 Review by ssherwood 
UPDATED: 1.2 years ago
member for 7.3 years, 657 visits, last login: 1 days ago
 Toronto,ON
 $55 per month
 about 7 days
 "When its working it can be very fast ..."
 "Throttling and Bandwith Monitoring (the monitor can't add it seems)"
 "Speed tests are great, but how about real world usage? (see updates)"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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UPDATE --> as of April 1, 2008
My Extreme internet now “up to” 10mbit/1mbit speed. I’ve just received a letter indicating a new bandwidth capping regime which will limit extreme accounts to 95GB of total transfer allowance. What is striking about this is that they include an analysis of 3 previous months usage which I know with 100% certainty is incredibly inaccurate. How can Rogers possibly justify charging its customers for over usage when their tools can’t even get the figures straight?
I pay about $55/month for this service. This price would be fair if Rogers delivered what they promised me when I signed up – my connection’s rated speed and unlimited bandwidth. As I don’t really use P2P, their current throttling regime doesn’t bother me, but how long until they start throttling everything like email and www?
I am now in the difficult position of having to evaluate cancelling my home internet with Rogers to look at other alternatives… do yourself a favor and avoid Rogers until these issues are sorted out.
-- SS
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UPDATE --> as of October 17, 2005
My Extreme internet continues to be fairly rock solid. I've been upgraded to the new and improved 6mbit service. (6000/800kbit)
My speed tests are very static, nevermind the time of day. There is a slight variation, but the dip is hardly worth mentioning.
Typical results range from 5400 / 740 to 5800 / 785 kbit/s.
Forget using many P2P programs with Rogers though. BitTorrent, while I rarely use it, once ran very quickly with Rogers, and now generally crawls. They apparently have new hardware which allows them to throttle certain types of traffic, and they seem to dislike P2P applications traffic the most. Typical speeds using BT can be as low as 20-30kb/s, with well seeded torrents. (100+ seeds) So, if BT is important to you, be prepared for disapointment.
I should say that this behaviour seems to be limited to certain areas as they don't have enough of the "boxes" to throttle their whole network simultaneously, and apparently move them from place to place to share the speed limiting joy. YMMV
I'll close this update by saying that it is great for all the speed tests to show that your connection is working very close to its maximum potential only to find that when you try to use your application of choice that you are being throttled as "somebody" has decided that certain types of traffic are either low priority or undesireable. I find it more than a little annoying that they continue to flaunt the idea of unlimited usage and lightning fast speeds/downloads when the vast majority of users of P2P applications will find that this is NOT the case.
Last I had heard Bell/Sympatico, the other major ISP in this area, do not impose bandwith caps or limits... you may be better off with them if you are a heavy downloader!
-- SS
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UPDATE as of January 13, 2005
I've switched from Bell/Sympatico's DSL to the new Roger's / Yahoo Hi-Speed Internet - Extreme. I made this decision based on a special offer with digital cable and wireless bundling. So far the speeds have been fairly good, though slowdowns have been experienced.
The installation at my new location went very well, with the installer arriving during the 3 hour window and spending a great deal of time wiring things to my specifications. I was very pleased on the whole with the installer. (though I didn't let him touch my computer system) 
Typical daytime speedtests are 4500kbit / 700kbit and I do sometimes enjoy even faster results.
Unfortunately, a large part of the day, especially in "peak hours" from 4pm until midnight, my speed are 50% of the rated speed. (2500kbit / 350 kbit)
For a few weeks during the christmas break, my speeds were fairly slow 24/7. We're talking 1500kbit / 200kbit tests at any hour, including early morning. (2am - 4am)
But for the most part, speeds have been greatly improved over my Rogers @home experience noted above in the review. Roger's internet services have improved and I am going to stick with them for the time being.
-- SS
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Original Review
If peaks and valleys are your thing, then Rogers "High Speed" internet is for you. When its fast, its VERY fast. (3 times faster than most of the major DSL providers here in Toronto) The trouble is that during peak hours, I'm lucky to get 1/4 of the advertised speed, though I am usually able to manage at least a 65kb/s download from major Tucows mirrors. I've had several outtages that have lasted beyond 24 hours ... well ... to be completely honest, I wasn't completely out. My service was simply slower than dial-up. (12kbit down and 20 up for over a week from several speed tests) I'm currently in an upward swing with my service resembling that of "good" cable internet, though I'm still VERY unhappy about the speed swings that occur through "peak" hours. From 4pm until 2am it can be down right slow. It certainly isn't the advertised 3000kbit speed ... through the day I'm lucky to test at 800kbit ... with real world transfer speeds of no more than 65kb/s. Is this worth $50 / month? At least with Bell (Sympatico HSE), which I subscribed to in my last city of residence, I 95% of the time enjoyed 900kbit speed ... and I typically got my maximum download speed of about 110kb/s from sites like Tucows, at all times of the day!
As I said at first ... with Roger's, its all about peaks and valleys ... if you use it when nobody else does, I suppose its likely worth it ... for "normal" people, I'm not so sure.
For the record, my best and worst speeds tested were :
2500kbit DOWN / 385kbit UP
12kbit DOWN / 20kbit UP
I'd also like to state for the record that I only got that top speed ONCE and the lower speed was sustained for over 8 days on all attempts to run a speed test ... when they would even complete. I typically test at about 1000kbit DOWN / 350kbit UP ... just ran a test a short while ago and that was the result ... though it is 2:45am and I would have expected a result closer to 2000kbit in the downstream!
-- SS
Followup comments:  
anon43535435
@rogers.com | It's always been that way.. The service has always been "up to".
There isn't a residential ISP around who can give you exactly the speeds they advertise. That' why the "up to" clause is always there. | |
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Paul Kambulow
@bell.ca
| Bell Sympatico Dealing with Bell or Bell Sympatico has clearly been one of the most demonic influenced experienced in my whole life. Firstly they are known liars who do not return the phone calls, secondly even their internet sites are often not accessible, plaque with errors, And they have not even for the last many years giving me a Unlimited high speed system, yesterday was the first time I got one too. Now they seem even to screw up the accounts receivable. In December I was given 5 months credit for my free six months unlimited account and next Bell falsely charges me 30 dollars per moth extra for the same 6 months for my excess band width usage on my limited account.. How unacceptable absurd. I should be given a credit for Bell not delivering me a high speed account for years, when I was unable to download fully as well not falsely now abused, and charged more. In Bell what the right hand gives the left one takes away.
I have just received a phone call at home call from tech support at Sympatico saying they had adjusted my Sympatico server (Yesteroday at 5.00 pm)
Last Result:
Download Speed: 5994 kbps (749.3 KB/sec transfer rate)
Upload Speed: 905 kbps (113.1 KB/sec transfer rate)
and my file download speed for these files was 631 kbs
and do note this is the first time I have such high speeds in years too, the previous download speeds were between 100 to 300 kbs even last week
and my Bit torrent download speed is 220 kbs
Now if Bell Sympatico can maintain such download speeds for me next permanently it would be very much appreciated too
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