Review by poolek 
UPDATED: 2 years ago
member for 4.7 years, 1072 visits, last login: a few hours ago
 Austin,Travis,TX
 $43 per month
 about 7 days
 "Fast, no need to cable TV, better price than RR"
 "More expensive than DSL. Slower upload speeds"
 "Good overall value"
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Install Co-ordination:
Connection Reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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**7/25/2006**
The service continues to work well. Speeds are still consisitently at 4.8mb up, 370k down (though there's rumor of a upgrade to 7mb down coming soon. Personally, I'd rather have more upload). Stability has been fine - there was one period where it was down for a few hours after a car crashed into some of their equipment, but that's it. I haven't had to contact Tech Support for anything so far, either.
The only concern I have is that I'm nearing the end of my 'introductory' pricing. At full price, It might be cheaper to switch back to DSL, even with the mandatory (and uneeded by me) landline.
**2/08/2006**
I'd been on SBC DSL for ~3 years and was quite pleased with it. It worked well, was plenty fast enough for me and was very nicely priced. However, when you added in the cost of the required landline, it wasn't such a great deal. We decided to try a VoIP provider, thinking we'd cut our POTS service down to the mimimum, keep DSL and have the best of both worlds.
The only problem with that plan was number portability. You can't port a number associated with DSL. Trying to find a way to keep DSL and port the number (add a second line, establish DSL there, ramp up, shut down DSL on the first line, deal with wiring issues, port number, disconnect first line, deal with more wiring issues, etc) was rife with complications and fees. Another alternative was to just switch to a cable broadband provider. That was much simpler and was what I ended up doing.
I signed up for Earthlink at Bestbuy. They were offering a $75 gift card, 6 months @ $30 and then $43/mth after that. No contracts required. Signup process was simple and only took a few minutes. They do require you to do it at the store rather than online to qualify for the giftcard, though.
I received a call about installation a couple of days after signing up. The lady on the phone indicated there'd be a $25 shipping and handling charge for the modem, which I thought was strange given that it wasn't mentioned anywhere along the process.
A day later, I received another call about installation. This time, the guy calling inidcated he was showing both an order for Earthlink and an order for Road Runner. Strange - I'd never ordered Roadrunner - and that was apparently what the call concerning the modem shipping/handling fee was for. He canceled the RR order and scheduled the tech to show up a few days later. There was no shipping and handling fee associated with the Earthlink modem (which is really strange considering Earthlink and RR are exactly the same service, just different DNS's and email servers - same modem, same lines, same guy installing it. Monthly price is $3 cheaper on Earthlink, too - and there's no penalty for not having Cable TV service (I could never get a straight answer from TW if there was a penalty for that with RR)).
Tech showed up on time and installed everything quickly. He verified connectivity and was on his way. I chose not to install the Earthlink SW and just moved my router over and changed configs. Everything was working pefectly. My download speeds are in the 4.8mb range and uploads are 370k. That's on the 5m/384k package, so I can't complain at all. The download is almost double the speed of the DSL connection it replaced, though upload is slower. Latency seems about equal between the two. For general surfing, the difference in speed isn't noticable. I do notice a bit quicker downloads of virus updates and other larger files, though. I did switch my default DNS from Earthlink/Mindspring to a set of Level3 DNS servers that were providing consitently faster ping rates to me. I'm not using the Earthlink email account, so I can really comment on it.
I live in a well connected neigborhood - I can pick up 6+ different wireless connections sitting on my couch (all protected with at least WEP - good job neighbors!), and I assume that the vast majority of folks here are connected to broadband with most on RR or Earthlink. I notice no speed slowdowns during 'prime' hours.
Stability so far has been good. No downtime, no needs to reset the modem (Webstar something or other - it's locked down tight, you can't even view the stats). No need to contact tech support. My VoIP is working well with the system. It is strange to see the modem flashing with activity all the time compared to the DSL modem that only flashed when I used it.
I'm pleased with the service so far. It's more expensive than DSL of comparable functionality, but cheaper overall when you factor in the cost of the required landline for DSL.
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