Spanish Internet
 

I'm moving over to Spain next year and am looking at living around the Nerja area. I am planning to work from home via the internet. How does it compare in speed, cost and reliability with Broadband in the UK?

BrianG

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Hi

In a word - POORLY - more expensive for slower speeds and not always reliable - BUT that´s in general, there are places where reliability is better

Davexf

Re: Spanish Internet
 

We live in Javea Port Alicante.
We are with Telefonica as they are the major telephone company.
They are by no means the cheapest , but we have found them most reliable
39.95 for Broadband only, that is with a Broadband Wireless Router 6mg.
They have always got special offers on the go, so wait until you are here and check.
Other providers depend on them giving them the lines
If you can afford to pay , look no further they are about the best.
Depends on where yuou are living obivously.
You wil here some horror stories regarding their service ,but I am sure that can be said about most suppliers, I have only in 10 years had to call them no more that six times.
Hope this helps it is a minefield out there.'
Regards :thumbsup:

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Thank you for the replies...

Assuming that I have work to bring with me (that I am being paid for!), reliability is a bigger factor than cost.

BrianG

Re: Spanish Internet
 

I think you should check with them as the current rate for ADSL is €19.90 +iva.

In fact if you take the Fusion Cero option you get ADSL, land line, free national calls and a mobile phone speech/text/data contract for €35 +iva for the lot.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

what about ONO(cable-optic fiber) ? EUR 27/month 100/10MB (down/up)

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Are all of the companies national?

I am looking to move to the Malaga area....

BrianG

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Best thing to do is once you found a place, get someone who is in same street with Movistar or any of the providers through the line and then contact the companies and they will tell you the best speed, getting through is a hassle if you cant speak Spanish, so either be committed or find someone who will translate for a while.

The other alternative is Wireless through a dish, cheaper but not always as fast.

Malaga if in the city should be v.fast as in fibre

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Thanks very much for that...

BrianG

Re: Spanish Internet
 

As Telefonica own the lines, the speed you get down that line will normally be the same whichever ISP you use. They can't change the characteristics of the line as it doesn't belong to them.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Hi BrianG my post was taken down but now you can check out my signature

AG

Re: Spanish Internet
 

I know, what I meant was sometimes the line is only 3mb and the homeowner may not know, so if they don't know then you can call say Jazztel if they have equipment in the exchange as they do where I live and then they can tell you the speed.

Once you have someone's landline number then you can see if the speed is better or worse than the wimax (this was my main point) not only that not everyone would know if there line is ready for fibre, we looked at a house in Elche and the owner had no idea that you could get 50mb's.

so its worth finding out.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

How long does Telefonica contract last ? Can you opt out also what happens when you move back to UK !

Re: Spanish Internet
 

I think it lasts 12 months but it might be 18 (can't remember) after that you don't have to give notice to quit.

If you go back to UK then I would assume the debt keeps rolling on unless it's paid.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

It depends on the service. A line is 6 months, with ADSL there is no minimum and mobiles are usually 12 months.

The new Fusion contract (which is a very good deal) combines a landline, ADSL and a mobile contact (with data) and that is 12 months.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

My Vodafone mobile contract is 24 months - unless I pay somewhere around 250€ to cancel it

Davexf

Re: Spanish Internet
 

I was talking about Movistar.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

I have had bad experience with Movistar so am wary of Telefonica

Re: Spanish Internet
 

If you got a "free" phone with your 24 month contract, then naturally they will want you to pay for it if you decide to cancel the contract. A "free" phone is really the only reason to take a contract anyway.

You can buy an excellent Android phone with all the trimmings, unlocked, dual sim and all the desirable features for €99 now. If you buy your own phone, PayG is always much cheaper and more flexible than a contract.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Unless you already have a landline and ADSL with Movistar, in which case the mobile contract is effectively free as the total cost of a Fusion contract is less than you pay for just ADSL and a line.

I know a number of people who have changed over and bought a cheap Smartphone and ditched PAYG.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

That may work in other places, but I had to ditch my land line / ADSL with Movistar, as it was much too unreliable - especially for the premium paid for it. Plus, my 6Mb internet on a good day might reach 800kbps.

I opted for WIMAX, which is far more reliable and renders far faster internet speeds for a little more than half the price. Not to mention very cheap international phone rates, a mere fraction of Movistar.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

What are your experiences of WIMAX? In our area WiMAX is offered by Iberbanda (Telefonica), they offer a range of packages which claim 3Mbps and download packages with various download limits - up to 6Gb. Can you get get reasonable IPTV streaming with the cheaper packaes or do you need the big package to provide downloads for buffering?

Re: Spanish Internet
 

I results vary from area to area, but we've found our WIMAX to be about 1000% more reliable than a land line, and far faster. But we are also not in the city, where internet infrastructure is usually a lot better (but not necessarily).

We have 4Mb WIMAX, not from Telefonica but a small regional provider, "IB Red". It's fast, a little more than half the price of Telefonica, and is dramatically better than the old 6Mb Telefonica line we had, which typically delivered about 600Kbps, never delivered more than 1Mb, and was non-functional for some period of time almost every day, and never worked when raining. For 5 years we tried to get Telefonica to fix it, but all they did was exchange routers (about 10 times), which never changed a thing. IB red also offers up to 20Mb WIMAX, but we don't want to pay that much.

Nonetheless, like all internet around here, even the WIMAX can't seem sustain a decent video stream for more than about an hour without some sort of glitch or dropout rendering picture freezes (or stopping the programme altogether), blockiness or other problems like audio going out of sync. I'm not clear whether it's the WIMAX system or just the nature of internet that causes it.

