Review by bpentz
Posted: 9.6 years ago
(review was emailed from domain spyderwebb.com)
 Rancho Cordova,Sacramento,CA
 $40 per month (12 month contract)
 "Fast Connection"
 "Terrible ordering process, weak initial installer, bad tech support site, worse tech support 800#"
 "Can't live without it and only game in town, so living with it."
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings well below consensus)
|
Two years ago DSL was announced to be installed in my area. I
immediately contacted Pac Bell only to be put off and get conflicting
stories month after month. I have two friends who live about one mile further
north than me in a different city, who got their PacBell DSL lines installed last year. They were really happy and both used Beadlenet hub/firewalls to share the connection easily throughout their homes. Finally in December 1999 PacBell said they had DSL available in my area. I tried to put in my order, but there still were some kind of delays, so put it off again until February. PacBell needed six weeks until March 22 to schedule an appointment. They were impossible to contact and in response to my many messages, finally left me one message saying they would be by sometime on March 22. I took a day off from work only to have the service tech arrive late in my day. He had a lot of
problems getting my connection going. It was brutally slow, stalled on each new web site, and continued to just leave my PC hanging. It also hung up on startup and shutdown taking anywhere from three to five extra minutes. Browsing here and elsewhere found some setup parameters that made this connection just zip with a 1100K regular throughput rate even though less than 400K was all that was promised.
Unfortunately, PacBell changed their service from dedicated IPs to dynamic IPs, plus implemented P.P.P.o.E. protocol. I had to find out the hard way that PPPoE is totally incompatible with the quite expensive Beadlenet hub/firewall I purchased. My efforts to install that device totally wiped my DSL connection so many times I can now make it and am still making it in my sleep.
Learning how to set my DSL connection back up was pure torture. The PacBell web site was near useless in terms of providing help and did not include much of the critical information needed to set up my account and email again. My service technician was supposed to have left my personal information, but just
like his not setting all the options, did not.
The only way to get that information was to call PacBell support. They
put me on hold with a scratchy recording for over an hour. Using my old
ISP and a dail-up connection, I quickly discovered that PacBell had
given me dated software and they had no upgrades available on their
sites. After my long wait PacBell cut me off with a busy signal. I continued surfing finding out much more while again on hold. It again took an hour and twenty minutes of additional wait listening to a scratchy recording before a technician finally answered my call. Right after we started talking, their tech decided it was too hard to hear me, mumbled something about my DSL installer not connecting correctly, then transferred my call to a maintenance recording.
The only scratchy connection or problem with my voice line was in calling PacBell! Regardless, I raised cain with some strong late night emails.
I did not get any response with PacBell apparently unavailable over the weekend in spite of their claims to the contrary. I finally called Beadlenet. Their sales force insisted their unit was fully compatible but were of no real help. Looking through my paperwork I found the Beadlenet tech support number. I was not too pleased to be told by their technician immediately that my Beadlenet unit is totally not compatible with PacBell's dynamic IPs using PPPoE protocol. They promised a firmware patch within ten days that did not arrive. After two more delays followed by an email that Beadlenet was not working on a patch that was compatible with PacBell, I returned the Beadlenet unit and am still keeping my fingers crossed I get a full refund as this was an expensive unit.
After five days with no response from PacBell I also got on the phone more
than a little upset and began working my way up through their supervisors. One after another they blew me off telling me the only solution was to move to their $79 a month service. With a scratchy voice connection and non working DSL, I said they had two choices either come get their gear working or come pick it up and forget about charging me. They said fine and a technician supervisor showed up the next day, a Saturday! He really seemed to know his stuff and in ten minutes had my connection working. Although he said nothing, having watched both him and the prior installer, it was pretty clear my initial installer was really struggling and made a ton of mistakes.
Meanwhile, after more research I ordered the Linksys Ethernet Cable /
DSL Router. It just arrived and after loading their new PPPoE protocol,
came up perfectly. I then tried to gain Internet access from my wife's
PC and was shocked that it worked perfectly and was incredibly fast with
the 100MB connection. Unfortunately, when I went to show it to her, her
first move was to try to log into her secure work site. All locked up so
tight we had to reboot her PC. She had lost connection and so had my PC
as well as our two children. None have yet to be restored and being a
weekend the technical support from LinkSys is unavailable.
Bill
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