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Review by HackedServer 
UPDATED: 1 days ago
member for 39 days, 21 visits, last login: a few hours ago
 Ossineke,Alpena,MI
 $99 per month
 "Friendly people over phone & Install Techs."
 "Bad communicaion between Sales Rep/Confirmation Rep."
 "N/A"
| Pre Sales information:
Install Co-ordination:
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(ratings match consensus)
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Called Charter today to get some more information on a Charter bundle. We'd be changing from Charter Basic Expanded Cable, Verizon Phone, and Verizon DSL, to Digital Home, 5meg Internet, Phone.
Had a short wait on the phone, it played very quite music, but everyone once in a while a loud voice would yell (Not yelling just loud :P) at you to wait. Woke you up at least lol.
Once I got to someone (5-10 min wait) I was please. Spoke great English. He even gave me his truthful opinion. He told me it'd be cheaper to buy a Modem from another store. Also, when I asked about Caps and p2p throttling, he said "no, that's Comcast and Time Warner that do that, not us small businesses. There's ways around them anyway. I download about 3 movies a day. The first movie I've went to seen without downloading was the batman movie". I'm not sure if it was an act, but he sounded sincere and had me trusting him.
So as of right now, he put my order in the system, and gave me number to call to confirm and complete the order, and set up the install date. (Which he said would be in the next 3 days, including the weekend. Today's Friday.)
So Far VERY pleased.
***UPDATE***
Called back to finish order and choose installation date. I again got a sincere real person, she was telling me about how she was just getting over the flu, and asking how I liked vista etc while we waited for some things to complete. They didn't seem like they knew that much about the service, but they did their intended job well. Bad communication between the sales people and the order people. Sales person said full installation within the next 3 days, but only the TV and Internet can be installed by the third day, the phone will take 2 weeks. The sales rep also said I could have 4 digital boxes installed for free. But it was really only one, so I'm doing 1 box and 2 analog.
So far their Customer Service people are extremely nice and friendly, some may have less knowledge though.
***UPDATE***
Ok, I'm a little late to update, but here goes.
The Install Tech showed up around 3, which is during the 1-5 time frame they game me. He was from ACI Direct ( »www.acidirect.com :A part of Charter according to him) and after I explained how I wanted everything set up, he got right to work. But after looking how the line ran outside, he informed us that it was over 250ft, and that a new line would have to be ran(Underground). He would lay the line, and in 2 weeks a team would bury it. He ran the line across the yard and hooked it to the house, and ran a line to the computer(Only one he had to ran, rest were existing).
He then hooked up the modem, and installed everything and activated the modem. I was surprised since I declined the Internet install, and choose to self install. I was going to buy a Modem, but couldn't find any deals in the stores where I live (Staples & Walmart are the only real options. Both 70$+) Luckily he had an extra with him, and just had it added to our first bill. Then he set up the Digital cable box and he was done. Quick and painless.
As a person he was cool too. I spoke with him about job openings at ACI and how training would go etc.
Anyway, to the services. Digital TV was kind of a let down. Don't get me wrong, having an On Screen Guide and the added options are nice, but when changing channels it flickers a lot. A minor annoyance but an annoyance none the less. Before it was analog so we didn't have that. Also have satellite (Direct TV) which doesn't have that problem.
Havn't had much of a chance to use the 5meg Internet, so can't comment there.
Telephone install is set for the 19th of aug, will update on that later.
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 Review by morbo
Posted: 1 days ago
member for 6.5 years, 2767 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Saint Louis,Saint Louis City,MO
$14 per month
"faster upload/download speeds than dsl, trial period cost"
"it's charter. :("
"better upload speeds than dsl, price is comparable to dry-loop dsl"
| Pre Sales information:
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as a long time dsl customer, transitioning to cable internet (particularly Charter Pipeline) was more anxiety provoking that I had imagined. however, since I spend more time watching tv episodes online and recently started using Vonage for voip, I figured it was time to quadrupal my download speed and more than double my upload speed and take the plunge.
the install date was set for a saturday, and the installer was more than 4.5 hours late. customer service reps did help sooth the pain by giving two $20 credits and another free month of service, so I feel like I didn't start off with an abusive relationship with my isp. the following tuesday I called and did a self install (wasn't offering originally) and was up and running within 10 minutes.
