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Review by (hidden by request)
Posted: 9.6 years ago
(review was emailed from domain hotmail.com)
 Hollister,San Benito,CA
 $39 per month (12 month contract)
 "Very Fast....Reliable Connection"
 "Poor Email....Poor Customer Sevice ( Install sales people and techs great....bad call-in sevice)"
 "Worlds faster than 56K .....Worth every penny"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings match consensus)
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I was on pacbell's website when I ran across their DSL page , saw a number
to call , called and was told that this particular salesman had just gotten
out of a meeting and that they were going to sponser a special DSL package
for 39.99 a month with equipment and installation free. I asked him if DSL
was available in Hollister CA.
and he said they had just finished getting the DSLAM up in Hollister
so I could schedule my install on the phone with him. I get a call 2 days
later from pacbell telling me that a tech will be out on monday to measure
my phone line and that on wed they would do the inhome install , I said
great. Monday comes and at about 10am I see the pacbell truck in front of
my house , so I go out to see whats happening and the tech informs me that
this is his first DSL line checkout and that I am the FIRST house to get DSL
in Hollister. I tell him "Great" all the while thinking that being the first
one makes me the Guinea Pig for DSL in Hollister....I watch him use the
portable line checker ( which btw was a very sophisticated meter with a
surprisingly loud cooling fan inside..) and he says I am very close to the
DSLAM and have a very good signal. He attached his portable red phone to my
second phone line in the box and told the person on the other end some
numbers and hung up. He closes the phone box and tells me he had the line
capped at 18 something and left, didn't take him more than 15 minutes. On
wednesday the pacbell
van shows up and the guy gets out carrying a couple of boxes...I let him in
and he sets the boxes down and says that he has to work outside first.....he
installs a DSL smaller box inside of my regular phone box ( btw this guy was
really good with wiring and hooked up the box really fast...I asked him how
long he had worked with pacbell and he said 2 months ) we go back inside
and I tell him I already have NIC cards in all my computers and he says
great ( gives me the kingston NIC anyway..) then has to modify my outlets
in the house...
gets that done as well as he did the box outside...then pulls out the modem
and its a USB modem...asks if that is ok...I said sure...well turns out the
USB software would not work at all and I uninstalled it...he went out to the
truck and grabbed another modem...this time an Alcatel speed touch home
Ethernet modem....plugged it in and software loaded without a hitch . Then
we tried to connect and it wouldn't....he called on his cell phone and the
lady told him the sevice was setup for USB and that makes a difference on
the DSLAM's end so she said it would take a while to changeover.....poor guy
was on hold for 30 minutes....so I told him to go ahead and leave to his
next job ( mine was the first job done in hollister and he had 4 more to do
this day....) He said he would call me back in the morning to see if the
line change had worked. I try the next morning and first time it hooks up
perfect...try Internet Explorer and it wouldn't get any pages...forgot we
hadn't registered the IP yet...so he called and said he would be over in a
sec....showed up with my paperwork so I could register with the IP...I
registered and It worked great....I first went to CNET to download a huge
demo....downloaded Quake III ( 30 something MB's ) @155K a sec.....really
fast....went to DSL Reports
and ran their benchmark @ 1372K down and 192K up....not too shabby.
I think my install was typical ( minor hassles...time consuming..) and I am
really happy with the speed.....I upgraded my software from the pacbell
website ( the cd that I loaded with was 2 rev's below what they had on their
webite...and the newest rev 3.oo 991203 has a much slicker loggin and
statistics ) I have had no problems connecting and have stayed logged on
for days with no problems....but their email really does suck....everything
I have read on DSL Reports about Pac Bell's Email is 100% true.......If they
could just fix that aspect of their service it would be a whole lot better.
I have had 4 friends in salinas get the pac bell dsl service and they all
love the speed and reliable connection....but all of them complain about the
email as well.....another negative is their customer service....I run a
firewall on my systems ( my friends do too ) and we all had a problem with a
particular site probing all of the computer ports....we all complained to
Pac Bell ( calling in requires MAJOR wait times....and have never gotten
back a reply from email EVER..) and none of us has gotten an acceptable
reply. The ones who waited onhold forever were shuffled around with no help.
Overall the DSL works awesome...great speed...great connects....just poor
email and poor customer service
BOBO
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