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member for 21 years, 3510 visits, last login: 1.5 years ago updated 1.8 years ago
I just moved to NC outside Jacksonville. The area is sort of Rural but not particularly far from the major city..still choices for service were limited. I'd never heard of Centurylink before but I knew I didn't want to deal with the other major provider in the area from past negative experiences with them. I knew the house I'd just bought had been remodeled but I never dreamed the moron would have ripped out all the equipment for the internet service. On the day the service was to be installed I got a phone call from the tech that there was no equipment left on the property and it would be three hundred dollars to install it. As you can imagine a variety of inappropriate words ran through my head. As they're the only fibre provider in the area I agreed. There were further discussions about their equipment so I could get service and that one was 400.00 an extra hundred to drill a hole in the wall (must be done by a licensed electrician of course). Feeling like I'd been grabbed by the short ones I agreed (not much choice since I was arriving in barely two weeks), even though they were currently running a free installation promotion that of course wasn't available on my street. Normally you'd be able to elect a drop from a phone pole which is cheaper than a buried cable but of course it's all buried on my street so no cheaper option. You should see this mickey mouse router (century link C3000Z)...it even says dsl on the rj11 port on the back (?). Oh and that's something else, 150.00 for their router or 15 a month to rent it. I know I'm not moving again so I just bought it. Now I'm not at all used to having real broadband come into the house on other than coaxial cable...in fact I didn't even know it was possible to get the sorts of speeds I'm supposedly getting over rj11 cable. I'm laughing because when i ordered it i was told I could try my gear to see if it would work...this is fibre?? I came from FIOS where the setup was not an off the shelf router and they certainly didn't charge me for installation or rental on the router/modem. Last but not least i had to correct the salesman at least a dozen times as she kept trying to run the bill up with add-ons I'd made it very clear I didn't want and didn't need several times and she kept pressing me to tell her what I was going to do with my service NUNYA lady I'm not telling you anything thus you say i can't stream movies without paying more. I have a nice gaming router but my other machines aren't here yet so I haven't hooked it up yet. Right now I've got my roku vizio tv and my gaming rig using net and a network printer, my phone, and two tablets using the wifi. The TV occasionally lags loading but it's not often and it could be Netflix or Hulu not my connection as well. My service seems to go out whenever anyone farts hard I'm sorry to say. First night I arrived there was a fairly significant weather front dumping rain on the area...net was up all night died the next morning and was out the whole day. Since then there have been a few other multiple hour outages and twice it "de-synced" according to their troubleshooting robot accessed through their web site. I'm about ready to get on the phone and request someone come and check their installers' work as I'm thinking something wasn't properly sealed and is suffering water intrusion when it rains. I moved to NC because you don't have government up your rear all the time watching what you do but that also means your consumer protections are less than in an area that is more interested in everything you do. When the service is up it's good but four or five hour outtages and service appointments a week out if you need one (which includes the disclaimer you get charged if it isn't their fault) are pretty annoying. member for 21.7 years, 14 visits, last login: 3.4 years ago lodged 3.5 years ago
04-18-2019 After yesterday's phone call with tech support and the broken phone pole still hanging by a thread I'm cutting my losses after 25 years of being a customer. Comcast is due by noon, the company I left to join Embarq/Centurylink. It's truly going back and forth from the frying pan to the fire! * addendum: Now running 70/5 with Comcast. 04-17-2019 Issues again. Upstream noise is terrible. The noise margin is 2 to 4 and weather drops the connection. Broken phone poles are not repaired and users are leaving on my street while new CL service is installed nearby in new half-million dollar homes. My neighbor has convinced me to switch to Comcast after she did a few months ago. She occasionally works from home and said she couldn't take the day off whenever it rained and the connection went down. CL is circling the drain with most of their resources focused on new installs, I suppose an acknowledgement of how bad the lines are in the older parts of town -- which they have no intention of replacing. 