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Review by HSG 
Posted: 9.3 years ago
member for 9.6 years, 603 visits, last login: 18 days ago
 Hamden,New Haven,CT
 $39 per month (12 month contract)
 "Good solid performance, low outages"
 "varying performance on internet traffic, terrible first level tech support"
 "live up to promises"
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I've had SNET ADSL for at least 4 months now. Install went smoothly and I was up and running before the tech left. Since I have an Alarm system, the tech had to pull a new cat5 cable to the room with teh PC (no extra charge and he even fixed a problemon my voice line). I just recently applied a tweak to incrwae RWIn to 65K (found on Navas) and that has increased donloads to 1200kbs as measured on DSLreports.
They had a problem with posting to newsgroups that took several months to fix but ecerything is working well now.
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Review by lzyasnboi
Posted: 9.3 years ago
member for 9.3 years, 31 visits, last login: 8.9 years ago
Danbury,Fairfield,CT
$39 per month (12 month contract)
"um price"
"im not really sure i choose this one cause all they said was 384l to 1.5m"
"um im not sure it starts aug15"
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from what i hear snet includes software with the dsl kit package in the review/forums
i did not recieve any software to date
i was told it would be shipped seperately
should i have either recieved it with the kit or seperatlly
my service does not start until august 15
what is the software package consist of and what is the error i hear of about it
Jimmy
384k-1.5m/128k
selfinstall kit
effiecnet networks speedstreem dsl modem, kingston nic, rf45, phone line, 1 slitter and 6 filters
not yet sure
i believe snet is a good company\
no bad experiences to date
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 Review by John in Norwich
Posted: 9.3 years ago
member for 9.3 years, 466 visits, last login: 2.8 years ago
Norwich,New London,CT
$39 per month (12 month contract)
"The only game in town right now"
"I'm not on-line yet"
"Poor feedback to customer so far"
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I sure wish I had discovered DSL Reports a month ago.
I'm just over the self-install distance limit, but well under max distance from the CO. I was disappointed at having to pay $99 for an on-site install, but with a teen, wife, and I vying for net time...
The SNET software and DSL install packages arrived just in time for my July 3rd residential 384/128 PPPoE install appointment. Business obligations forced me to leave less technical folks at home to wait for the tech. Baaaad mistake.
LESSON 1: Be there when the tech is there.
My less technical representative let the tech talk her into a nice, "neat, spacesaving" internal DSL card. Wonderful. What's the first question one gets when calling the help line: "Do you see green lights on the modem?" The card might have lights, but I'm not pulling everything apart everytime I want to check. Of course, I also was planning on using a hardware firewall or router, and sharing in future. Drat.
LESSON 2: Don't be talked into something you don't want.
Splitter installation was neatly done; I appreciate not needing filters on the various phones around the house.
The install tech wasn't able to login; he told my less technical representative to "keep trying, it'll be switched on in a few days". That evening, discovered that in process of installing DSL-related software, the tech had garbaged up my Compuserve installation. I called SNET/DSL every few days; I only got a vague "they're having trouble getting synch". I was reluctant to futz with their software install, so was without email of any sort at home. After three weeks, finally got exasperated on phone and got a promise that my situation was "escalated to second level of management review" (MANAGEMENT review?? I want a ENGINEER--or TECHNICIAN, at least--working on the problem!) I turned calling duties over to my more persistent and insistent wife.
The past week or so, I've noticed the SNET trucks making their way to my house from downtown, manhole by manhole. On Saturday, they were in front of my house. Monday, nearly a month after the start of installation, we get a call from SNET saying that they're "throwing it to the engineers, and it might be another month" before I can use my DSL line.
LESSON 3: Live where competition in high-speed access exists.
By the way, tech took the NIC and Speedstream with him. I haven't seen anything in the service agreement about them--who owns that stuff?
Nothing has appeared on my bill yet, so I can't speak to billing problems others seem to have had.
In a way, I'm glad that my install was delayed--I'm now better prepared (as a result of these reviews and responses)to talk with the tech when he comes back to complete the install. I'll add to this post when things are resolved.
