that are loaded with video or Flash, etc. Day-in/day-out use, however, or running Microsoft Office documents and a lot of Web apps through your mobile phone likely will either trip the too-much-bandwidth throttle or will outright violate your VZW terms of service. That's a lot of data to be moving down a mobile-phone-sized pipe.

One recommendation would be to contact at&t and ask to speak to "customer loyalty" or "retention" or whatever they call it. They may be willing to cut you a deal rather than lose $60/month.

And while I don't know what Comcast charges everywhere, I know we're paying about the same amount you're paying each month for Internet service which is several orders of magnitude faster than anything Verizon Wireless offers. (I just ran a test and it worked out to 24.3 Mb/sec downloads and 2.5 Mb/sec uploads; the same test says Comcast averages 18.1 Mb/sec.) The price on Internet service has not gone up much in the years we've had it; maybe $5 or so over 8 years. Cable TV, OTOH, has increased much more, but we get the city-mandated required channels, so we don't have "Basic Cable."

[Tammy]

We have no home phone and no home internet. We each have smart phone with 4G internet. It's all we need. 140 a month for two of us. Unlimited data. Verizon. Been with verizon for over a decade. Grandfathered in to this deal. I think it would be 210 monthly otherwise.

[cdttmm]

cdttmm (by the way, I love your kitty pic!)

Thanks! That's my baby boy, Jake, sleeping in the kitty condo.

[decemberlov]

You mentioned you have verizon....

Last Christmas I got a kindle fire and we didn't have internet at the time so I tethered my smartphone so that I could use it just until we got internet. When the bill came for Verizon they were charging me $35 a month to tether it, I had to call customer service to cancel it. And yes, like Steve said, it was pretty slow. Just something to keep in mind since you can get just internet for around the same price.

[miradoblackwarrior]

Got rid of my internet when the Comcast modem fried my brand new (to me) computer, and didn't care! I looked into other companies, but they all want land-lines, or some other little add-on, just to get the internet. So, out it all goes. If I need the internet, I'll use the computer at work, or use the free service at the library!
Susan

[freein05]

Cable Internet is our only option. Cell phones don't work here and no news papers.

[Wildflower]

I would NOT want to get rid of home internet. I'm pretty much stuck at home these days due to health problems. My internet connection is invaluable to me at this point in my life.

No smart phone or even any kind of cellphone. They never work out here. Not worth it. The landline always works...

DH does have a cheapo cellphone for when we travel, which is almost never these days.

[Zoebird]

We did a short run without it just to see how it would work out. It would save us $100/month.

We opted to keep it because we discovered that we liked facetime/skype too much. :) we do download fewer shows and the like -- so we've cut back on reliance -- but we still work from home and do the whole Skype/facetime thing and enjoy it. :)

[kitten]

Yes, we haven't had a landline at home since 2003. At one point we had internet and cable at home - hubby needed access to media for his job - but now that he can get everything on his smartphone, we've dropped that too. Home is a crashpad, and we see each other so little that we wouldn't be spending our together time on the computer anyway, so we don't miss it.

We're also freelancers so we have offices, and that's where our internet access it. Although we have it in just one office, mine. I have a router for when hubby wants to come in and use his laptop to get online. We don't have landlines in our offices either. I have the kind of gig where you can do everything over email.

We live without television, but we love watching stuff - mostly get our fix via Netflix. We did splurge on two wide-screen monitors and can watch DVDs at home or at the office. I play video games at the office too. (The offices are kind of like our rec rooms - we don't have enough space at home for anything but the bed really.)

btw, Tradd - I'd be interested in knowing how you tether your phone to the computer, would you explain?

[fidgiegirl]

Tradd, we have Comcast internet only and it is $39.99 a month for the economy package or some-such-name. We were careful not to enter into a promotional deal because of the very reason you said - we didn't want the monthly fee to go up after the promotional period. We had to do some digging on their website and had to stand strong about it when we signed up and it has been fine for a number of months now. There was a connection fee of some kind, and we got the modem/router for about $100 on CL.

[goldensmom]

We have no home internet, no landline phone, no cable. We use our phones as (not tethered) modem/hotspots and it is faster than any wifi we've used elsewhere. Verizon hi-jacked our unlimited Alltel data so now have unlimted talk and text, 8 mg data $170/mo. for 2 phones.

[Spartana]

I don't have internet at home - just use free wi-fi when ever I need it - which is very rarely. I can check e-mail on my old tracfone flip phone (no smart phone) and that's all I need but I liove a very low tech life by choice.

[Tradd]

I've been poking around on Comcast's website. There's a special offer for $20/month for 6 months for the economy plus service. After that, the cost goes up to $30-$40, depending on what other services you have. I did read the fine print online That special is for people who have no other Comcast services. I'm going to call and get more details, what installation, etc. costs.

[Tradd]

Actually I was finally able to find the AT&T internet only U-verse option. $30 a month for 12 months and $100 for modem. Doing self install option which is free. That's fine with me. Will then cancel regular internet/landline phone. Regular price is $40 month.

[larknm]

This week we'll start trying for DH to keep our computer at work, and I'll just go there or to the public library once or twice a week. We have no other source for computer service, and I think this could be good. DH was going to by a new computer, it turns out, because he wanted one all to himself. I didn't know that was his reason, so came up with this idea.

[Tradd]

My new internet was installed this week. Works fab. It's wonderful to be able to watch something online (mostly PBS shows) with NO buffering at all. :)

[cdttmm]

Sounds like you found a great solution to your problem, Tradd! Enjoy!