03-2019 Issue resolved by local tech who worked most of the day to run a new pair. Tech was prompt, courteous and knew his sh*t inside and out. Service is now better than when it was installed. 05-2017 Line noise, attenuation, losing sync when it rains .. all this and more. My SNR is like a yo-yo on crack. A once excellent service, for what it was (not cable), has dutifully shit the bed. Hard. With the force of a fat man who, after receiving a max load of Nexium from his GP, doubled-down on saturated fat until his toilet shamed abu ghraib into submission and dropped flies like a nuclear Shell No-Pest Strip from the 70s. On Turbo. With bells on. Tech support is so abjectly stupid there is no sense in calling, and why no one does. Management FTW! --------- 10/2016 My up-time is great; the service is fine. I'm never down and speed is consistent. However, since going to DSL-only, my head explodes once a year from calling in to 'renew' (ostensibly) my discounted rate with what amounts to anywhere from 2 to 4 months of paying a non discounted rate of $72 for 10M internet, so I'm changing the rate to $72 above. Every time the discount expires I suffer through scripted support, no chance of being compensated for the months after I re-negotiated for the sane rate and the sane rate is not applied, and being charged the non-discounted rate when I shouldn't be having to call in the first place. This f****** scam is so old I'm actually considering Comcast. And that's bad. Very, very, very bad. I'd like to note I've been a customer under this same Centurylink/Sprint/Embarq service area for 25 years. 4/2015 Tech support and reliability have dumpster-dived. Support is useless. TalkToUs has even given up the effort. The connection is no longer reliable and the support is extremely poor. TalkToUs says go to Chat or call support over an issue ongoing for 6 days that no one is able to acknowledge beyond "Add a new rental modem to your account." Good luck. 6/2014 Just concluded a complete revamp of my service with the help of Centurylink TS (rep that hangs here on BBR), and couldn't be happier. Now I'm jinxed. Seriously good tech support and as reliable service (no downtime) as you could ask for. Very happy with CL DSL. 7/7/13 Video problems have resolved, and performance is back to where it was - decent. Still, the price is high for 10M connection. But I'll pay that rather than pull my hair out with Xfinity. 5/29/2013 ** Evening performance suffering. Videos buffering down to slower streams. Network congestion for nearly a month. Paying too much for this level of what was solid service at $90 a month (with phone). --------------- 6/17/2012 Solid service @ 10 MB ___________ 10/1/2011 Still very good, but late night downtime is on the increase, usually between midnight and 2 AM. Speed is what I pay for and latency is OK (see latest test grab). 9/2/10 Service is as reliable as can be. No downtime to speak of and speeds on the money - no complaints. Billing is a little rough lately, but I think I've worked it out. BR corporate fan boys remind why i stopped visiting this site. 1/7/09 New pricing as of 1/6/09 puts the 10M package at $54.95 for landline customers. I'm adjusting my total cost based on an increase of roughly $15 (from $39.95 for 3.0 to $54.95 for 10.0). Easy as a phone call (or chat) to get the new rate. 1/3/09 I upgraded to the 10Mbps package on the 24th. of December by way of embarq_joey here on the DSLR Embarq forum. The install date was one day off due to line conditioning and being moved to a new DSLAM (I'm 4000 ft. from the CO). So far everything is working great. You can see my speedtests here: »/testh ··· 67/8cbb5 I'm estimating total cost; I haven't received the first bill with the new charges. I have a land line, and with 3.0 service the total bill was $67. The 10Mbps service is $65 a month (roughly $25 more than the 3.0 service). Connectivity so far, as always, is rock solid. Hat tip to embarq_joey ! 