I'm using a dlink cable modem I purchased from an online retailer for $40 after rebate.
so far, speed seems decent. amazon unbox movie downloads are much faster than what i had been experiencing with dsl. voip is working fine. so far so good!
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Review by CGServices
UPDATED: 1 days ago
member for 5.1 years, 38 visits, last login: 1 days ago
Gainesville,Hall,GA
$50 per month (6 month contract)
"It works 50% of the time...."
"and it works 50% of the time..."
"you really don't want me to say something here..."
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If paying for a full meal and getting about half of it in return is your cup of tea then sign up with Charter - even calling Tech support has not provided any workable solutions... If it weren't for the fact we have to register at least one star, they would get none - internet is up only 50% of the time and even properly rebooting the modem when it is down does not turn things around (hence it is NOT our equipment)... OnDemand movies? forget it - E3050 is an error code that almost consistently appears on the screen... Customer Service?? Apparently 'customer' is defined by anyone who is behind on their bill (which we are intentionally) and service is a scripted response read from their 'bible' by anyone we happen to get hold of...
Based on our experiences, foreign phrases to Charter include...
- thinking outside the box
- customer service
- quality
- integrity
- 99% up time
BTW - at the time we filed a complaint with Charter we had to borrow someone's Verizonwireless Broadband service to file this complaint... We have now since bought Verizonwireless Broadband and find ourselves using it more often than not thanks to Charter... Once we can get a handle on keeping our usage to 5GBs/months Charter is history...
We are so angered by Charter's patheticness that we have also started the process of filing complaints with the necessary local, state and federal government agencies - anytime we get tired of doing this we can count on them to provide great motivation with a E5030 error mesage or a lost internet connection...
There is a move out here to open up all areas of the country to competion - wonder how long Charter and others like them would last once that happens???... DSL Reports may have given them a Bronze star but Charter seems to have sat on it without any feelings.... Given the former insider's posting here I'm not surprised....
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Review by boscoj
UPDATED: 2 days ago
member for 1.6 years, 9 visits, last login: 2 days ago
Watsonville,Santa Cruz,CA
$39 per month
 about 3 days
"Sunday 3 hour install window"
"$4.00/modem rental, $10.00/month wireless router rental . . ."
"We'll see . . ."
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Pretty amazed to get an install on Sunday. Arrived at 2:00 for the 1-3 install window. Single port Ambit modem. Was unable to get a WAP hooked up and working. Went and bought my own cable modem. Called tech support and had the new modem initialized in about 5 minutes ! Futzed some more with the WAP and got it hooked up. Advertised rates are 5Mb/900K. Speed Test reports 4700/428.
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Review by AGSommers
UPDATED: 2 days ago
member for 4.3 years, 3 visits, last login: 1 days ago
Spring,Harris,TX
$55 per month
"Not as bad as some."
"Still pretty bad."
"Get something else if you have the choice."
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I signed up with Charter Pipeline in 2003 and got a decent deal, 3Mbps/256Kbs, no contract, free modem rental and self-install kit, $35/mo. I was up and running within a week and got speeds of ~3Mbps down but never had upload speeds higher than 128Kbps. I was happy for about the first year, then the modem died and the price jumped $10/mo. I went through about 3 modems before I got a good one that I've had since, but the quality of service has gone downhill.
In about 2005 the upstream signal was weak and I'd lose service during the day. It took months for them to figure this one out. The signal quality is still not what it should be, but it works and that's good enough for them. Speeds now vary, anywhere from ~500Kbps down to ~4.5Mbps down, but I'm supposed to be at 5Mbps according to the ridiculously expensive $55/mo. service tier. Nowadays the whole cable service goes out randomly during the day taking the internet with it. If you ever have a problem with your service you might as well just go to a bar, drink and complain to the bartender because it won't do any good to call Charter.
The only reason I haven't switched to AT&T DSL is that I'd have to get my home phone service through them and pay $20/mo. extra for a "metro" line whereas I get a fully loaded "metro" line through another company for the same basic rate.
I wish Comcast would buy out Charter in my area, at least Comcast is modern and you get crazy speeds with their internet service for the same price as Charter's handicapped service.
