Review by MyDogHsFleas 
UPDATED: 1.5 years ago
member for 2.2 years, 808 visits, last login: a few hours ago
 Austin,Travis,TX
 $164 per month
 about 4 days
 "Faster Internet access."
 "HDTV picture quality not as good as Time Warner Austin."
 "Dump the TV, keep the Internet."
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I knew I wanted to replace my AT&T Southwest ADSL with AT&T Uverse Enabled Internet (VDSL). They kept telling me I could not just order Internet, I had to order TV too, but I could cancel within my free month and pay nothing and keep the U-verse Internet. So I did.
I ordered U400 TV service with 3 boxes, and Max (10/1.5) Internet. Installation was excellent (but I was well prepared). They even found a bad RG6 wallplate installation and replaced it for free.
I am thrilled with Max. Yes the latency to my VRAD is 20 milliseconds which sucks. Maybe someday they'll fix that. But I don't experience any slower Web surfing. And downloads/uploads (which I do all the time) are faster. Note I am not a gamer -- I've heard that FPS online gamers have trouble with even a little more latency.
The TV service was pretty good, if all you are viewing is SD. They do not carry the NBA package which is a dealbreaker for me. Also they currently only allow one DVR on one TV. They keep saying "whole house DVR" is coming soon -- this would allow you to playback recorded shows on any TV connected to U-verse in your house.
The HD service wasn't great. First, they only have one HD stream right now, so you can only watch/record one HD program at a time. Two TVs watching different HD shows? No go. Watch one HD show while recording another? No. Again, this is something they promise to fix "soon" by adding a second HD stream (still not enough!)
Second, and a killer for me, a side-by-side comparison with Time Warner Austin showed visible picture quality degradation on U-verse, most likely due to them compressing the HD stream to 6 megabits/sec or so. It wasn't unwatchable -- but it was quite noticeably soft and fuzzy compared to TWC.
So-- bottom line-- I called up Time Warner and told them I was seriously considering switching to U-verse. They knocked $40 off my bill for the next 3 months. Maybe I'll switch to DirecTV by then! Then I called up U-verse and told them I was cancelling the TV. They were not happy, but they willingly did it. They are sending me boxes with pre-paid return labels to ship the STBs back in.
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