8/20/08 Teh system logon message for me today (aren't they cute!) told a heart warming tale of how my last update was framed and, to this day, leaves the staff in tears. After finding their hankies, I was implored to update my review. PS: The HSI price here is $39.95 + the no-frills landline brings the total to $60 and change. No downtime since February. At least none that I was aware of, anyway. I may have been asleep, so I can't say for certain. I'm so very sorry the previous review brought such emotional responses from the BBR staff that I'll keep this one short (-: 2/15/08 Embarq is currently rolling out 10MB plans, as well as re-structuring tier prices. I was offered 5.0 for $5 more than I'm paying now for 3.0 ($44.95 w/POTS). I called in and renegotiated my current price for 3.0 to the new price of $39.x, with the understanding that I've renewed my contract for another year rather than go month to month come April. The service has been very good; speeds are spot-on with my caps (with only one brief period of high latency -fixed fairly quickly), and with no downtime. I'm happy with the service, and the price drop was most welcomed. 12/21/07 It's been one year since I signed up with Embarq. The service, up until a week or so ago, has been excellent, with no downtime and consistent speeds. There is a promise of "new equipment" in my area by 11/23/07 to address these issues. However ... Embarq appears to have joined in an industry trend of appallingly bad support. Everything is geared towards sales, and problems are addressed (or not) only by repeated calls because you can't get through or you get erroneous information when you do. Service interruptions always cause clogged queues and their online chat system buckles like a dollar store beach chair. I'm downgrading my rating to reflect the poor support and lack of accurate information from Embarq. I'm also not happy with what I'm paying at this point given the quality of support. There was also confusion as to what occurs when your lease expires at one year: I've received different answers from different reps. This is not acceptable. Bottom line after one year: very good connection reliability (much better than cable) but with near terrible support (on par with cable). -- 7/10/07 There has not been a moment of downtime since my last review, and speeds are consistently spot on. The price ($50 for 3000/640) is still a bit too high, IMO, but the service -- compared with cable in this area -- is solid as a rock. Cable goes down here with half the passing storms. Latest test to speedtest dot net's DC server was: D: 2988 U: 637 L: 19ms (DC server) 4/3/07 I'm updating my review due to a recent experience with tech support. There's a world of difference between phone messages (management) and the people that man the lines -- both phone, email and chat. These guys are on the ball and deserve a lot of credit for the time they take in helping us out, even with matters of little concern. There is a tech here on BBR who posts in the Embarq forum that is also a valuable asset to the BBR community and Embarq. Perhaps I shouldn't mention the name, but it begins with dsl. Kudos to all of you that work hard to make the little things possible for us! 3/19/07 My first trouble with the service and I'm totally unhappy with tech support. There has apparently been a fiber cut somewhere that occurred midday on the 17th. Phone tech support has been horrid, with messages stating everything from their business hours to 'all lines busy' to some nonsense about weekends being their busiest time and to try my call at another time. 36 hours to fix cut fiber is one thing, but their communication on the matter is worse than Adelphia - and that's saying something. If not for Comcast being my only alternative, I'd pay the $99 and go with another provider. If customers don't talk with their wallet the companies never hear you. If this problem doesn't go away by next Saturday my next review will be for Comcast. I dropped my TS rating to 3 and the Value for money rating to 2. ---- Update: 12/8/06 I upgraded to the 3000/512 tier for ten more dollars a month, as all speed tests were right under my 1500 cap, line quality was good and latency is bearable. I notice I'm paying a bit more than some areas for my middle-tier speed. I've no idea what metric Embarq is using to determine price points per area, but income in my neighborhood certainly isn't above the national average. I've included some links to tests run via BBR: Speed tests from both coasts: »/im/19 ··· 6256.png »/im/19 ··· 6700.png Line test: »/lineq ··· /2142177 I'm quite happy with (A) no longer being a customer of Adelphia/Comcast and (B) the performance of Embarq so far. The connection can lag a little more than cable at times, but pages pop open and downloads generally run better than 250KBs. I've actually hit above my cap a few times, as illustrated by the image below. The upgrade was done completely from the CO, on time and with no problems. I did have to reboot the modem in order to gain connectivity after the upgrade. ---- 11/21/06 I called Embarq last Friday and I'm up Tuesday (today, the 21st) on their 1500 tier. Installation was a breeze (5 minutes), and speed tests clock me nearly up to the 1500 I'm paying for (I'm within a mile of the CO). So far so good -- I'll update after some time passes. Attachments: member for 19.7 years, 3063 visits, last login: 4.6 years ago updated 4.8 years ago
