Review by PHOENIXZERO 
UPDATED: 304 days ago
member for 3.3 years, 276 visits, last login: 25 days ago
 Beaverton,Gladwin,MI
 $35 per month
 about 4 days
 Ameritech
 "Much, much, much faster than dial up, no longer tying up the phone. Much better than the experiences I've had with cable."
 "Nothing yet, but no longer tying up the phone leads to phonecalls from people I don't want to talk to."
 "If you're still paying for dial up and DSL is available to you, it would have been an excellent time to get it."
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(ratings match consensus)
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[Note: that I started writing this review last month, stopped and just got around to finishing it today. At the end I wrote an "update" as this pretty much covers the time while I was being ramped up and shortly after.]
Okay, just a little pointless back story... I've had internet access at home for eight or nine years now, with almost all of the time being with a dial up connection. I lived in Florida for about six months over four and a half years ago and during a short time had cable internet through Time Warner Cable/Road Runner, $50 a month for a service that I had many problems with connection loss and speed that for the $50 a month I was paying, even back then, didn't seem worth it. I have been using PeoplePC for dial up for almost a year and despite the annoyance of being disconnected every four hours, I renewed it for a year at $100 back in early June, I guess that was a mistake, especially since they have a "no refunds" policy when you order like that. Anyway, on with the review.
I had recently had been told of Ameritech/SBC/AT&T/Whatever company they merge with next, deal for DSL. I decided to check to see if it was finally available in my area by going to SBC's site and it was! I was given the three main speed choices (along with the business options) and I went with the Pro service seeing as it at (3Mbps up/512Kbps down, Dynamic IP/PPPoE) was potentially twice as fast and the price difference only $5 more.
I placed the order Saturday afternoon online, a relatively simple procedure, I also chose the self install as I felt paying $200 to what would likely just involve them plugging in a single filter, (only use one of the two working phone jacks) installing software I didn't want or need and setting up the modem which I could do myself. I saw it as a big waste of money at this point. I receive the confirmation e-mail shortly after my order was accepted and while it had a link to go to check order status, the page didn't work because apparently the way to access your account has changed (not my phone number) and I wasn't give any account number at this point. I called AT&T/SBC with some questions, one being what my account number was, but the lady I talked to, while helpful didn't even know of the change when I informed her of it, I still do not even know what the account number is. Another question I had was regarding whether I would be connecting to a remote terminal and to a central office, she said that it was a central office and I was able to get out of her that I was around 5,200 feet from it, though I'm thinking she gave me the road distance, not line but I seem to recall her saying that was the line distance, oh well. The last two things she told me was that the self install kit would be here no later than July 12th, a day before my DSL was supposed to be activated.
Receive the self install kit ($49.99 for the modem, $12.95 for shipping/handling via UPS plus 3.78 sales tax) on the as stated which included a Speedstream 4100 modem, the two cables one for connecting to the phone jack and the ethernet cable to connect to my computer's ethernet jack, also included a $49.99 rebate for the modem but I won't be getting that until sometime in September since they make sure you pay for the first two months.
I needed a longer cable to reach my computer so I took 30 mile drive and bought a 14ft Belkin Premium Cat5e cable at Meijer for $8.97. Brought it back and found that it just barely connected after moving the modem, I plan on returning it and getting something longer, it would be nice if they sold a 20 foot cable instead of 25, shouldn't need that extra five feet, I might try to get a shorter phone cable/network cord..
So, after doing a few things to shorten the distance I was able to hooked it up and set the connection/modem configurations, I didn't bother with the software and created the connection according to the directions on this site. For the next few days I was in the ramp up period I didn't have any real problems, the connection stayed very stable. I the day I was ramped up to full speed first lost sync, but after a simple restart things were again solid. It's now been just over a month and I've pretty satisfied with my connection and after using one of the tweak tools, I rose my RWIN setting from somewhere in the 5000s to in the low 40,000s and gave me a slight boost in speed. It has been a little higher than 2.5Mbps down (was around 2.4 before the RWIN raise) and with around 439 up. Coming from having exclusively used dial up for almost my entire time of owning a computer and being on the internet, it's a massive improvement. I do believe it's better than the connection I had for a couple months while I lived in Florida through Road Runner, not to mention a much lower price.