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Review by dougparker
UPDATED: 3 days ago
member for 6.1 years, 99 visits, last login: 1 days ago
Johnson City,Washington,TN
$65 per month
about 18 days
"It is broadband :S"
"Expensive, Lowsy quality (both the connection and service),"
"Charter Pipeline (Charter.com) has gone from"
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Back when I first reviewed this (2004) the service was great. Of course, since then the quality of service has gone downhill dramatically. Support is next to nil now days when there is a problem. (Back in 2004 I could actually call and talk to someone when there was an issue with the line) Now here in 2007, if there is an issue, it is like they just put the phone systems on ignore and let you listen to music for 3 days. (ok, 3 days in an exaggeration but you get the point)
*UPDATE*
2008 - Nothing much has changed with charter. I hold to my old reviews to the fullest EXCEPT it has gotten worse. for months now my speeds have been CRAP. No other word to describe it. I also keep getting calls from Charter that are ANNOYING me to death, trying to sell more services to me.. I have told them over and over again I am not interested and even requested that I be removed from their call list. I am not racist, but when some guy from a country that barely speaks English calls me to sell me a service from Charter and I cannot understand half the words he is spitting out.. That is a problem.
I upgraded (for an extra $5/month) to 10Mbit cable. I rarely get even 6 of that. My pings are off the charts half the time and still get the run around when I call support. Then I am told that if a service tech does come out there is the possibility that I WILL BE CHARGED if any repairs occur. WHAT ?!?!?!? Are you kidding me?
I really wish a new ISP would move in this area.. I am getting sick of it. As soon as FioS is available in my area I am hopping on that train.
Stay away from Charter... At least until they get their act together.
Followup comments:  seagoat67
join:2003-05-21
Miami, FL | CHARTER>NET SERVICE Sorry to hear you are having problems. I moved from 4meg to5meg...they offerred me 10 meg for a month and it will only cost me $20.00 morethan 5meg. Having been in sales many years I learned SUGAR gets more ants.
East TN | |
| | 
Comrad Pyro
@impromed.com
| Re: CHARTER>NET SERVICE Coming from the Internet tech support side of things, those of us who no longer work for charter and are free to speak their mind agree with you all fully. As you have heard. when you call in we do what we can, be it a little or lot. Charter has chased off every troubleshooter in the call centers, at least in the mid west, to hire on sales representatives and outsourced the troubleshooting the way Dell and Linksys have become very well known for. As soon as the Call center teams got adjusted to getting their local areas up and working and pushing the good field techs and tech supervisors to clean up messes made by bad filed techs and improperly trained installers, wham another change. now every Charter call center takes calls from anywhere in the US. Ok no big deal, 24 hours later, still no access to accounts for clients we were taking calls from.... 24 hours later The Call center representatives you love speaking to lose the ability to contact filed techs to send them back to send them back to appointments, or get ETA for them. The ability to remote a client as having a service fully out stopped being the job of the person doing the troubleshooting and started becoming an issue that requires an appoint made 2 to 3 weeks in the future with a request for a supervisor to ask if we can come out next day. Appointments went from mostly 2 hour windows, with 4 hour windows as overflow into all half day morning or evening appointments. From there things just go worse, the increased push for selling new Items instead of fixing existing system. the Start of outsourcing calls and being promised that our jobs are secure. Then the order that we are going to be sells representatives or not work for charter any longer. So yes all the employees agree with you. The Customers are stuck in the middle of a fight between the debtors and shareholders of the company and nobody cares about long term happiness. No matter how much the consumer is complaining the actual people who make a difference are not caring. The ones you complain to are in your area, We feel your pain, we know your sorrow. If you are in a place that has little to no problems, great. Show some appreciation to the people who helped you get that way. If you are in an area that has a lot of issues change service provider, do it sooner rather than later and don't get talked out of it. So Please unless you want the few employees of charter that are left in the US to vent to you about their problems with charter, don't blame them for your problems. Its sad that when it comes to tech support, the people you have direct contact with and who would know the most about your problem are not given any power to do anything to resolve the issue. Hopefully one day before the company goes under they will get it right. In the meantime you as customers have the responsibility of not spending your money on a product you are not happy with. Exercise it. As long as you stay charter customers with the problems you are talking about it will never get fixed. If you don't have any other options in your area for Cable or Internet, then you need to talk to your city government and replace charter as your provider with a company that actually cares about its customers and not just how much money can we get right now.
Good luck all. | |
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 Review by docwat3201
UPDATED: 3 days ago
member for 6.9 years, 438 visits, last login: 2 days ago
Bonne Terre,Saint Francois,MO
$69 per month
about 5 days
"Stable connection, very rare drops"
"download speeds much below advertised 10/1 actually 6/1"
"Reliable connection, but paying for much more than receiving"
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Customer service remains my major sore point with Charter. Download speeds at only about 60% of advertised.