Croton, OH BFE. Being a tech person moving out here was painful. For ~13 years I dealt with dialup, and then satellite. I hated HughesNet. When DSL came out, I was the first to signup. Service and cost was great! As time went on, around 2012 the service started to get worst. I was told but support (after many calls) it was because of bandwidth and there was plans on upgrading the equipment. Months went by and nothing. I would say early 2013 they must have upgraded the network equipment and service got better. Well, it would seem this month 10/2013 service is starting to show sign of becoming more unreliable. Just today 11/2/2013 at around 1900hrs I was getting 40% pack loss. All in all, I am happy with the service. Years with nothing and satellite has made me appreciate what I have, but I am still watching it, and I will complain when I don't get what I pay for. Update as of 11/20/2018 service was average for many years. But, starting in 8/2018 I have noticed that they can't handle the bandwidth requirements from 6pm-11pm. I have started to calling and complaint daily due to the service. I am not getting what I am paying for. member for 17.5 years, 188 visits, last login: 156 days ago updated 5.3 years ago
CenturyLink increased the monthly data allowance to 1,000 GB. Update - July 2017 I am happy to be on CenturyLink's Las Vegas $40.00 "Price for Life" offer for my 20/2 Mbps Internet service. No more annual calls to renew an expiring promotional price contract. The service has been reliable: estimated reliability 99.8% or better. My one reliability quibble continues: CenturyLink is pushing too hard for the 2 Mbps upload speed. The FCC/SamKnows Internet monitoring service measurements for June: Downstream throughput: 19.5 Mbps average, 19.1 Mbps min, 19.8 Mbps max CenturyLink's Las Vegas competitor, Cox Cable, offers a 1,000 gigabyte data allowance. CenturyLink needs to raise its 250 gigabyte data allowance to be competitive. Update - May 2016 CenturyLink increased its "Broadband Cost Recovery Fee". The bill for May just arrived: $41.38 ($73.95 Pure Broadband less $10.00 Autopay Promotion less $29.00 HSI Promotion plus $6.43 Taxes, Fees, and Surcharges) per month. The 20M/2M service has been reliable: estimated reliability 99.8% or better. My one quibble: CenturyLink is pushing too hard for the 2 Mbps upload speed. For my service, a more reliable upload speed would be 1.536 Mbps. Before I upgraded to 20 Mbps bonded service, I had 10M/768K service (sync at 11.773 Mbps down and 896 Kbps up). My DSL lines are over provisioned to allow each of the bonded lines to sync at 11.773 Mbps down and 1.103 Mbps up. The modem's estimates for maximum rates: 20.536 Mbps down and 1.125 Mbps up. I have lots of head room downstream and very little upstream. After a line disturbance my modem does a lot of upstream bin swapping. Update - July 2015 In April CenturyLink's web site offered a 20M/2M Pure Broadband at a discounted price for a 24 month commitment. My first bill without prorated charges just arrived: $39.33 ($73.95 Pure Broadband less $10.00 Autopay Promotion less $29.00 HSI Promotion plus $4.38 Taxes, Fees, and Surcharges) per month. I doubled the speed of my Internet service for an additional $5.00 per month. I was paying $34.33 on a 12 month commitment for 10M/768K DSL service. Nine years ago I paid $35.00 per month for 1.5 Mbps DSL service. I placed the order for the upgraded Internet service using www.centurylink.com on Saturday, April 25. I received an email confirming my order on April 27 for installation on May 4. I received a second email on April 28 asking me to call CenturyLink regarding my order. The CenturyLink representative insisted that I needed to purchase or rent a new modem. Unable to convince her that the modem I purchased on eBay was sufficient, I agreed to rent a modem. Installation was rescheduled for May 5. My CenturyLink billing cycle starts on the first day of each month. By placing my order late in April with installation in early May cost me an extra $40 in prorated charges: basic (not discounted) rates are used to calculate charges for a partial month. Upgrading my service to bonded ADSL2+ took about an hour. CenturyLink's technician replaced one and added a second station protector module in the Network Interface Device on the side of my house. The new protector modules are specifically designed for high speed data applications. The technician tested the DSL signals at the wall jack where I connect my C2000T modem. I returned the rented modem to a local CenturyLink store to get the modem rental fee removed from future bills. 