I'll try to keep this updated and maybe change the ratings/scores if possible when I have had more experience with some things, such as the tech support, which I haven't really needed yet.
**August 15th***
I've had a few spots where I've lost my connection, one when there was a brief but powerful storm and a few others for seemingly no reason, those were remedied by just either disconnecting, resetting or restarting the modem, the computer or both, no real big deal to me not yet enough for me to lower my ratings.
But this morning I've been having sync/connection problems with a lot of CRC errors on both ends but especially on the "to internet" side, my SN Margin had fallen from its usual 19.5-21 range to 12 all the way down to 2.5. My Line Attenuation rating rose to 26.5. I noticed that a cable that AT&T hooked up to the terminal (narrow box about three or four feet high, can't remember the correct term, unless that's it) a few days ago still hasn't been buried. It doesn't seem like that would be the problem though so it should have caused problems from the start. But I was thinking it could have been for some reason. I totally lost connection but when it came back I was back to my "usual" so hopefully that's over with, hopefully it's back to it's usually stable self. Maybe there was work being done somewhere?
I plan on returning the 14 foot Cat5e cable tomorrow, I still have the receipt but I can't find the packaging, it might have been accidentally thrown away. They should still take it back, then again it is Meijer....
I also receive the first bill, which was $19.51 including a $1.52 FUSF Pass-Through Fee, not counting the modem, shipping and sales tax charges.
***August 18th 2006***
Returned the 14 foot cable for a 25 foot one for the same brand/type, nothing seems to have changed from that at least. Still having problems with dropping SN margins and losing sync. Made a topic in the forum regarding my issue... My upload speed has lowered to 448.... O_o
***September 9th, 2006***
Beach boy opened a ticket for me on the 5th after finding my line was crossed with another pair. The next day the tech came out, found the problem (also said there was water too) and fixed it. Since then my SN Margin and Line Attenuation have been are above/below what they had been before my problems, I also haven't had sync loss/connection drop since the sixth, I did lose connection three times that day after it was fixed, oddly once I got a call from AT&T right after the connection came back. But since then, no droppage or loss.
***October 6th, 2006***
Hasn't lost sync at all since my last update, including a stint where I had my computer and connection going for over 12 days straight. I've been really happy with that, it stayed up even through some harsh weather, while my cable went out.
***January 9th, 2008***
It's been about two and a half years and while I had one more problem where my SpeedStream modem was dying and not staying connected about a year but that was resolved for free thanks to a member in the ATT Direct section. Since then it has been 100% solid with no problems at all. However, in that time the price for Pro has gone up, I started with the promotion that was $17.99 a month for a year, when that ended it went to what I guess was the normal price then for $25 a month, made a deal and had a contract with ATT soon after that reduced it to $15 a month for the first six months and then $25 for the next six. That ended this past December and found they had raised the price of the Pro package to $30 since I made that deal. I guess it was a good thing I did. Now Elite is only five dollars more so being that I was within range of the Central Office I figured I might as well upgrade for only five buck for twice the download speed and a more than 50% faster upload. But wasn't the Elite upload speed 1 mbps before?
I upgraded a few days ago and it actually increase that same day and not a couple days later like I was told. Though I do think the person I talked to didn''t too knowledgeable as he was clearly reading or going be a script. But anyway, my connection has remained completely solid with my faster connection, there's been a dip in my SN Margin but I think that's to be expected, it's still in a stable range and didn't drop too much. My connection is a bit over twice as fast downloading and more than 50% faster uploading as well.
Even though I'm paying now ten bucks more than I was before my contract ended, I'm happy. I wonder if I could have done more to talk them into giving me a better deal.
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