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Review by scr4t
UPDATED: 4 days ago
member for 5.4 years, 1305 visits, last login: 3 days ago
Fulton,Callaway,MO
$60 per month
"Fairly consistent download/upload speeds"
"Incompetent tech support, high latency, frequently dropped connection"
"Not worth it if you actually plan to use your service."
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Since I already had TV service through Charter, adding their HSI service was fairly simple. I had to contact their support to give them my Motorola SB5100 modem's MAC address, after which I was up and running with the 10Mb down / 1Mb up package.
Being an avid PC gamer, I was happy to find I had approximately 20ms to Chicago and between 40-60ms to other central/east coast locations. Additionally, my download and upload speeds slightly exceeded the advertised speeds.
A couple weeks after I started using Charter HSI I noticed significant latency in the evenings, and identified a Charter-owned address as the "trouble spot": 68-112-12-198.dhcp.stls.mo.charter.com [68.112.12.198] (tracert below). Typically I would ping between 5-10ms to this hop, however I was getting anywhere between 150-350ms. Unless you're playing checkers, any gamer/savvy user would agree that kind of latency is not good. One particularly interesting "tech" informed me that anything under 900ms wasn't really a problem.
Over the course of the next two months I called in (over 10 times... I'm persistent) to report reduced transfer speeds, higher latency, and dropped connections, each time mentioning that I had identified where the problem likely was and that the latency didn't occur until my second hop on Charter's network. Charter's tech support continued to insist, however, that the problem was probably only in my house. And yes, I did unplug my modem and restart my computer each time. I had also verified that my signal strengths were well within Charter's desired range.
The connection drops seem to occur randomly throughout the day, and may occur up to 5 times. Whenever I called Charter they said no problems had been reported for my town, but they could send a tech out between 8-5pm. I explained that although I would be willing to have them come inspect my cables, I needed a time after 5pm due to my work situation. The "tech" I was speaking with bluntly stated that Charter doesn't work after 5 in my area, and there would be no way to arrange such a thing.
So now flash forward to today, over two months since I started reporting the same issue to Charter. Nothing has been resolved, and I have not been contacted by supposed upper-level Charter "techs" regarding my continued issue despite assurances that they would look into it.
I called to cancel my Internet service with Charter, and was dully asked why I was doing so. I briefly explained that after over two months of patiently trying to resolve a problem that seemed very cut-and-dry, I was fed up with the lack of service (particularly "customer service"). The voice said "okay", and we proceeded to set a date for service termination.
With Charter, like so many other companies, you're just a number in the system. If you choose to get their Internet service, don't go in with any expectations of quality, reliability, or customer service.
=========================
Tracing route to chi.speakeasy.net [64.81.159.2]
over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 1 ms 1 ms 1 ms 192.168.0.1
2 6 ms 6 ms 5 ms 10.167.112.1
3 186 ms 215 ms 200 ms 68-112-12-198.dhcp.stls.mo.charter.com [68.112.12.198]
4 169 ms 173 ms 180 ms 24.217.31.54
5 168 ms 166 ms 161 ms 24-217-58-193.dhcp.stls.mo.charter.com [24.217.58.193]
6 184 ms 195 ms 199 ms 24-217-58-145.dhcp.stls.mo.charter.com [24.217.58.145]
7 258 ms 273 ms 279 ms so-1-2-0.gar2.chi1.bbnplanet.net [4.79.74.1]
8 261 ms 521 ms 295 ms ae-12-55.car2.Chicago1.Level3.net [4.68.101.131]
9 216 ms 219 ms 207 ms unknown.Level3.net [166.90.208.206]
10 249 ms 218 ms 207 ms dns.chi1.speakeasy.net [64.81.159.2]
Trace complete.
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Review by markopoleo
UPDATED: 4 days ago
member for 5.3 years, 2357 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Bonne Terre,Saint Francois,MO
$55 per month
about 7 days
"Faster than advertised download speed, good connection"
"Tech support is a NIGHTMARE, trained monkies are better than these people."
