Man holding a router and sitting in front of a laptop on a couch | Picture: iStock
DStv has heard your complaints about what they have to offer, well, kind of, and have introduced a number of new products and features to meet the needs of the modern-day viewer. Among these new offerings is the new DStv internet service aimed at connecting households for DStv customers across South Africa.
Well, DStv internet, is exactly that – fixed LTE internet provided by DStv for customers who may not have access to fibre and ADSL internet connections.
Since the service is still only in the early stages, DStv currently only offers three packages:
25GB, 110GB and 220GB data along with a nighttime equivalent. So, if you were to opt-in for the 25GB package, for example, you’d have the same amount allocated to your router for a certain amount of time after midnight and any usage during that time would not be deducted from your daytime data.
The router (which many service providers either charge for or offer for free) will be covered in the monthly fee of whatever package you opt into should you decide to try out DStv internet on a contract basis. Currently, one can expect to either get a ZTE MF286R or ZTE MF286C router depending on expected data usage.
If you prefer the prepaid option, the routers can be purchased for R1,300 and R1,800 respectively.
25GB (day) + 25GB (night) – R229
110GB (day) + 110GB (night) – R499
220GB (day) + 220GB (night) – R799
While the jury is still out on how DStv Internet compares to other offerings from a performance and connectivity point of view, it seems to more or less be on par with other service providers in terms of pricing.
With Afrihost Fixed LTE (and MTN), a 30GB + 30GB plan for day and night time data cost R199p/m at the time of writing. This includes a router at no additional cost provided that you stay with the service provider for a set period of time.
By Afrihost’s estimation, this amount of data allows customers to “socialise online” for up to 154 hours, stream to over 3,000 songs, watch 28 hours of YouTube videos and watch 63 episodes of a show via streaming.
The brand also offers a 100GB + 100GB package for R549 p/m which is higher than what DStv offers for slightly more data.
Afrihost also offers a 200GB + 200GB package for R949.
Cell C’s Smart Data prices are as follows excluding a device:
R645 for 30GB + 30GB data, R1,699 for Smart data 100GB + 100GB and R2,099 for 200GB + 200GB.
Vodacom only seems to have two deals available on their LTE Advanced package. A 50GB + 50GB deal for about R899 and 100GB + 100GB deal for about R1,199.
At these prices DStv internet seems worth the try if you’re not in the market for a fibre connection.
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