Review by clewis 
member for 1.8 years, 3 visits, last login: 1.8 years ago
updated 1.8 years ago
 Cleveland,Cuyahoga,OH
 $58 per month- (12 month contract)
 about 10 days Cavalier "Price is better than AT&T" "Internet speed much lower than advertised" "Not bad for the price, but could be better"
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Update: I would still like to have faster Internet speed--I can't seem to get above 2500. A support technician made some kind of change and said the speed I was getting wasn't bad, but 31% of the advertised speed doesn't seem that good to me. Still, it is fast enough for streaming video, so I am not complaining too much.
The only real unsolved problem is that I don't have a message-waiting indicator for voice mail on the phone--either the flashing indicator or a stutter tone when dialing out. I was critical of tech support at first, but they really have done their best to help solve the problem. We have pretty thoroughly established that the problem is not in their home office, so they are sending a line technician to troubleshoot it. I have done everything possible to rule out my equipment and wiring as the cause, so it has to be at some point in between. My only real complaint about the support is that the company has no way to contact support people directly. Every time I have to call back to tell them the fix they tried didn't work, I have to get back in the queue and wait two hours or more to get through. At least they give me the option to get a call-back so that I don't have to wait on hold the whole time.
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Previous posting (edited)
Cavalier is the only real alternative to AT&T where I live. (I tried Time Warner a little over a year ago and speeds were horrible--great early in the morning but down to about 250 kbps by mid-afternoon.) I signed up because I get a lot of phone features for a lower price than I had on basic phone and Internet service from AT&T. Advertised Internet speed was up to 8000 kbps, but speed tests so far have not been able to get above 2500. Usable, but not great.
Now for the bad part. There is hardly any documentation for the Internet. The installation instructions said to register at their web site, where I was prompted for my modem's serial number. I got an error message that the serial number was unrecognized. (To be fair, I did have full Internet access even without registration.) After several days and multiple calls to tech support, the serial number was still unrecognized. Eventually they told me it didn't really make much difference if I registered, but then I had to ask them how to set up an e-mail account and how to log in to the router to enable wireless security.
The router was sent with the firewall disabled, and the documentation (which I had to look up on the manufacturer's site) said that I have to log in as an administrator to enable it. But they have set the administrator password so that I can't do that. One support person told me the router had no firewall; another one said the firewall was not what I thought it was--what does he think I think it is?-- and it was unnecessary. Maybe not, but the router didn't score very well on the Shields Up test.
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