As we remembered a few days ago, ADSL in Spain has its days numbered what’s more, you only have the fingers of one hand to watch the end of this countdown, because the blackout will happen next time Friday, April 19. And although to many people ADSL sounds like ancient history, the truth is that there are still many connections of this type active today. The most recent data from January this year spoke of roughly 440,000 ADSL connections.

There are those who think that users who have not made the jump to fiber do not want to, but this is only true if this type of connection is available in their location. As one of our Virtualbox Vbox readers commented in the news we reported on this outage, today you can still find ADSL users in areas where fiber is already available, and in these cases the solution is obvious, simple and in addition leads to higher quality of services.

The problem is that despite the many plans we have seen in this regard over the last 20-25 years, the thread has not reached 100% territory yetand there are places where its deployment is not even considered at the moment. We are talking mainly about the rural environment, geographies in which even the reach of copper took time to materialize, which led Telefónica to alternative plans for the “communication” of these places, such as the remembered TRAC (rural cellular access telephony, from the days of Moviline, analog mobile telephony) which is actually still very active today, with over 200,000 users at the end of 2023.

Many will not remember this, but in the beginning, Telefónica sold its ADSL services through Teleline and Terra

Spain was the European pioneer in introducing ADSL connectivity, but this was because at the time (early century) high speed internet connection was becoming a necessity, but the rollout of optical fibers was far behind schedule and desirable. Thus, the great advantage of ADSL was that it offered much faster connectivity than dial-up network access and could be implemented over an already existing and more consolidated metallic network.

That’s the problem Telefónica has already completed the deployment of optical fibers, which it considers necessary and in response believes that it is time to “turn off” the “high speed” connection via the switched telephone network. This is not really a surprise as the process of closing copper exchanges started more than 10 years ago. However, it was in April 2023 that, along with the closure of 3,329 of them, it announced that the remaining would cease operations on April 19, 2024, thus ending ADSL connectivity that could not be contracted for some time.

So does this mean that all the people, those who depend on the 440,000 still working ADSL connections, will be left without fast and reliable internet access? No, as I already indicated, some of these connections are maintained in places with optical infrastructure, so their users will be able to make the leap and in this way find out what they have been missing all along. However, What alternatives do those who do not have a fiber optic alternative have?

Connection35

Space, the last frontier. These are the journeys of the starship Enterprise as it continues its mission to explore worlds… sorry, sorry, but while it’s actually technology that’s been around for years, it still sounds rather futuristic to me personally. And although not many people know it, Satellite Internet connection has become a great alternative on ADSL connectivity for all those places where the fiber did not reach.

To this end, and as part of the Spanish Government’s Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan, Last year, the Conectate35 service was launched which, in cooperation with Hispasat, offers a high-speed satellite connection (200 Mbps) for a monthly fee 35 euros without the costs of installation and the purchase of the necessary equipment (both points are subsidized by the program, in the amount of up to 600 euros).

There are some important limitations, yes.. The main one is that although the coverage of the Hispasat satellite network reaches 100% of the national territory, since it is a subsidized plan, Conectate35 can only be contracted from places where there is no alternative that offers downloads of at least 50 Mbps. To facilitate their identification, it is possible to look at the detailed map from this link. On the other hand, we are talking about an asymmetric connection, with a download speed of up to 200 Mbps, but for upload it is limited to 10 Mbps.

Except, high speed is “capped” at 150 gigabytes per month (with accumulated upload and download), it is true that when it is reached, the speed is not automatically reduced, but the user will have a lower priority when accessing the service’s resources than the one who has not yet reached his limit. Of course, there is a time range from 1:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m., in which traffic is not included in the monthly consumption. And another aspect that we have to take into account is its latency, which can reach 690 milliseconds.

However, this solution is temporary and subject to future renewal, it is currently stipulated that the Conectate35 service will be available until December 31, 2027. You can find more information about Conectate35 at this link.

starlink

We’re still in space, but this time with Starlink, SpaceX’s internet connection service that we’ve told you about several times before. Its coverage of the territory of the state is practically completethey reach as far away as Chafarinas Islands and Peñón de Velez de la Gomera, with the sole exception of a small region located between the east of Madrid (in the area of ​​Azuqueca de Henares and Pastrana and west of the province of Guadalajara, including the capital, and which extends east to Sacedon). You can check its geographical extent on this map.

Its connectivity plan is better than that offered by Conectate35 and with a special focus on latency which can be as low as 25 milliseconds and can be negotiated by anyone who is interested and has coverage. On the contrary? Its price, 65 euros per month, is almost double what the state initiative offers and which, in addition, does not include the regulatory fee (9 euros) or equipment rental (15 euros per month), for those users who did not want to buy it. Total? 74 or 89 euros. You can get more information here.

4G-5G connectivity / radio

At this point the possibilities grow substantially because There are many carriers with cellular-based internet plans, although we find huge differences between them, such as monthly traffic limits, geographical availability, the types of networks we can use and, of course, prices. These are the main plans in this sense with nationwide coverage, but if you’re looking for an alternative to your ADSL and there’s a ‘local’ telco, we’d recommend checking their terms as they might be better.

• Phone: Movistar internet radio, limited to 3G and 4G networks, with a maximum speed of 20 Mb/s, only available in areas without optical network coverage. Movistar Conecta offers a higher speed (up to 30 Mbps) and includes a telephone line.
• Vodafone: with this operator we find two options, Vodafone One and Internet Conecta. Both include Internet access and a landline, but the One also adds a cell line. However, both are also limited to locations where fiber optic infrastructure is not available.
• orange: This operator’s proposition is its 4G home plan, which offers unlimited data with 4G connectivity. It is also limited to places where there is no optical infrastructure.

WiMax

By being limited to more local areas, the WiMax offer is much more dispersed, with more than 700 operators operating here. Therefore, if we recommend looking for local operators in the case of a connection via a mobile network, in this case it is essential that you use this to find out if there is an operator in your location that provides this service.