If VOOM Is "The Fastest Internet At Sea" ...

[Hombre59]

It was horrendous on independence when I sailed in December... If you're phone screen locked, you would have to open up your settings and try to connect back to the WiFi, and that was a mission to get it to successfully reconnect... I bought the surf+stream, but it could barely stream a youtube video without constant pauses. Definitely wasn't worth any extra money.

[Baron Barracuda]

I was fortunate enough to sail on Grandeur twice last year.

 

In February, the internet was slow, but I could stream video, but it was nowhere near the speed of the Anthem when I was onboard her. I watched enough shows on most of my streaming services if i kept the quality low. I was able to stream Hulu and Netflix. I was not able to stream Xfinity as it wanted a much faster connection and it was obvious. The passenger base was a much older crowd. They were not the type to need internet.

 

In July, the internet was way more unpredictable. It was a younger crowd and so i assume there was a higher demand for the bandwidth. I could not do nearly the same as I could when i was on-board in February. I had hoped that in March during the dry dock, they would have upgraded, but they did not. I had to theorize that it was the same bandwidth but higher demand that caused speeds to plummet at certain points. It was a lot more frustrating and considering I paid more in July than in February, I was annoyed.

 

Am boarding Grandeur Saturday 2/10 for 12 nights and will report back. Hopefully it's an older, not-techie crowd.

[SRF]

On Grandeur in August the connection was fine. Ping was a bit high at 250. But SpeedTest was returning a solid 5 MBPS down.

 

But one day, for most of the day, there was no internet, due to satellite positions.

 

There are MANY things that can affect the internet speed on board.

 

And BTW, fastest is not the same as FAST. To be fastest, you only have to be faster than the others, which may be very slow.

 

Think of it this way, if you were in a race, and the rest of the "runner" were in their 90s with canes and walkers, how fast would you have to be, to be the "fastest?" :D

[Clarea]

On Grandeur in August the connection was fine. Ping was a bit high at 250. But SpeedTest was returning a solid 5 MBPS down. ...

Sounds like O3b service.

[Biker19]

Sounds like O3b service.

 

 

 

I am somewhat doubtful that she has O3B.

 

 

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[Clarea]

I am somewhat doubtful that she has O3B.

Agree, probably an inaccurate speedtest.

[Beachammo]

On Freedom last week and the service was fine. No issues. Our free days were surf and stream.

 

Sent from my VS995 using Tapatalk

[Biker19]

Our free days were surf and stream.

 

 

Are you sure? The D coupon only covers Surf.

 

 

 

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[Beachammo]

Are you sure? The D coupon only covers Surf.

 

 

 

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Instead of giving us 2 "free days" each. Royal has been giving us a $49.98 credit to use how we want. I usually select stream over those 2 days and pay an extra $10-20 per cruise. But......Freedom reduced the prices on port days which allowed us to choose the stream package for the price of surf only.

 

We would buy it at 3pm on a port day which carried over to our sea day.

 

 

 

Sent from my VS995 using Tapatalk

[Biker19]

Instead of giving us 2 "free days" each. Royal has been giving us a $49.98 credit to use how we want. I usually select stream over those 2 days and pay an extra $10-20 per cruise. But......Freedom reduced the prices on port days which allowed us to choose the stream package for the price of surf only.

 

We would buy it at 3pm on a port day which carried over to our sea day.

 

 

 

Sent from my VS995 using Tapatalk

 

 

 

Both the discount amount and the reduced rate is news to me.

 

 

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[bob brown]

Doesn't the speed depend on how many are using it?

It seemed that way to me, aboard the Anthem in December....I found that if I went online at around 0100, it worked much better than around, say 0900....

[Clarea]

Doesn't the speed depend on how many are using it? ...

Yes.

[Beachammo]

Both the discount amount and the reduced rate is news to me.

 

 

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Seems more and more each ship is doing something different.

 

Freedom also offered the 10 drink cards starting the morning of the third day on an eight day cruise.

 

Sent from my VS995 using Tapatalk

[Rogueperson]

Am boarding Grandeur Saturday 2/10 for 12 nights and will report back. Hopefully it's an older, not-techie crowd.

 

I'm on Grandeur in April and have already purchased the voom plan. Here's hoping to new hardware. I look forward to your report.

[Rogueperson]

On Grandeur in August the connection was fine. Ping was a bit high at 250. But SpeedTest was returning a solid 5 MBPS down.

 

But one day, for most of the day, there was no internet, due to satellite positions.

 

There are MANY things that can affect the internet speed on board.

 

And BTW, fastest is not the same as FAST. To be fastest, you only have to be faster than the others, which may be very slow.

 

Think of it this way, if you were in a race, and the rest of the "runner" were in their 90s with canes and walkers, how fast would you have to be, to be the "fastest?" :D

 

A month earlier in July, my pings were averaging 650ms and had maybe 2.5 mbps if i was lucky. the lowest I got was a 575ms ping and the highest download speed was 3.76 mbps.

 

In February, I was getting similar, but better results. I averaged closer to 600ms pings with about an average 3mbps download.

 

I never got a ping faster than 575ms, so if its 250, it is a good chance they upgraded!!! That would be awesome. Someone on this thread is boarding the Grandeur on Saturday, so hopefully we can see.

[Pellaz]

I was on the Independence this past week (2/1 - 2/5) and was actually pleased with the Internet speed...and this was a music charter, so there were likely more internet users onboard than normal. Itinerary was FLL -> Grand Turk (!) and back.

 

I had the Surf & Stream option and was able to do pretty much anything, including flawless Wi-Fi calling. My friends couldn't believe I was aboard a ship in the southern Bahamas.