20 Mbps service makes Internet bottlenecks more visible. For example, I get 20 Mbps updates from Microsoft but only 15 Mbps updates from Adobe I still believe that 10 Mbps Internet service is adequate for my needs, but I could not resist the luxury of 20 Mbps Internet service for an additional $220 (including installation and prorated charges) over next two years. Crosstalk between the two bonded circuits reduced the Signal to Noise ratio by about 3 db. Interleaved mode increased latency by about 10 msec. ------------------------------------- Update - March 2015 I recently renewed a 12 month contract for CenturyLink's 10M/768K Pure Broadband High Speed Internet Service at $33.31 per month ($63.94 less $34.00 discount for 12 month contract plus $3.37 in taxes, fees, and surcharges). I estimate service reliability at 99.8% or better. The FCC/SamKnows internet monitoring service measurements for my internet during February: Downstream throughput: 9.87 Mbps average 4.77 Mbps min 10.19 Mbps max Upstream throughput: 0.71 Mbps average 0.43 Mbps min 0.79 Mbps max Latency: 30.08 msec average 28.08 msec min 50.22 msec max Packet loss: 0.27% average 0.00% min 44.13% max At my address CenturyLink recently started offering 20 Mbps (apparently using bonded ADSL2+ technology) internet service. Web site prices: $73.95 no contract month-to-month internet service or $66.90 for bundled internet and unlimited home telephone service with a five year price guarantee. CenturyLink's competitor Cox Cable now offers 50 Mbps internet service at $49.99 per month for the first 12 months and $66.99 thereafter. While faster Internet service would be desirable, CenturyLink's 10 Mbps Pure Broadband service offers, in my opinion, the best value: adequate performance at a reasonable cost. --------------------- Update - January 2013 I am continuing to use CenturyLink Pure Broadband High Speed Internet service at 10 megabits per second (10M/768K). I renewed again on a 12 month contract at $59.95 less $20.00 promotional discount plus fees giving me total cost of $41.93 per month. Contract has a $200 early termination fee. My modem syncs at 11772 kbps down and 887 kbps up on ADSL2+ mode with fast data path. I participate with the FCC / SamKnows internet monitoring service. Measurements for my DSL service during December 2012 as reported by SamKnows: Downstream throughput: 9.97 Mbps average 8.36 Mbps min 10.35 Mbps max Upstream throughput: 0.74 Mbps average 0.49 Mbps min 0.77 Mbps max Latency: 31.73 msec average 25.17 msec min 829.76 msec max Packet loss: 0.23% average 0.00% min 19.49% max Service has been better than 99.8% reliable. Reliability would have been even better if CenturyLink had not bungled a central office equipment upgrade. The work on my line should have been done overnight instead of during the day. Once I reported the outage CenturyLink technicians promptly restored service. The equipment upgrade was completed the next day without disrupting my service. ----------------------------------- CenturyLink upgraded my Pure Broadband DSL service from 10M/768K to 10M/896K last week. They also changed my data path from fast to interleaved. I sent an email to TalkToUS@centurylink.com asking to be switched back to a fast data path. They responded within a day to report that my fast data path had been restored. After trying Clearwire for several months, CenturyLink's introductory offer of 10 Mbps Pure Broadband offer at $29.99 per month on a 12 month contract was too much to resist back in January 2011. I renewed on a 12 month contract at $40 plus fees/taxes with a $200 early termination fee. I am in an area where Prism TV is offered. I signed up last year for the Federal Communications Commission broadband monitoring program run by SamKnows.com. Data collected by SamKnows confirms my experience: consistent, reliable broadband service at or near advertised speeds. From Sprint to Embarq to CenturyLink, my DSL service has been always been reliable. Looking back six years to my previous review, I find that I have DSL service that is more than six times as fast for only 20% more money. My review from 2006 -- 1.5 Mbps DSL service - $35.00 per month - 12 month contract Helpful and well informed customer representative. Placed order on Monday for 1.5 Mbps DSL. Received self install kit on Tuesday (Sprint SP-660ME-61 modem/router). DSL service scheduled for Thursday. Live at 2:00 am on Thursday, as promised. Smooth as glass. No problems. member for 21.5 years, 4896 visits, last login: a few hours ago updated 6.6 years ago
