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Review by UGAJoe See Profile

  • Location: Loganville, Walton, GA, USA
  • Cost: $199 per month
  • Install: about 6 days
Great Product (X1 Platform in Atlanta Market)
Horrible Customer Service/Installation
If you can get it installed and WORKING, you won't beat it.
Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings below consensus)

Ordering Process:

I was an existing double play customer. The website prompted me to upgrade my service to an X1 Triple Play. I chose the X1 Complete Package for $199. It is their highest priced triple-play package and includes the X1 DVR and service on up to 3 additional TVs. I went through the ordering process, picked my installation time, and finalized my order. I received an order confirmation which showed that I was going to receive free professional installation.

After I clicked submit on my order, the online ordering system said the order had to be reviewed and completed by an online representative. It connected me in a chat window. The representative quickly confirmed my order and told me that installation would be $100. I told him that I had an order confirmation showing free professional installation. I even offered to email it to him. He refused to honor the offer but told me that he would waive $40 of the installation fee. When I refused, he provided me with a number for "promotions" to call. The rep in promotions also refused to honor the deal but offered to waive $60.

I emailed the "We_can_help" email address and made a false advertising complaint. I forwarded a copy of my order showing free installation. The rep that responded finally honored the deal that I signed up for. He set up an installation time of 1-3 PM the following Saturday.

Installation:

As I said above, the installation time frame was 1-3 PM Saturday. At 3 PM, I received a call saying that the installation tech was delayed 30-50 minutes due to a problematic order. I was told he would arrive by 4 PM. At 3:30 PM, I received a call that stated no tech would be coming at all. They rescheduled for Sunday 1-3 PM.

On Sunday at 3 PM, there was still no sign of a technician and I didn't even get a courtesy call telling me there would be a delay. However, at 3:30 PM, a technician finally showed up to install. He profusely apologized and said he had come out of his area to pick up my job because they were so backed up on installations in my area.

It took him about two hours to install. He installed a professional looking "house box" on the side of my house. In the box, he installed an amplifier because he said my signal would be too low with four rooms hooked up. He also installed a filter that he said was required for X1 service. From there, he came inside and spent about two hours hooking up the new DVR and three receivers. He was polite and professional. More importantly, he didn't leave until the X1 boxes were all up and running.

Internet:

Internet speed advertised in the package is 105 Mbps. Unfortunately, I haven't received anything close. Most of my speed tests show 50 Mbps/10 Mbps. The latency is usually always less than 40 ms. It is commonly under 15 ms. This is no where close to the advertised speed but still almost ten times faster than available DSL speeds in my area.

Phone:

No complaints about phone service. You can't tell that it is VOIP. It works as well as a regular POTS line. Unfortunately, Comcast has declared that they are no longer providing a battery backup for their eMTA. This means that if the power goes out, we will lose phone service. However, with the phones that we currently use, the base requires power so it really isn't much of an issue.

Cable TV:

All I can say is WOW! The Graphical User Interface (GUI) on the X1 platform blows the old cable boxes out of the water. There is absolutely no comparison. It shows pictures of the movies you are about to watch. It shows you the rotten tomato ratings. It reminds me a lot of DirecTV's on-demand interface but a lot cleaner and less cluttered.

The built-in apps are cool but not sure if they are practical. However, the main DVR has built in Facebook, Instagram, Pandora, etc. All of the boxes have weather, traffic, horoscopes, and some other built-ins. Caller ID

It auto-tunes to HD channels if one is available for the channel you are watching. It is capable of up to 1080p resolution.

The DVR is MUCH smaller. The other boxes are roughly the same size at the last generation HD boxes so not much difference.

Parental controls are very user friendly. Select TV and movie ratings that you want to block and set a pin. You can have a purchase PIN to prevent unauthorized purchases. You can block specific ratings. You can also block adult titles from view.

The remote control is great. It is RF based instead of IR. Therefore, you don't even have to point the remote at the box and it works. It also seamlessly controls my TV volume, power, etc.

The only downsides we've found:

1. When the box disconnects, it takes a while to connect to the system. We have not had any random outages but I imagine if the power flickers we'll be off a few minutes before we regain service.

2. The guide occasionally drops out. Last night for about an hour, when we hit the guide button, nothing displayed. However, it came back on its own some time last night.

3. I tried to use the X1 app for my Ipad mini. It said we couldn't use it because we didn't have a cloud-based DVR in our market.

3/19/2014 UPDATE

Installation date was 3/16/14. By 3/18/14, one X1 receiver had already bit the dust. After several hours trying to get the problem fixed, they told me I needed a tech. The next tech appointment is 3/22/2014. So... After the ordeal of getting it installed, we lose service on one TV less than 48 hours later. They then are going to take four plus days to get it fixed.

member for 10 years, 12 visits, last login: 9.9 years ago
updated 10 years ago

doliver1616
join:2011-05-20

doliver1616

Member

Similar experience

It took 3 weeks after I switched from double play to triple play and I didn't even change the TV equipment. I have found that most of the customer service phone reps don't have a clue but the tech support phone folks are pretty good. I finally had to go to an Xfinity store to pick up a phone modem.

I'm about 50 miles from you and getting 120 mb on the same tier as you (direct cable from the modem to computer. If you are testing through a router that maybe causing the speed drop, mine did.
JohnShade
join:2009-03-07
Pearland, TX

JohnShade

Member

Extreme 105

Speed guaranteed for hardwired over Ethernet cat 6 cable to a gigabit Ethernet card