-John in Norwich, CT
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Review by soulgypsy
Posted: 9.3 years ago
member for 9.3 years, 176 visits, last login: 7.7 years ago
East Haven,New Haven,CT
$39 per month (12 month contract)
"when they have problems they are slow to fix and never admit being any problem"
"not happy having a reoccuring problem"
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well i'm an online gamer and ping(latency) is very important and for a while it was real good.Then all of a sudden my ping was real high and it only does this weekdays from 10am-11:45 pm rest of day fine and weekends fine.i have traced there network nodes and when i am having the problem with my ping 2 of there nodes get a real high latency and that is where the problem is.I have told them and must of the support people there are clueless of what i am talking about .I have talked till i'm blue in the faceand it still is not fix i do not know where to turn for help anymore.But one thing is i think all snet dsl users should unite see it is happening to us all.lets all email them to fix this problem and call them daily till it is fixed bring the power back to the people. Anyone who want to join my quest email me
later
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Review by ptherrien
Posted: 9.3 years ago
member for 9.3 years, 9 visits, last login: 9.1 years ago
Ellington,Tolland,CT
$40 per month (12 month contract)
"Excellent help desk, especially John"
"Hardware delay of 2 weeks"
"Good transaction"
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I see all the negative reviews, but my experience was pretty good, actually excellent. The only glitch was the same delay everyone experienced in hardware delivery, but it was only 2 weeks. I did a self install, everything clicked, took me about an hour. Speeds are pretty good, averaging 600-800 down, 100 up. Help desk was very knowledgeable about helping me tweak. Even got a credit for the lateness on the hardware end. I think if you do the homework properly, you get what you pau for anyway.
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Review by wflynn
Posted: 9.4 years ago
member for 5.2 years, 2 visits, last login: 4.5 years ago
Naugatuck,New Haven,CT
 Business customer
$99 per month (12 month contract)
"Fast - when it works"
"Horrible tech support"
"It's worth it even with all the hassle - but not for the faint of heart"
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I have had SNET DSL for about 6 weeks now and the trauma is beginning to
subside. It started with the installation, which took over 4 hours.
Believe it or not, the tech was on hold - waiting for someone to pick up -
for over 3 of those hours. He said this is not uncommon - and made me
believe that if he couldn't get through quickly, I wouldn't either.
Once installed, all seemed great - until I tried to get my home network to
work. Many hours later, home network now functioning, I tried to install
Internet Connection Sharing - with no luck even to this day. I had it
working with dialup, but once DSL was in it was all over.
The next thing I noticed was that once in a while IE would simply stop
responding for almost exactly one minute. The time between these "hang ups"
became more and more frequent. Finally, I wrote a VB program to hit Yahoos
web site and time the response. It did this over and over, graphing the
results. Sure enough, every three minutes, the response would go from
sub-second to one minute.
Multiple calls to SNET yielded the same 877-363-3681 number that truly is
tech support. Prior to call this number, all I ever got was people that
denied this occurred, said it was related to my home network, said I should
re-install Windows, my mouse was bad, I had scum on my teeth, and that I
wasn't paying them enough. But calling te -3681 number got me people who
cared and almost knew something. Unfortunately, they called back and said
something about where I was in the router, and that there was nothing they
could do. Luckily, I found a web site that said for this type of problem I
should assign a fixed IP address to the NIC attached to the modem - it
suggested something like 192.168.0.200. I did this and POOF! - problem
gone.
Then, I asked to change from a dynamic to a static IP address. They said it
would take 10 days because they had to cut the circuit and establish a new
one. They said I would get an email telling me that it was done, what the
IP address was, and how to set it up. 12 days later, no email, so I called
them. It seems it had been done about 11 days ago, there was nothing I have
to do to set it up, but they couldn't tell me what the address was - it
would be different every time I logged in. Well duh, that ain't the
definition of static, now is it. So I hung up, call right back, and was
told that yes it was done, and no they didn't know what the address was, but
that I could run WINIPCFG and find out. Feeling adventurous, I called back,
and this time was told it was 65.252.blah.blah (which, by the way, agreed
with WINIPCFG). One final call just to round things out. This time I was
told that they can't tell me what it is, and the the 65.252.blah.blah number
is my router address not my IP address, and that I was fairly stupid for
thinking that my IP address was something I could know. Hmmmm....
Now, I run DSLReports Line test, and fail. Seems I'm losing tons of
packets. I think I will call SNET and discuss this with them. Sure. I
can't wait for cable to have internet access in my area. It can't be worse
than this.
Bill Flynn
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Review by mattmcc
Posted: 9.4 years ago
member for 9.5 years, 13 visits, last login: 8.4 years ago
New London,New London,CT
$39 per month (12 month contract)
"The DSL install guys were 50/50 knowledgeable. :-> Fast once they had conditioned line."
"Outside install guy nice but incompetent; came w/o appt & needed inside access."
"Educate yourself first and you can't go wrong. They support Macintosh."
