 Review by Jaime 
UPDATED: 105 days ago
member for 7 years, 4254 visits, last login: a few hours ago
 Norwalk,Los Angeles,CA
 $60 per month
 about 1 days
 "Not anything really stellar"
 "Billing department sucks, newsgroups leave something to be desired speed wise, and disconnects occasionally"
 "They're pretty good as long as you aren't on newsgroups 24/7"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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The speed that I ordered is 768/128. It costs me $39.99 a month; there is an additional cost of $10 a month if you don't have cable tv. They have contractors to install and the one who did my installation had NO computer experience. The order process was a sinch; the person who I ordered from was VERY good and knew what she was talking about. The modem that I got was a Surfboard 4100 external modem. You can also get an ethernet card if you ask, and for free. They say that they are dynamic IP's but I haven't seen any change in mine since I have ordered it, a month and a half ago. I would have to say that intially my Charter experience was horrible. I called tech support and they had no idea what to do so they sent a rep to my home. After a couple of hours he could not find what was wrong with my settings. But after tweaking the speeds have been good. My uploads are around 120k and downloads around 740k. All in all its a decent provider.
Update 1: After a few months charter is so and so, same speeds but I keep getting DISCONNECTED once every few days.
Update 2: Got 1544/128 service for $10 more and speeds are good. Still get disconnected once a day atleast 
Update 3:
Janurary 25, 2003
No more disconnects, it seems like it was a linksys firmware problem. Had a disconnection maybe 2 days ago but it was a city wide problem so that doesn't bother me. All in all its all good cept the price is a bit steep(1544/128) for $64 thats because I don't have cabletv and they add an extra $10 a month for that :\
Update 4:
July 16, 2003
It seems charter has really dropped the ball in the billing department. First time they credited the wrong amount and didn't notice it until the next month when I was billed twice as much, so I told them the story and they said they'd fix it.. it's been 4 months since then and they have yet to fix it. This is horrible and hope no one ever gets a billing mistake because if they do you're screwed.
Update 5:
August 17, 2003
Finally, they fixed the billing problem and I only have to pay $65 dollars :\. Other than that they've been good but I hate paying almost twice as much for my broadband than everyone else for the same speeds.
Update 6:
November 15, 2004
Just returned back to Charter after a few months with Verizon. Installation was much faster than last time they installed it, two years ago, and the newer speeds are cool, 2000/128 for $29.95 plus $4.95 for the modem lease. Now I don't have to pay for a cable TV fee since I don't use their horrible TV service.
Update 7:
March 26, 2004
Charter raised their rates since the 2000/128 offer for 29.99 is over (ends on April 1st). But I've been hearing that they'll be increasing their cap to 3000/256 in some markets, hopefully they'll be doing the LA area very soon. No connection problems yet  .
Update 8:
Septemeber 30, 2004
There have been connection issues with all of souther california for a while (around a month). The modem will lose sync for around two minutes. They're random and sometimes won't happen for a week but a day will happen where I lose sync three times a day.
Update 9:
May 23, 2005
Everything has been running fine speed wise but I have been noticing sporatic disconnects where just unplugging the modem and router for a minute and plugging it back in would fix the problem. That's my only gripe.
Update 10:
December 28, 2005
Still have times where it disconnects for a few minutes or a few hours, pretty annoying when you're playing a game or just need to be online.
Update 11:
September 20, 2007
----- Still have times where it disconnects for a few minutes or a few hours, pretty annoying when you're playing a game or just need to be online. -----
Pretty much the same as usual, disconnects occasionally with low speeds.
Update 12:
March 21, 2008
I talked to charter about changing my package from the 5 mb tier to 10 from 54.99 to $34.99. Next months bill comes in, and I'm getting a bill for $55 for 10mb service and some charge for $7 thats some stupid "service" no one would ever use. I call them up, and they tell me that I was mistaken.. Apparently the person that I called beforehand was mistaken and the price was for a bundle with telephony service. Anyways, FiOS is being installed in my neighborhood so I'll hopefully be rid of Charter for the second and last time.
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