Update 8/2/17: 3mbps is still their fastest available speed here so I still haven't gone back to them. Update 3/28/15: I paid Comcast the money to run a line to my house about 5 years back. I do not miss having Centurylink. They keep sending ads to my house touting blazing fast speeds "up to 10mbps" but the fastest my house qualifies for is 3mbps... which is twice as fast as what it originally was here, but ultimately still a pathetic speed. That is 33x slower than the speed I get with Comcast. Since this is a semi rural area, it is safe to assume that Centurylink will never upgrade this area to real speeds. With the definition of broadband having been raised, almost of all of East TN and SWVA has only one option for broadband service IF you are lucky enough to have one... Comcast or Charter, depending on your city. Original review: I recently moved into a new home and I signed up for Embarq since Comcast wants $3,000-$4,000 to run cable down 3 utility poles to my house and I just am not that rich. Embarq maxes out at 1.5mbps here with no plans on ever upgrading, so I am going to have to deal with these ridiculously lame speeds until I can pay for Comcast. The low ratings for services and value for money reflect my belief that I should be getting 5mbps minimum for this price. Pre sales information, first agent I talked to said I could get 3mbps but all others after I signed up said 1.5mbps. I had reliability issues at first, and the problem was finally resolved when they replaced the problematic card that I and 7 other users shared. This was about a month into my service. member for 20 years, 5122 visits, last login: 25 days ago updated 6.6 years ago
The local technician is good, but rarely will my service show it's ugly self when he comes out. He says they are installing a new DSLAM nearby and hopefully it will take care of the problems with reliability and less than advertised speeds. Centuryline customer service is the worst. They are just reading a script and really don't give a damn if you are happy or not. member for 7 years, 5 visits, last login: 7 years ago lodged 7 years ago
$20.00 month - 1.5 mb download speed plus Unlimited Long Distance. Great Deal. member for 20.8 years, 260 visits, last login: 14 days ago lodged 7.2 years ago
When it became obvious that my dial up ISP was not going to offer wireless broadband in my area, I started to look for alternatives. I do not have a television, so cable was not cost effective just for the internet. My local phone service is Embarq, but I was wary of signing up for DSL because there is no speed guarantee. Also, Embarq's aggressive sales calls from Out of Area numbers turned me off (I put a stop to that some time ago with an Email to them requesting my rights under their privacy policy to not be bothered). It was the reviews and forum comments on this site that convinced me to try it. I received the DSL package, and installed it after the designated time. I had to enable the Gigabit LAN port (RJ-45) in my bios. Carefully following the installation directions, I booted up the Windows XP x64 drive and uninstalled my dial up connection. Windows XP x64 found the LAN port and installed the driver without problems. The browser went to the proper web page, ran some checks, and failed with a message that the Embarq DSL was not compatible with Windows XP x64. I then booted up the Windows XP x32 drive. It could not locate the driver for the LAN. Since I was having trouble finding my installation CD, I hooked the dial up connection back up. Windows XP x32 then downloaded the proper driver from the web. However, I could not get to the installation page on the web. The web address was not readable on the instruction sheet, but I was able to do a Google search from dial up and locate it. Once I had Windows XP x32 successfully set up, I booted into Windows XP x64 and used the installation web page address I had found with Google to set up x64. So Embarq DSL is compatible with x64, if you have the necessary computer skills. I got the 785 Kb speed I signed up for, but would lose my connection occasionally. After the first couple of times, I figured out that turning the 660 box off and on would restore it after a few minutes. With the computer on, there was line noise, and the caller ID no longer worked (I had installed the filter as directed). I ordered 7 foot and 14 foot RJ11 twisted-pair cables to go from the wall box to the 660 from »www.excelsus-tech.com. The 7 foot cable was just long enough. Installing it