"Good service, better than advertised speed. No complaints"
| Pre Sales information:
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DEC 27 2004 note:
Using online deal for $25.99 a month till Feb 05. Little savings even for a short time is ok by me. Got hooked up Dec 16, took a bit long from original signup online because previous owners had HSI before me, so had to disconnect them before they hooked me up. Not a huge deal, but good to know if you want to order, make sure previous people (If you rent that is) disconnects FIRST. Then you order.
Total a month till Feb: 25.99 for 3meg/256
So far everything is smooth, the only hitch was the signup part, and modem install fee was suppose to be deducted from first bill if you signup with Credit Card. Had to call to get it removed, redone. Not a huge deal, just annoying.
Feb 6 2005 note:
Its been about a month with service, had a one hour long outage, not a big deal because of a huge storm in area was expected. Billing is slowly fixing itself out from original review. My next bill I will update price a month I pay, last month for $25 deal. Still cheap in my book even if I have to pay little more. Charter is doing great in my book.
March 13 2005 note:
Price increased to $52.99 a month for 3meg/256k connection. Since Charter HSI is only option for me, whats a internet crack fiend to do?  I called to see if I could get in on another deal, they throw out the typical "you can save money if you get such and such package!"..but they don't seem to understand it is still more money! lol
On a side note: my review could be a little bias on the price, I used to pay about $200 a month for ISDN service, so $52.99 seems REAL cheap to me..but as I understand from reading forums Charter has higher prices than most other providers so take that into consideration.
ZERO downtime since last update btw.  Will update in another month or so.
JULY 6th 2005 note:
Zero downtime in about 5 months. connection rock solid. Still ticked off paying a extra $10 a month for NOT having TV from charter..what kinda of reasoning is that?? $42 vs $52 for not having there TV service just makes me want to kick someone at Charter.
October 5th 2005: since last update (4 months ago) i have had only 10 MINUTES of downtime! I was not even at home when it happened so no big deal. If you can get HSI from Charter in my area, i recommend it highly.
April 26 2006: Still kicking along strong Speeds as advertised or better here. Rumor is VOIP is coming to this area..but still waiting on 5meg/512 service here.
October 20 2006: On 10meg/1meg for a few months, still no complaints. I went ahead and got Charter telephone, so got on a 6month deal for both of them about $100 a month.
July 5th 2007: Long time since update, but only ONE outage! Service is still rock solid still in my area. The 10meg package is working out great, the only complaint I have is the price, but its the only game in town, and still cheaper than what i was paying for ISDN before i moved here.
Feb 14th 2008: Still kicking along and 10meg speed, no outages to report except the expected from really bad weather but was no more than a few days downtime. 16meg/2meg is available here though! I'm moving to a new house so waiting to sign up for it then.
March 12th: Moved into new house, got cable hooked up.. Charter customer support is just TERRIBLE. I've spent 4 hours on phone total with them on my weekend. Each person makes a simple issue more complicated than it is. I actually had to chat with a lady online to get them to provision my modem to 10meg instead of 5meg the installer set me at..it took a HOUR to just change that, when normally took like 5min. There was maybe 20 problems with just transferring service to new address..across the street. lol
DO NOT EVER CALL CHARTER, always visit local charter office and talk to lady behind counter.
The only good news from this move to new house was price lowered from $70 to $55 a month..but for all the annoyance of dealing with morons on the phone it was not worth it. Some flat out lied to me on the phone about things, like one waived the install fee, but was on bill anyways and support "can't do anything about it". The list goes on and on.
I changed me rating for charter tech support from 4 to 1. Install co-ordination from 3-1.
August 16th 2008: Last 6 months have been smooth sailing, had a modem go bad, but was terrible lightning storm so i figured as much when could not connect. Billing has remained the same, no problems with it.
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Review by benc
UPDATED: 6 days ago
member for 1.1 years, 430 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Glen Carbon,Madison,IL
$120 per month (month by month)
about 8 days
"They have service in my area. Read below."
"No one else does. Read below. Low tiers are PRICEY"
"It's OK. You should look into alternatives before signing up."
| Pre Sales information:
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NOTE: Updates are at the bottom.
The other choices were seriously unsuitable, so basically this is the only choice.
The only other choices were:
- Cellular Internet, via Sprint EVDO or Cingular 3G with a USB adapter (or you can add a PC Card Slot to your desktop). Verizon EVDO is no good because of the 5GB monthly data transfer limit. Plus it's a bit silly to pay for the wireless capability when your computer itself isn't portable.