I've been told I only need to have the right kind of pixels on my TV, but I find that advice to be a little dubious, since HD satellite and HD movies from local hard disk are stunning on the very same system :-)

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Many thanks - useful, practical information.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

but you have to take a telephone line at around €15 + iva which effectively doubles the base cost - unless someone somewhere has found out how to get ADSL on its own, which I would take as all landline phone calls are on voip.

they also do packages involving mobile contracts and 4G as well as Fibre, but the roll out of fibre is sparse in this part of Granada province and I don't see why I should upgrade to 4G for no benefit

`

Re: Spanish Internet
 

quite correct, I bought a Samsung Mini from MediaMkt for €88 last year, swopped in the card off my old 1G Nokia added an €8 memory card and started flying.

not so sure the cost of calls is cheaper, thought they were dearer the way I keep pumping money in - and they also charge for asking how much is left.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

If you check the post I was replying to it said:-

They are by no means the cheapest , but we have found them most reliable
39.95 for Broadband only,

That is what Movistar used to charge for the ADSL add on and clearly the poster was not aware that the prices had come down - Movistar never tell existing customers and just keep charging the old amount until you complain.

Incidentally Movistar don't charge me for 4G - it's free. I can't really see the point of it as if you use it a lot you will blow your monthly data allowance away in minutes! I can usually get well over 10mb/s on my phone using 3G which is fast enough for me.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Fred can I apply for the new rate, I only had a line fitted 2 months back ?

Re: Spanish Internet
 

We have a PayG flat rate of €10 per month, which gives us 1GB data (never use that much), 20 texts (never used - we use whatsapp almost exclusively) and 20 mins talk time nationally (also rarely used up). Calls between Spanish mobiles of same provider (Vodafone) are also free. We have multiple email accounts always active on both phones, use whatsapp constantly, surf the web a lot, and still never hit the limit of data usage. Of course at home and in the office we have WIFI, which cuts our mobile data usage dramatically.

For (I believe) €16 per month, national talk time goes up to 40 mins, and for €20/mo it's 80 mins. talk and unlimited data (I think).

We don't use the mobiles for dialing-out all that much (receiving calls are of course free), so we rarely go over the limits, but even after hitting the limit, call costs are pretty much the same as a contract. Certainly I have never hit the limits of data or texts.

Now, if you use your mobile for calling out constantly or use a million texts, or use a huge amount of data, then such plans may not be suitable for you. But it works for us. "Almost free" is how I'd characterise it. But you need your own unlocked phone.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Does the receiver need whatsapp to receive the texts ?

Re: Spanish Internet
 

When questioned, they always state that it's for new customers only. I have heard that some people have threatened to leave and then got the new rate. Others have had to leave and then re-apply - this is tricky though as you may not be able to get a line and/or the same number again.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Your big problem will be speed.. many areas are still well under 5 mbps, and often as low as 2. Forget about the 30 - 50+ you get in the UK, only in places like Madrid and Barcelona will you get anyhwere near to those speeds.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

The number does not bother me but I believe I am tied to a 1 year contract from when I took it out, and it was quite a hassle for me to get it in the first place.

While I am here and discussing this, I have no caller id, I know I can buy it and phone 1004 but can you also just go into a movistar shop and ask them to connect it ?

tia.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

I disagree a lot of towns have pretty decent internet, maybe some expat areas have been forgotten as it seems they always are, surrounding me its not that bad, both towns outside of my urb are 25's (adsl2+), many CBN towns have fibre now.

Obviously rural places are bad, they are in a lot of places inc USA

When I searched for a property here the speed of the internet was a factor and I would imagine that anyone who needs it will also take that into account. Having now lived here for a bit I think I could easily move into a town / city, rather than the outskirts of a urb.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Yes, but it's free for the first year, and only pennies for every year after, for unlimited use worldwide. Works on iPhones and Android, and I think Microsoft mobile, too. Whatsapp is extremely popular over here. Everybody has it. We've enlightened our friends in the UK, Germany and the US too. We can send messages back and forth anytime instantly, no charge.

The other thing I like about whatsapp is that you can also send photos and sound in a message, and the user interface is brain-dead easy to use and understand. It automatically identifies if users in your contacts list have it, and allows you to message them if so. Really simple, fast, and even fun to use, and uses very little data. Sometimes we have 5 or 6 simultaneous chats going on all over the planet :-)

Very cool app. Google Play Store or Apple app store. It's free.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Tend to use facebook, never was a fan but the messaging is handy, some of my friends don't have it, but one his wife wont let him have one, they will take convincing as they don't like anything apart from the norm.

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Anywyay thanks for that, it seems a few of my mates are on it already ;) Im the slow one !

Re: Spanish Internet
 

but at the end of the day it all comes down to good old copper connections and the final run.
considering Spain electricians don't use ring main but radials and its the same with their fone ccts then you can see the potential for large voltage drops.

`

Re: Spanish Internet
 

Exactly, the best option, if available in your area, is to choose "fibra optica" with movistar o Ono that reaches up to 100 mbps whilst movistar ADSL only gets up to 10mbps (5 mbps in most cases)

Re: Spanish Internet
 

if you go to the Movistar website and start working the pages you will come to an option for the type of connection you require. One of those is Fibre.
Enter your post code and see what result you get. For very many parts of the Iberian Peninsular it is NO CONNECTION.

All other companies will give you a response based on the Movistar search, as with BT they own the infrastructure, the bare bones, call it what you will. So, again as the UK, they make space available in the exchange for their kit to be fitted, they ride on Movistar's infrastructure.

Satellite systems downing in the UK have no connection to the infrastructure until the signal is processed in the UK - Bentley Walker for example downs near Coventry.
Wimax downs at the nearest mast to your location in Spain, after that they are subject to the vagaries of the owner of the infrastructure - Movistar !!

enjoy whatever you go with, it can be a bumpy ride and an expensive one without a photo of you coming to the end.

`