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ADSL is now available in New London, CT. I ordered the "384-1.5mb downstream/128 upstream" standard service. The contract costs $39/month for 12 month minimum, plus $4/month for maintenance contract on equipment. (I chose this because New London has high incidence of electrical storms, and don't want to find myself paying for a fried SpeedStream all at once.)
The order process was quick; one SNET secret is that they have established a separate DSL group in their business office. Talking to the regular sales reps will get you no help, though they sometimes try to bluff their way through. Ask at the top for the DSL group. The rep I spoke with was knowledgable both marketing-wise and technically. (!) She let me know what I _didn't_ need as well as what I _did_ need. That was cool.
Under this promotion, which it appears SNET/SBC is running as a rolling deal, they supply free equipment and free installation. The equipment arrived 10 days ahead of the install, and was figured generously. It included a SpeedStream 5260 ADSL modem, a Kingston PCI 10/100 Ethernet card, and several cables. The SNET software arrived separately; it's the original ISP kit they've been shipping since at least 1996, with Netscape 3.0 on five floppies. They included an additional 3-page instruction sheet for ADSL installations, that outlined what they would and wouldn't do during the installation. They were unclear about the software, but I echo other people reviewing this ISP: do NOT use the installer disks in the ISP kit! SNET brings a CD-ROM with MacPPPoE software (EnterNet 300).
The outside installer came as a bit of a surprise! Nice guy, but he ended up doing work that the DSL techs had to redo when they arrived a week later. At least he didn't destroy my service, and he re-did the drop to the house.
On install day, an experienced DSL installer and an apprentice showed up. They did some preliminary work, then had to leave the premises because they thought there was a problem with a coil down the street. They could not see the ATM signal from the central office. They called the CO, where the tech who handles the ATM cards was at lunch. When that person finally came back, he reported that I had been assigned a defective card at the CO. He swapped it out, and there was much joy. The installer explained that the New London CO had been shipped a bad batch of cards. Being the telco, they still installed them to fill up the slots, and were swapping them out with good cards as they populated the rack with real customers. (I once worked for the Bell System; I get it. PITA, but I get it. :-> )
Once there was a signal, it took about 10 minutes to complete the install on my PowerBook. Install EnterNet, configure, and restart. I had to walk the apprentice tech through establishing a new configuration in my TCP/IP control panel, rather than wiping out the existing settings. But he was pleasant about it, and appreciated that I taught him something.
EXPERIENCE: 4 hour install, maybe 30 minutes of real work. The rest was the installers waiting for something to happen elsewhere.
The speed is phenomenal. Although I was warned I'm at the fringe of the serviceable area, I'm seeing the high end of the bandwidth on downloads. (VERY close to 1.5 mb/sec consistently.) I'm crossing my fingers that this won't deteriorate as more DSL users come online in this CO -- it's not cable modem where you're sharing bandwidth by neighborhood, but after all there is a pipe to the CO and eventually that has to get loaded up ... and wait for new capacity from time to time.
I have had not needed tech support since the DSL came up in the middle of May. Very easy, and consistently reliable. This could have a lot to do with my being on Macintosh, which lacks the Byzantine TCP/IP mechanisms of Windows. I had a short period where my Xsense router showed a huge lag every time I wanted to navigate to a Web address; it turned out that the SNET techs put in a default starting address for domain name lookups "1.0.0.0" -- and taking it out restored it. I plan to split the connection among four computers (all Macs) and do not anticipate any problems.
Do not expect any hand-holding from SNET ... they will not give it to you. Educate yourself first, stick around during the install process and ENCOURAGE them not to give up (in other words, no whining!), and they'll do well by you. I recommend them!
--Matt McCaffrey
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Review by prf6
Posted: 9.4 years ago
member for 9.6 years, 37 visits, last login: 8.1 years ago
Milford,New Haven,CT
$40 per month (12 month contract)
"reliability of connection, download speed, cost"
"Inconsistency in information, installation, and support"
"a superior alternative to dial-up, at a reasonable price"
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I have a two-computer network, connected by a hub. Before I signed up, I was assured that the ADSL service would use a second NIC and wouldn't interfere with my network. But when the installer came, he refused to install the second NIC; I called customer service and was treated to gobbledygook. I reluctantly agreed to continue the installation. A second analog phone line had been installed next to my computer for dedicated Internet access, and the second port made it easy to install the DSL line splitter. The installer was finished in about 20 minutes. I had to corral him to show me how to set up the included dial-up account.