- IDSL via Covad. It would've been reliable, but the cost was quite high. If you're willing to do this, then you may as well use T1.
- T1. This would be ideal, but the cost is quite high, and it was out of my budget. Plus I'm not sure if it would require modifications to the building. If so, it may not be an option for apartment dwellers.
- Dial-Up. Cheap, but it's SLOW. It also means what while it's being used, you can't use your phone. I ended up using it in conjunction with Charter, as I'll detail below.
- DSL was NOT an option, as both Covad and AT&T told me. Here, SBC, or now AT&T I suppose, is the phone company. This really burned me because I was planning on using DSL. Have used both Cable and DSL before, I've had better experiences with DSL.
Before anyone asks "Why did you move there, if they don't have DSL?" I wanted to live in this particular region (St. Louis region), but unfortunately the apartment I managed to locate does NOT have DSL available. I only took this apartment because it was the first decent choice I found, and I only had a couple days to get an apartment. At the time, I lived too far away to shop around very much. I'm not renewing this lease, and my next apartment is going to have DSL available. I'm going to make sure of it. Thankfully I live near enough that I can shop around a LOT.
I seriously wanted to use DSL. Any time I've used cable Internet in the past, my experience is that the Internet connection cuts out intermittently. Unfortunately, I can't DSL in this apartment, so I begrudgingly called up Charter Business to set up service. I just had a feeling that since they use Cable, I'm going to be dissatisfied. I wasn't wrong.
So I signed up. I had the Sales Rep. fax me the contract since I didn't want to wait for it in the mail. At that point I was going crazy with nothing but slow, slow dial-up. When I got it I had the apartment for nearly two weeks already. She got the contract back, and said that someone from the Installation department would call me. Well, they did call, but I missed the call. I figured...no big deal, I'll call them back right away. I did, but couldn't get through. I had to call up TECH SUPPORT to get the order process started AGAIN, which I believe made me wait longer than I needed to (why can't I just call back directly?).
The low upload speed makes it barely usable for Remote Desktop, and unsuitable for servers. However, the next higher package meant giving the cable company too much money, which I didn't want, since I didn't believe that the service will be good enough.
Net Result:
I have the Charter Business Cable Internet service, with this package:
1.5M down, 256k Up, Static IP at $67/mo.
AT&T Business DSL has a similar service level, which is:
1.5M down, 384k Up, 5 Static IPs at $65/mo. + taxes ($50 + taxes with year-long contract)
With Charter the service cuts out intermittently, and too often. I hope that no one runs a serious server on any of those connections. Plus they only offer service with a contract, unless you go residential-grade, which means service will be even worse (DHCP issues). As a back-up connection, I use dial-up when the cable Internet connection quits on me, which unfortunately I've had to do several times already.
My next apartment needs to have DSL available, so at least I have a choice. Cable is just....no good.
October 21st, 2007 UPDATE: I know numerous negative reviews of Charter, and I know it's the company, since to compare apples to apples, some Cable companies get very good reviews even with the same technology.
Despite this, my experience hasn't been too bad. There's intermittent connection breaks that have no pattern (so you can't plan around it), but it's not as bad as it's been with other cable connections I've had. I suspect this has to do with the fact that there's a static IP, so there aren't any DHCP lease issues.
The connection breaks mean that I am quite unwilling to do anything that involves a real-time connection that requires a constant transfer of data, since the connection may be lost. Then again, anything like that will require more bandwidth than i have.
Given certain things that other people here have said, some may think that $67 for 1.5Mbps/256k is too high. However, it's worth it since it means there are no server restrictions, and I can truly do whatever I want with the connection (provided it doesn't break any laws, of course). The static IP also keeps things simpler. It's also almost price competitive with offerings from other companies, although at the same price I can get static IP DSL on a month-to-month basis without a contract.
Plus 1.5Mbps down, at the moment, is good enough 95%+ of the time. Occasionally I want to start a massive download, and at those times I wish I had a faster connection. However, that doesn't happen too often, especially if I consider the fact that the next higher package (3.0Mbps down) cost $104, or $37 more. It's hard to justify paying over 50% more when I'd experience the benefit less than 5% of the time.
The tech support is also supposed to be better for "Business" customers, but since I haven't needed to call them I can't comment on that.
Speeds: I have always gotten at least 95% of the speed I pay for, whenever I've performed tests.