did not make any difference. I also ordered a ADSL2 / VDSL2 Splitter with surge protection, including the outdoor box, and CAT5E weather resistant cable from »www.homephonewiring.com. As it turned out, my current box and surge protector were identical to those supplied. However, the splitter is the most expensive component, and life is easier if you just order everything at once. I installed the splitter and removed the filter. The loss of connection problem went away, along with the line noise. My caller ID now worked with the computer on. However, I had a funny sounding dial tone. It occurred to me that the dial tone sounded like a phone at work which is set up to automatically forward calls. After doing some Wikipedia research, I figured out that I had messages (voice mail is part of the package). I went to the Embarq site and figured out how to listen to my voice mail, and then delete the messages (political spam). I replaced the line cord from the outside box to the computer wall jack with the CAT5E cable. There was no further improvement. Recently, my connection speed was not quite fast enough to keep up with standard YouTube videos. However, I am probably getting close to 785 Kb 99% of the time. This is adequate for YouTube videos with HQ sound, but not with HQ video, unless you pause it to let the buffer fill up. I am quite satisfied with the speed and reliability of Embarq DSL. I have not set up a web page yet. I was disappointed to see that you have to use the Embarq format, instead of raw html code, which I prefer. Perhaps if I paid an additional $5 a month for a fixed IP Address, I could get around this problem. The Embarq package included free long distance access and voice mail, along with caller ID with name. I already had the caller ID with name. There are apparently some other provided services, such as enhanced call waiting, call forward, and 3-way calling. I doubt that I will ever use these features. My total cost is $67 a month, or $18 a month more than I was paying before. My dial up internet had cost $100 for 6 months, so I am getting DSL for a little more than $2 extra a month. Had wireless broadband been available, it would have cost another $20 a month. Suggestions: Embarq needs to print the DSL setup page web address on the installation sheet. Buy yourself a good splitter like I bought, and use it instead of the filter. Although I have not used technical support, I rated them as a 5 based upon the responses in the Embarq forum. 01/25/2009 Update: I bought another hard drive, and installed Windows XP (32-bit) SP3 Professional on it. Unlike my previous XP 32-bit and XP 64-bit drives, I did not remove Internet Gateway Device Discovery and Control Client (through Windows Component Wizard). This client is not needed for dialup, which I had in the past, but helps when installing DSL. The new drive connected to the Internet by itself as soon as I had installed the Ethernet driver and turned on the 660 box. 05/28/2016 Update: Over the years, I upgraded my service to 1.5 Mbps, 3 Mbps, and finally 6 Mbps when it became available. I now use the C1000A CenturyLink DSL modem, because it is IPv6 compatible. Windows XP x32 supports IPv6, but you have to add the network protocol. As a result of a service call for landline buzz, the CenturyLink technician found a Bridge Tap. The landline buzz is gone, and I just got 6.13 Mbps download, 0.55 Mbps upload, and 12 ms latency. Previously, I was always under 4 Mbps download speed. member for 15.2 years, 589 visits, last login: 61 days ago updated 7.8 years ago
Had the service since Dec 2004. No major Problems. In 2009 there were a few latency issues here and there during the typical holiday high usage times. From my experience I would give them an "A" rating. They are closing in on the ever so coveted five nines (99.999 %) uptime for me. 2010 has been uneventful which is good. 2011--I cant remember the last time there was any trouble with the service!! 2012--Upgraded me to 10Mb at at no extra charge per month. I continue to be very happy!! As with any service dependant upon location and load YMMV. 2014--Still going strong...No Complaints. 2015--More of the same. No issues to speak of. 2016--Had a few issues this year with Ports in the DSLAM took them 3-4 weeks to resolve while I had intermittent outages. Recently upgraded to 20/2 pair bonded service for $10 a month less than what I was paying before. Still my only option at high-speed so I consider myself fortunate that the service has been so reliable for the most part. member for 19.2 years, 3475 visits, last login: a few hours ago updated 7.9 years ago
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