🌐 The Basics: Connectivity Types
Not all “high-speed” internet is created equal. These are the main ways rural Ohioans get online.
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Fiber-Optic: The “Gold Standard.” Uses glass strands to transmit data as light. It’s incredibly fast and reliable but is still being built out in many rural counties.
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Fixed Wireless: Uses a signal sent from a local tower to a small dish on a customer’s home. A popular, effective choice for areas where cables can’t reach.
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Starlink / Low Earth Orbit (LEO) Satellite: Unlike old-school satellite, these “constellations” are closer to Earth, providing much faster speeds and lower lag for the most remote farms.
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DSL (Digital Subscriber Line): Internet delivered over traditional copper telephone lines. It’s widely available but generally much slower than modern options.
⚡ Performance Terms
How to tell if a connection can actually handle a Netflix binge and a Zoom call at the same time.
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Bandwidth: The maximum “width” of your digital pipe. More bandwidth means more devices can be online at once without slowing down.
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Download Speed: How fast data travels to you (watching videos, loading pages). Measured in Mbps (Megabits per second).
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Upload Speed: How fast you send data out (sending emails, posting to social media, being seen on video calls).
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Latency (Ping): The “lag” or delay. High latency makes gaming or video calls feel choppy, even if your speed is high.
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Data Cap: A monthly limit on how much data you can use. Many rural plans have these, while “Unlimited” plans do not.
🏗️ Infrastructure & Local Context
Terms you’ll see in local news or when talking to cooperatives.
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The Last Mile: The final leg of the connection from the provider’s main network to your specific front door. In rural Ohio, this is often the most expensive and difficult part to build.
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Line of Sight (LoS): Crucial for fixed wireless. It means the dish on your house needs a clear “view” of the provider’s tower without trees or silos in the way.
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Middle Mile: The high-capacity “interstate highway” of internet that connects local towns to the global internet.
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Broadband: Defined by the FCC as a minimum speed of 100 Mbps download and 20 Mbps upload. Anything slower is technically not “broadband.”