Billing: Some people have complained about Billing. So far I haven't had a single problem. The bill has always been what it should be. Also there are no unfees. The price I was quoted when I ordered was the price I ended up paying. No surprises.
Overall: So far, I'm pleasantly surprised. It's cable, which has shortcomings. But for a company that gets a lot of horrible reviews my experience hasn't been that bad. I'd still prefer DSL though, if I could get it.
Update July 29th, 2008:
Okay, so I'm still using Charter. Not everything is bad about them. But believe me I'm no fan boy.
Connection reliability seems a little better, although if you can't get DSL you'd still want to have dial-up backup. However, the reliability is good enough that you don't need a second POTS line just for dial-up. So far I've only rarely had to use the dial-up. It's a good thing too, since Charter Business isn't cheap.
Support: Well, there haven't been enough problems for me to call them up to complain. However, I once called them to get my reverse DNS changed. The fellow I talked to (first person I talked to!) actually knew what reverse DNS was, and changed it within 15 minutes. He did tell me it'd take time to propagate throughout the Internet, but I already knew that.
However, keep in mind that I have Charter Business service. I've never used Charter Residential, but I wouldn't be surprised if the first support worker reads off a script and says stuff like "power-cycle your modem" and "reboot your PC." Now me, I don't ever call support unless I'm totally sure that all my ducks are in a row and it's their problem.
As for pricing, it's better than it was. Perhaps they figured out that their previous pricing was outrageous. Most recently, I learned that I could get 10/1 for $110 (1-yr. contract), or $120 with month-to-month. It's a good thing too, because I was ready to ditch them due to high pricing for what I was getting. However, I can justify $120 if it means I get 10/1, static IP, and month-to-month. This is definitely much better than the old pricing I was subject to.
This is also a good thing since my current connection (1.5M/256k) now seems anemic.
I still plan to relocate to a place with DSL available, so I will have a choice. At a minimum it means I can ditch the dial-up and use DSL as a back-up.
If you want to use Charter Business, be prepared to spend at least $110/mo. Otherwise, you will probably be disappointed by the performance.
Update: August 5th, 2008
Okay, so I just put in an order to switch to 10/1, 1 Static IP, mo-to-mo for $120. I could have saved $10/mo. if I had a one-year contract, but I want the option to ditch them later if quality suffers. Hopefully they'll process this quickly. 1.5M/256k is just way too slow.
Update: August 14th, 2008
They finally got my speed up to 10/1. Having taken nine days was a little annoying. However, to be fair I didn't push very hard. I actually waited a week (until the 12th) for them to send me a new contract. Yes I know, it's funny but even with month to month there's a contract. However it's for only one month.
If I was less patient I probably could have gotten them to upgrade the speed sooner.
Since I got this speed tier, I increased the "Value for Money" metric up a point, since for less than double the cost I'm getting over four times the previous speed.
Followup comments: bufbarnaby
join:2002-01-06
Riverside, CA
edit:
December 18th, @10:36PM
| Charter cable unreliable... I could not agree more...I have had outages 4 times , for several days at a time in just 2 mos. with Charter. ATT was NEVER down ! When my discount is up , i`m back to DSL dry loop. | |
| | 
dav0r
translate
Premium
join:2003-06-15
Albertville, MN
 ·Charter Pipeline
 ·Embarq
| Re: Charter cable unreliable... I had about 8 outages in 5 months earlier this year. A couple of them were not Charter's fault and they were also upgrading things in the area. Still I think more than 5 outages for 6 hours (even if it's planned and starts at midnight) in a year would be plenty for most operating companies. It made me feel a little disposable. | |
|
ducklick
@charter.com | re idiots.. 95% of outages are not cable MSO faults.. you can blame the majority on the electric company. | |
| | benc
Premium
join:2007-06-17
Glen Carbon, IL
·Charter Pipeline
 ·Future Nine Corpor..
·Callcentric
·AT&T Midwest
| Re: re said by ducklick :
idiots.. 95% of outages are not cable MSO faults.. you can blame the majority on the electric company.
Instead of calling people idiots, can you instead tell us why you think so?
People always want to point the finger at someone, and I'm not exempt. Thing is, I always try to find out who's fault it is before I point the finger.
I'm disinclined to believe you, because wouldn't there be power outages at the same time the cable goes out?
My experience is that electricity is more reliable than cable. | |
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Charter Cable unreliable?