Broadband is simply a better way to access the Internet – unlike a dial-up connection, you don't have to re-connect each time you want to get online.
You can choose either:
- Broadband at home, which uses the phone line to your house without interfering with your telephone conversations (what we call Telecom Broadband).
- Mobile Broadband, which works the way a mobile phone does, for people on the move using a laptop.
Why choose Broadband?
For heaps of reasons!
- It keeps your phone line free, so you can surf the Internet and talk on the phone at the same time.
- There's no need for a second line.
- It's always on - there's no wait to get online as there's no dialling up.
- It's a whole new online experience - you can shop and bank online easily, buy music and games, email large attachments, watch music and film clips from your computer and much more.
How is broadband different from dial-up?
Broadband usage is measured in the amount of data that you use (how many megabytes (or MB) you download and upload) whereas dial-up usage is measured in the time you spend on the Internet (how many minutes you are connected).
Your broadband data allowance can only be used on your own broadband connection. That means you can’t use your Xtra Username and Password on someone else's broadband connection to use your broadband data allowance. On the other hand, you can do this with the dial-up time you have allocated on your dial-up plan
If you exceed your broadband monthly data allowance it will either cost you $2 per GB for the additional data used (charged per MB so you only pay for what you use) or you'll have your speed reduced to a maximum of 64Kbps and pay no extra. Your usual speed will reset at the end of your billing month. You can choose whichever broadband option suits you best.
With broadband, Internet pages will generally load quicker and it’s great for watching video and listening to audio online. A dial-up connection is generally too slow to watch video or listen to audio online
With dial-up you need to dial-in every time you want to connect to the internet whereas with broadband there is no need to dial-in when you want to connect.
With broadband you can use the Internet and talk on your landline phone at the same time. With dial-up you can either use the Internet or talk on the phone but you cannot do both at the same time
With a wireless broadband modem from Telecom, you can connect up to four computers to the Internet at the same time.