After the guy left, I tried unsuccessfully to install the second NIC and restore my internal network. Owing to my efforts, I had no network and no ADSL service. Realizing that SNET tech support would offer no assistance, I got on the Web (using my old dial-up account) and found two sites that provided good information: dsl reports and Steve Gibson's "shields up." After about eight hours of study and trial and error, everything was working like a charm and I had learned a good deal about networks, protocols, and security. Since the initial installation, I have contacted technical support three times. On two occasions, I received prompt, courteous, and competent service. On the other, the response was prompt, courteous, and incompetent. I also have supervised another SNET ADSL installation and was impressed by the thoroughness and knowledge of the installer.
The moral of the story is that, with SNET, you roll the dice: Ask a question and you might get the right answer. You might just get superior service; everything might work as advertised. It all depends.
Two notes on software: First, SNET's outdated EnterNet 300 dialer does not support Windows 2000 and it is intrusive besides. By consulting the dsl reports web site, I found RASPPPoeE and did a dry run by installing it on a Windows 2000 notebook computer. I then upgraded my NT4 desktop to Windows 2000, removed EnterNet and installed RASPPPoE without difficulty. Second, I installed BlackIce and realized that hack attacks were occuring regularly. About half of these are deliberate efforts to probe my system. Segregating my LAN from the Internet by tweaking protocols is a precaution, but a full-time ADSL connection makes security software a requisite.
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Review by maylar
Posted: 9.5 years ago
member for 9.5 years, 101 visits, last login: 2.4 years ago
Wallingford,New Haven,CT
$39 per month (12 month contract)
"Prompt installation, good documentation, good ping"
"Idiot SBC sales people, speed not as advertised"
"Better than 56K modem"
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SNET DSL is through Southwestern Bell. Installation is either $99, or "Self-Install", which I opted for. Hardware is free, with a 12 month commitment. Terminating before 1 year cost $150 penalty. DSL is part of the phone bill. Monthly rate is $39, including ISP account. After 1 year price will increase $10 to cover the ISP.
Hardware includes Kingston NIC board and SpeedStream DSL Modem. Also included are 6 filter gizmos for the phones, including one for a wall phone. Software is on CD, including custom SNET browser if you need one.
Connection is a dynamic IP address, PPPoE protocall, with EnterNet300 PPPoE software. NIC is Plug&Play PCI, they have USB options as well. The hardware package and installation instructions were very complete.
Installation of the EnterNet300 software caused IE5 to become corrupted. This required uninstall/reinstall of IE5 to fix it. A fairly common thing I hear.
SBC Sales people don't have a clue. I had questions about my apartment's old phone wiring, and their answer was either I pay the $99 to have an installer check it out, or figure it out for myself. They refused to coordinate the external wiring effort such that I could be there when it happens and talk to the phone co. guys about it. They are also instructed to tell customers they have no info whatsoever about sharing the DSL among multiple PC's. You're on your own.
SNET did the external phone line stuff on the day specified. They also disconnected my 2nd phone line by accident (no longer needed anyway) and broke my Caller-ID service. Fortunately SNET's customer service is an 811 call away, and they made everything right.
SBC Tech support took a while to get hold of, but were able to help me get my e-mail and browser set up for the DSL. They did NOT know how to fix the Internet Explorer 5.0 problem (found that answer here on DSL Reports).
After 1 week I'm impressed with gaming ping times, but not with download/upload speeds. D/L seems to vary from 560K bits to less than 200K. Upload is typically only 50-100K. Not sure what the source of that is yet.
Dave Cullen
Wallingford, Ct.
maylar@hotmail.com
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Review by daniel.nevelos
Posted: 9.5 years ago
(review was emailed from domain snet.net)
Vernon Rockville,Tolland,CT
$40 per month (12 month contract)
"Fast so far, tech friendly and knowledgeable."
"Anxiety over not getting hardware until 11th hour, and no software at all."
"Leap of faith paid off."
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I just got SNET DSL yesterday (5/12/00). Everyone told me I was crazy and
should wait for Cable Modem. I took the leap of faith since SNET was the
first company to offer high speed access to my area. I was swetting, the
hardware didn't come until the day before my install. Never recieved any
software in the mail at all. I guess that was actually a good thing. The
guy called at 1PM and said he would bring the software with him. He was at
my appartment in 15 minutes and out in another 30. One weird thing, the
software wouldn't connect using my second NIC (the one they sent me). The
tech said this seems to be a WIN 95/98 issue. Connected it up to my old
3com ISA NIC and away I went. Other than that it works great and it's fast.
Downloads get up there but seem to settle in at between 50 - 100 kps, best
ping so far in Unreal Tournament is 50.
Good job.
Daniel Nevelos
Vernon, CT
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SNET - Southern NE Telephone
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