Review by kornphlake 
UPDATED: 148 days ago
member for 4.6 years, 195 visits, last login: 6 days ago
 Portland,Multnomah,OR
 $55 per month
 "fast, reliable"
 "expensive, only other option in this area is Qwest DSL with suspicious TOS & billing"
 "You get what you pay for, but it sure does cost a lot."
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(ratings match consensus)
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I've had Comcast HSI for a little over a year now, I really liked having ATT DSL but moved out of ATT territory and the only telco offering DSL to my address is Qwest. Now, I've had enough problems with Qwest in the past that I don't want to ever go back to Qwest for any reason, even if it was advertised to save me a million dollars a month I just won't do it. Qwest has never sent me a bill that matches the rates promised and they make you wait on hold for hours on end before addressing the charges, which they improperly credit forcing you to call back and waste more time on hold to get it resolved correctly the second time around.
So I went with Comcast, I did the triple play bundle which was pretty competitively priced for the first year at $33/mo for internet, but not nearly as affordable as the $19/mo I was paying ATT for DSL. I never had any problems with either the VOIP service or HSI, the internet has come up every time I've turned on the computer and the phone has worked every time I've lifted the receiver, except for once a couple days after the service was installed, rebooting the modem solved the problem. With DSL I'd have to reboot the modem or router once a month or so, not so with Comcast HSI, it has been as dependable as a Maytag washing machine.
I had problems with online webstorage and FTP uploads, apparently Comcast was upgrading the capacity of the online storage from 15mb to 1gb and had some major problems, issues started in November when I was only able to connect to the FTP server occasionally if at all, then the files on the Comcast server became unavailable, once the files were restored from a backup there was some other problem where images couldn't be hotlinked. The FTP issue was resolved for me in late January, I filed a trouble ticket in December and was notified that the ticket had been closed even though intermittant problems continued, the techs said they couldn't replicate the problem and refused to follow the steps I was using to force the problem on my end, someone must have aknowledged there was a problem down the line when thosands of other customers complained and it was resolved without any fanfare or apology. Comcast continued to ignore thousands of complaints about hotlinked images stored on their servers saying it was a problem with IE, even though no updates had been released during the time the problem began. I received an email saying that the upgrade to 1gb online storage space has been complete a few days ago and mysteriously the problem that Comcast said didn't exist with hotlinking images has dissapeared. You be the judge, when you pay for internet service are you paying for an internet connection or are you paying for an internet connection and the extra features like online storage and email? I feel like for the amount billed, the extra features should work flawlessly.
My biggest gripe is that after the promotional offer expired the rates nearly doubled. I went from $33/mo plus $9 modem rental to $55/mo plus the modem rental, they give a $10 discount for having bundled services still but my total bill is about $160 for internet, phone and TV. When I signed up the potential rate hike was disclosed, but the verbal promise was that the promotional rate was a $10 discount and after the promotion ended rates shouldn't be raised more than the $10 discount. They really miscommunicated, the rate increase for internet service was $10, the increase for VOIP was $10 and the increase for cable TV was $40, the total increase in my montly bill was nearly $60/mo. I'd really like to be closer to $100 for the three services so I'm going to be keeping the HSI (since it's the only provider aside from Qworst) but cancelling the other services and going with Vonage VOIP and satellite TV. I was dissapointed when I called Comcast to let them know I was considering terminating services, I thought they'd give me a 6 month extension on the promotional rates, or offer a new package with better rates. The refused to give me any deals so I refuse to continue using their service, their normal rates are about 50% higher than the competition and service hasn't been any better than what we've gotten in the past from other providers.
Update 6/09: Still with Comcast, still no major complaints other than the price, the rate plan I had subscribed to was discontinued so I was bumped up to the new minimum speed for an additional $5/month. I was happy with the speed I was getting and would have rather spent the $5 on a hamburger but there wasn't much choice, the rate change happened automatically, all I could do was hold on for the ride. I am convinced that the difference between 4mbps and 12mbps is imperceptible for general web surfing, as I don't download heavily or play online games I see little to no benefit but my wallet feels a little lighter.
I get lots of junk mail from Comcast, usually 3-4 advertisements per week. They are in fact offering specials that I'm not eligible for as an existing customer, finally it occured to me that I could call and request to be removed from the marketing database, it's only been a couple days, we shall see if the junk mail stops.
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