Review by bemis 
UPDATED: 294 days ago
member for 1.3 years, 87 visits, last login: 11 days ago
 Cambridge,Middlesex,MA
 $50 per month
 about 8 days
 "It works 99% of the time"
 "It doesn't work 1% of the time, high costs"
 "They're the only game in town, so it's like it or lump it"
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Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
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Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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In my most recent town Comcast is the only high speed provider, the review is based on living w/ the service from Nov 2007 ish to June 2008 when we made an in-town move (the installation comments below) to present
Note that Monthly Cost is just for the DISCOUNTED internet portion of the bill!
- Installation REQUIRED a $49.99 truck roll to "install" despite the fact that we literally moved and plugged in all the existing equipment from the last apartment and it was all working... Comcast insisted that we must pay $49.99 for installation
- Installer arrived to see my working modem and digital cable box, spent 5 mins inside with a field strength meter, 20 mins outside doing who knows what... left in his van... came back 60 mins later and asked me to sign a work order... I said "For what?"... "installation"
- We've had 5-6 internet outages in the past year ... typically I will call them, they will report that nothing is wrong in the area but confirm no access to my modem from their side, they will ask to schedule a truck roll, I will decline, then 24 hours later service is working on it's own w/o any changes on my end
- Most recently I had an outage where the CSR came to the conclusion that I had "low signal" and wanted to do a truck roll... problem resolved itself...
- "Truck Roll" is expensive for an intermittent problem if they claim either there is no problem or that the problem is your end... they will almost ALWAYS claim that your splitter or wiring is at fault for any signal issue and attempt to charge you!
--> Case in point they came to my house after complaint of broken up digital picture and intermittent cable block sync on modem, they claimed it was low signal, said it was my splitter and use of an amplifier block, tried to charge me $50 for the pleasure and weren't going to resolve my issue... I said "Please check the signal at the point of demarc where the cable is coming into the house from the pole"... tech checks it, finds it low, ends up replacing the tap (or something) up on the pole... it was NOT my wiring, my splitter or my amp... but if he had his way I'd have paid $50 and not had any solution
:^( I've looked into DSL, but it's not available at speeds >1.5Mb/s
:^( I've looked into FIOS, but due to city charter it's not available
:^( I have Sprint Mobile Broadband, but it's only ~1.5Mb/s at best
:^( There is no alternate cable provider (like RCN) in this town, there is all surrounding towns
We have ordered whatever the standard tier is, depending on which CSR you speak with it's either 6Mb/s or 8Mb/s ... in reality it's consistently 4-6Mb/s, so it is close to what they advertise
I've had Comcast 3-4X in the past and been happy w/ the equipment, this time around I got a really used looking RCA cable modem that they've been charging us $3/mo for--it's my own fault for continuing to use it rather then either trading it or getting my own modem
Overall I think the costs are high for what you get w/ them, for the money it should be 10Mb/s downloads ... their CSRs on the phone are nice enough and seem well educated in the product and related technologies, but the "truck roll" techs have consistently been a disappointment, they are rude and relatively uneducated (or at least seem that way based on the things they've said and work they've done)... they also don't even make an attempt to clean their shoes after walking into your home from the lawn.
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