Internet Residential FAQs
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How do I buy my own Internet modem? You may lease your Internet modem from Oceanic Time Warner Cable, or you can choose to buy your own. Modems may be purchased through retailers such as Best Buy, Amazon, or Wal-Mart. Make sure you purchase a cable modem that is compatible with your Internet service level. CLICK HERE for additional information on purchasing your own cable modem. I use a dial-up connection on a 56k modem. Can you describe how much faster Oceanic Time Warner Cable's is compared to what I use now? Many factors can influence the delivery of data, particularly once you are out on the Internet. These factors can include how busy the Internet is at the time you're using it, and how many hits the site you are visiting is getting. Oceanic offers speeds up to 100 times faster than traditional dial-up connections over its high-speed network*. And because your local cable company has special "caching" or holding computers, we can put videos, music and popular web sites inside your community's Oceanic Internet for even faster, better delivery. Another factor that influences the speed you get can be the kind of computer equipment you are using. While Oceanic's Internet will work as long your setup meets the minimum requirements, users meeting the recommended requirements rather than the minimum requirements tend to experience faster speeds. Do I need to get a second phone line in order to have Internet from Oceanic Time Warner Cable? NO! Oceanic's Internet service is delivered to your computer through the same cable that brings TV into your home. That keeps your Internet affordable, too. My kids like to watch the Discovery Channel, and often would like to get to the Discovery web site during a show. If I get Oceanic's Internet, can they still watch TV while they are using Oceanic's Internet to get to the web site? Absolutely! In fact, we have heard a lot of families will keep their computer and their TV in the same room, so when a television show makes reference to more information on the web site, the kids can go to Oceanic's Internet and investigate while the show is still playing. It's a great technique for educational and news events. We even provide TV listings on Oceanic.com so that you can plan your family TV viewing along with using the Internet all at the same time. Right now, I'm paying for an extra phone line and my dial-up service: do I need to keep them if I get Internet from Oceanic? Not unless you enjoy the expense. Oceanic's Internet costs about the same as having that extra phone line and dial-up service, plus you get all the time-saving benefits! If you'd like to find out more about Internet pricing, click here. You mention broadband a lot. What IS broadband and why does it matter? Broadband connections allow more information to be transmitted in a given amount of time. It's a bit like putting more lanes on a highway -- more cars can travel on it at the same time. The benefits of having a broadband connection to the Internet are faster access to the Internet and more and varied media services than you can get on a narrowband, or ordinary phone, connection. What is Turbo Internet? Turbo Internet is a wonderful product for people who enjoy online activities such as video news and entertainment, online gaming, sharing photos or people who just appreciate really fast speeds! Turbo Internet offers speeds of up to 20 Mbps downstream and 2 Mbps upstream. In my area, I can choose DSL or cable. What's the difference? Internet and DSL are both broadband technologies. There are many differences between them, however. The main ones are outlined below:
The DSL providers say that cable modems are "shared" and will slow down when too many people in my neighborhood come online. Is that true? Thank you for asking. Truth is, ALL Internet technologies, including DSL, are shared and no one can guarantee or control speed, due to variables inherent to the Internet. What the DSL companies want you to believe is that cable modems will slow down when more users come online and that DSL does not slow down because it is "dedicated", not shared. There are two other things you should know about DSL and speed.
One DSL provider even built a series of marketing campaigns around this message. However, the DSL provider was instructed by a court of law to stop running the campaign because the message was not true. It is not true because a properly designed and managed cable modem system (such as Oceanic's) accommodates the popularity of the service. It is one of Oceanic's major priorities to take all the appropriate steps regarding design, management and capacity that maintain a high-quality, high-speed online experience for our subscribers. I hear about computers and Internet security in the media. Can you tell me what Oceanic does to protect its users' security? We take security, yours and ours, seriously. For our part, we've designed our cable modems to deliver data only to the address that has been assigned to your computer. This prevents the interception of data that any user sends or receives. In addition, the modems we use support the encryption of data sent to and from the computer. That adds a layer of security you can't get with phone modems. Many computers and operating systems include features that allow you to share files or printers with other computers on a home network. These features are designed to allow you to decide what, and what not, to share with other users. This sort of "sharing" has to be set up in a specific, safe way or you may be open to a security risk when you connect to the Internet via dial-up, DSL or cable modem. For this reason, Oceanic's Internet specialists will secure file and print-sharing on your computer when installing our service. We may also recommend that you safeguard your computer with a password. I'm not an technology expert. What sort of help and support does Oceanic offer? It can be wildly frustrating to have a problem you can't solve. Our world-class customer service provides many help resources available to Oceanic Internet customers:
How many email accounts will I get and how do I set them up? Can I send email to anyone, or just other Oceanic Internet customers? With Oceanic you can receive and send email to anyone, anywhere! The number of email accounts is determined by your local cable provider. When the Oceanic Internet technician installs your service, he/she will set up your email account. You will have your own Online Account Management system to create and manage the additional accounts that come with your Oceanic Internet service. This allows for sub account identities to be created and deleted as needed. I've seen the Oceanic Internet computer screen at a neighbor's house. Do I get that when Oceanic Internet is installed? Yes! Our customized version of Internet Explorer, the browser that makes it possible to see all the great information on Oceanic Time Warner Cable and on the Internet, comes free with your Oceanic Internet subscription AND CAN BE PERSONALIZED. It has special features you won't get anywhere else. Of course, if you choose to use a different browser, you are able to do that easily -- we don't lock you into a particular browser choice. There are members of my family that are interested in building their own web site for school projects. What does Oceanic's Internet offer for them and how hard is it to use? Oceanic hosts personal home pages for their users. What do our customers use them for? Middle school history projects with links to web sites. High school drama group announcements. School club meeting schedules. Community sports leagues-the list is endless! Detailed online instructions for creating and publishing web pages are available for novice users. And if you have an experienced user in your home, they can update their home page directly using FTP (file transfer protocol, a method of sending the information from your computer to the Oceanic web page computer). How does Oceanic connect to my computer? Whether Oceanic's technicians install your Internet or you self-install, the way it works is the same.
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