Fibre Internet
Get on Niagara’s network and experience the power of full fibre.
The Difference
Fibre
DSL
Cable
Wireless
What’s the download/upload bandwidth like?
Symmetrical.
E.g. 100 Mbps download/100 Mbps upload.
Not symmetrical.
E.g. 5 Mbps download/2 Mbps upload.
Not symmetrical.
E.g. 80 Mbps download/10 Mbps upload.
Not symmetrical.
E.g. 25 Mbps download/10 Mbps upload.
What kind of wire is used?
Fibre-optic cables buried underground, some portions are aerial.
Telephone lines to deliver Internet.
Coaxial cable TV infrastructure to deliver Internet.
Dependent on the line of site to your home or heavily congested wireless spectrum.
What speed does it have?
Fastest technology available, current speeds up to 1 Gbps.
Very slow speeds averaging 6 Mbps download.
Faster speeds available than DSL but slower than Fibre.
Faster speed than DSL but less reliable than all other available Internet solutions.
Does the technology have room for improvement?
Future-proof to deliver speeds up to 10 Gbps.
Future improvements of DSL will be limited by capability of telephone lines.
Future improvements of Cable will be limited by capability of coaxial cable infrastructure.
Wireless technology has potential for growth, but it may be limited to mobile phones and not homes.
What is the performance like?
Not affected by weather or slowed by peak hours with multiple users.
The farther away you are from the DSL service provider, the worse performance you will have.
Expect slower connection speeds during peak hours when many people are online.
Performance is extremely susceptible to bad weather.
Limited amount of bandwidth shared among many customers.