 Review by MikeL 
UPDATED: 81 days ago
member for 7.4 years, 3524 visits, last login: a few hours ago
 Miami,Miami-Dade,FL
 $60 per month
 about 10 days
 AT&T
 "Nice and Fast, Static IP, 6.0/512, Always On!"
 "Not many"
 "An ultra-fast, reliable connection to the web"
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Connection reliability:
Tech Support:
Services:
Value for money:
(ratings above consensus)
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I discovered that I could get Bellsouth FastAccess ADSL service while I was on vacation in New York. I went down to the hotel's business center (which was networked on a blazing T3) and I started to get addicted to the speed. I had visited the FastAccess page before and they had ALWAYS told me it was unavailable for my telephone number. I log in to see if I can get broadband and wow, my number is prequalified! I get an email saying my order is confirmed and to wait 2-3 weeks for my modem and equipment. Just to check if the service was already turned on, while I was waiting for my equipment, my friend had an extra FastAccess install kit Bellsouth sent him by mistake and did not want back so I booted it up... IT WORKED! I must be one of the first with DSL on my block because my speed is rather slow. The max I've been able to log in at so far is 736000bps. The Bellsouth reps explained to me that at my CO, they are still working on getting the DSL service "perfect" and the speed should increase soon enough. I don't care if the speed ever goes up... this is better than anything before. So far, I've had nothing but good experiences but I will be networking the connection and it seems that the Bellsouth setup is only friendly with Alcatel products (hard to find if you do not want to pay Bellsouth's premiums). Anyway, I have an Alcatel ADSL router on order and that should work fine. Gotta go dl more music. This is the FIRST time I've heard of DSL being available in the North Miami Beach/Aventura area for any locals out there... test your tel number.
UPDATE 1: Since I wrote this original review, I have networked my DSL with the Alcatel STH and the Linksys 1port router. Between the original review and now, a few events have taken place. At one point, my DSL service went down for the entire afternoon and then started again at night. Once, my sync light was on but I was getting sub-56k speeds! Currently, I get about 600 down/220 up... I have called Bellsouth and they KEEP telling me DSL is freshly deployed in my area and they are still removing bridge taps, load coils, etc to clean up the lines in my neighborhood. Basically, they told me to wait 2 weeks and if I was not happy call again. Whatever, the service has PROBABLY been on 75% of the time and when it's on, it's nice. I hope they can get my connection more solid though, friends of mine have left AOL signed on for 2 weeks straight without loosing their connections once. Either way, I'm glad I can get DSL and I am willing to deal with the occasional "hang-ups" (for lack of a better word) because I realize this is a NEW technology and is pushing the limit at every corner.
UPDATE 2: Since having sync problems so much, a tech came out to my home some time ago and fixed some problems on my premises. The DSL is now always-on and has not been down once since the tech came (it even went through winds of 60MPH and nothing happened). I'm happy.
UPDATE 3: Everything is still greath- thumbs up! 
UPDATE 4: DSLR was asking me to update my review so I will. Everything has been fine for weeks on end- it's a great service. ATT Broadband is supposed to begin offering service in my town in December but as long as my ADSL works fine I'm sticking to Bellsouth- A+.
UPDATE 5 (03/02/03): Well, it finally happened. For 2 weeks on end, my ADSL connection had slowed down considerably. It dropped from my usual 1000 down/200 up to 300 down/150 up... so I gave the service a week to "improve itself on its own" but it never fixed itself so I called Bellsouth. After spending the better part of an hour on the phone with them trying everything I could from my end (the tech over the phone was great), they rolled a truck out to me. The Bellsouth tech arrived promptly and took his Sunset xDSL kit to diagnose my line. He confirmed low sync rates and higher-than-usual pings. Sure enough he informed me my loop was at over 18,000' and to not expect much better speeds at this distance since I was so far. HERE COMES THE BEST PART. The tech goes on to tell me that they JUST deployed a remote terminal/remote DSLAM fed by a fiber optic pipe two blocks from my house in January 2003 and he was switching all my neighbors over to the remote terminal so he would do the same for me, free of charge. It took him no time to do the switch. Soon after, my modem re-synched at the FULL 1472/256 Bellsouth maximum and my first hop pings became 2-10ms vs. 40-50ms. Essentially, instead of being at 19000' the tech reports I am now 1000' away from the DSLAM. Now more than ever the DSL is really to the MAX. I had to update as this was the best treatment from an ISP that I've ever seen. AWESOME WORK Bellsouth!!
UPDATE 6 (11/21/03): Since being moved to the new Remote DSLAM, my service has never been better. Speedtests always clock in at the fastest possible speed with overhead. Actually, one night my speed went to hell, but apparently this was the result of a software update gone wrong. The upgrade apparently caused lots of issues with customers who were on remote terminals. A call to tech support helped, a line tech reset the terminal remotely (pretty neat) and I was back up to speeds in no time. Everything's great, I just wish Bellsouth would increase the speed a little bit... can't complain though.
UPDATE 7 (5/2/04): I upgraded my account to Bellsouth ADSL XTreme and am VERY happy with double the downstream and 50% more upstream WITH a static IP addy for only an extra $5/month! My download is now 2472 and my upload is 320! Short of even faster speeds, it doesn't get much better than this !
UPDATE 8 (8/7/06): Finally up to 6Mbps/512Kbps, no complaints here
UPDATE 9 (5/20/07): So Bellsouth is now AT&T... my service remains solid at 6 down/512 up and it's been trouble free since that RT was rolled out in late 2003, maybe under 1 day of total downtime over 4 years. This is the way surfing the net should have been 10 years ago! I can only imagine what awaits us over the next 10 years.
UPDATE 10 (11/28/07): Everything continues perfectly. Nothing but love for AT&T!
UPDATE 11 (6/10/08): Things are still awesome with AT&T, and although more speed would be nice, thus far I don't miss it. I'd rather have my current speeds and connection reliability than any less reliability for more speed- that's for sure. For years now I've been with AT&T, and that's how I like it!
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