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Review by Suse56$ See Profile

  • Location: Windsor,ON
  • Cost: $93 per month
  • Install: about 5 days
Speed (most of the time), Web Space
Tech Support, Inability to access from out-of-town
For the most part, I am pleased with this service
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I switched to Cogeco from Sympatico HSE. Apart from a week's worth of down time since my switch (a year ago) this service has been consistently reliable. However, due to sluggish speed at times, an occasionally disrupted connection and my need to be able to access my account when traveling, I kept a dial-up account on Sympatico -- an account that has proven invaluable.

We pay $93.99 ( + GST & PST) for HDTV & Internet service....a tad pricey but overall value for the dollar.

We are very pleased with Cogeco's service.

member for 22.1 years, 501 visits, last login: 21 years ago
lodged 21.1 years ago


Review by linuxgeek$ See Profile

  • Location: Computer
  • Cost: $44 per month
  • Install: about 3 days
Awesome speed and pings
News Server
Overall great ISP
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This is an unrealisticaly GREAT ISP, first off, time from order to success was only 3 days!, unlike most other cable companies, you pay exactly what you should for what you get, unlike most other cable companies, it never slows down, unlike ALL other CABLE AND DSL COMPANIES, they care about the customer and secure the service on THEIR end to protect computer newbies who don't know about firewalls. And they're the only company to have a friendly tech support team come on here and help, nevertheless, zedsdead, lippy, viggen93, and all the others, congratulations on doing such a great job on here, with Cogeco, who needs DSL?:)

member for 21.5 years, 192 visits, last login: 21 years ago
lodged 21.1 years ago


Review by originalbart See Profile

  • Location: Niagara
  • Cost: $45 per month
Speeeeed.
A confused installer.
Would not, could not go back to 4 k/s downloads
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I started with Cogeco when they were part of the @home network. They made the transition was about as smooth as could be. The initial installation was brutal. The installer showed up with no tools to do the job except for a utility knife that he used to try and hack a hole in my plaster wall. I cut a hole and put a box in later. I also had to drill the holes to get the line up to the main floor and pull it through. Not a big deal, but if I'd known ahead of time I could have prepared everything. I think the jobs are contracted out so I don't think it was even a Cogeco employee.

There was a tiny glitch just after we moved into our new house. My account name must have defaulted to a different name, but customer support was unbelievably friendly and efficient and that problem lasted all of 2 minutes.

The speed has been fast and steady and I can't remember the last time the service was down. The cable modem is an InfoRanger SCM-110R.

I'm not too impressed with the mail server but I don't really have anything to compare it with other than Sympatico's. It seems to have a lot of irrevelant posts and I rarely use it.

I don't have an option of going to another cable provider (and Sympatico's High Speed hasn't made it out here yet) so it's kind of a moot point, but based on my recent experiences with the company, I wouldn't go anywhere else.



member for 21.1 years, 208 visits, last login: 13.3 years ago
lodged 21.1 years ago

sarniaman
join:2002-04-09
Sarnia

sarniaman

Member

Not bad!

After a year, download speed dropped to half what I had when I started (still twice better than Sympatico!!!).
Angel69
join:2003-02-06
Windsor, ON

Angel69

Member

Re: Not bad!

Concerning cable, lately it has been nothing but garbage! I constantly lose connection, email problems are a nightmare and their tech support is a joke! One tech will tell you something and the next will ask you why did they tell you to do that? My connection speeds suck...182.5 kilobits per second. When I first got cable things were great, now being with them for 2 years now, things are horrible.
It's the old cat and mouse game I see.

Review by linuxgeek$ See Profile

  • Location: Canada
  • Cost Contract price not specified.
Awesome Speeds, Rarely ever slows Down
Tech Support, News Server
Other than phone-in Tech Support and News Server, can't get any better!
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Great ISP!:)

member for 21.2 years, 45 visits, last login: 21.1 years ago
lodged 21.1 years ago







Review by DaddyO3 See Profile

  • Location: Burlington, ON, Canada
  • Cost: $45 per month
  • Install: about 1 days
Good value for the $$ - Tech Support generally knowledgeable
Tech Support waits are a killer - often exceeding 1 hour
Good ISP for home users
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I have been with Cogeco for more than 5 years.

Pro's: They don't hassle you about exceeding U/L & D/L limits unless you really abuse it - and I mean REALLY abuse it. I am usually well over the limit each month and have never heard from them yet (probably will now). Mail & Usenet service is pretty good with near excellent coverage of usenet groups (over 35000) to choose from. I have found Tech Support to be quite knowledgeable whenever I needed to talk to them (you can also contact them by email although response usually takes 3-4 days)

Con's: Tech Support wait times are usually a BITCH (with some exceptions). Sales info leaves something to be desired, often obtaining contradictory info from different reps & sales documentation (sometimes wonder if the reps have received any training). I did my own installation because nobody touches my box but me so I can not report from experience (hence the middle of the road rating). Connectivity is sometimes a sore point with service lost periodically for 2-3 days at a time (but if you push Customer Service, they will generally credit you for the downtime).

Overall: I am reasonably happy with the service and feel that it is a good bang for the buck despite the occasional problem. They are not "Rogers" or one of the other heavyweights in the business and may just be experiencing growing pains.

member for 22.6 years, 17 visits, last login: 18.1 years ago
lodged 21.2 years ago


Review by HiFlyer See Profile

  • Location: Hamilton, ON, Canada
  • Cost: $45 per month (12 month contract)
  • Install: about 3 days
Fast, great tech support at DSLR, WAY faster than Sympatico
Long wait times for tech calls, not as much phone centre customer support as Sympatico
Most bang for your buck in SE Ontario
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Cogeco does not have the resources of Bell, so call center support can be pretty patchy. BUT there's super help available on this website. I've had to wait 3-7 days for a tech call (they were busy periods tho...) but the techs were always friendly and got the job done.

Cogeco is fast as hell (beats the pants off of sympatico), with low and consistant pings.

It's not been a perfect relationship, but then, what is?

member for 21.2 years, 52 visits, last login: 16.9 years ago
lodged 21.2 years ago


Review by pH1 See Profile

  • Location: Canada
  • Cost: $50 per month
  • Install: about 3 days
*FAST*, Stable, Good tech support in forums..
News server is pretty bad :)
Very good ISP!
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Well speed is going good right now.. like 5Mbit/s down Only bad part is the news servers which are rumored to be fixed soon.

Update: typo.

member for 22.2 years, 3134 visits, last login: 3.5 years ago
updated 21.3 years ago


GoldBob
@cogeco.net

GoldBob

Anon

Very poor Kingston service.

I'm amazed by this review. I can only conclude that it must be a regional issue.
I have been with Cogeco cable from the very beginning, when it was called the Wave. It was very good then, mostly fast and reliable, and when there were problems there was an actual local person to talk to.
Since the last week in March, service has been declining terribly. Often as low as 9kbps, rarely as high as 112 kbps,and there is no knowledgable technical support. They usually don't phone back, and when they do they aren't helpful. Yesterday, a woman asked me to run Broadband speedtest from the Cogeco site, and I got 112kbps ( for once!), 55 and 45 at 1 pm on a Wednesday, and she said that was as good as I can expect.
It is very upsetting, but I guess I'm not getting what I paid for. I'll have to try Sympatico...

Vhrus
@cogeco.net

Vhrus

Anon

Re: Very poor Kingston service.

i also get cogeco services in kingston and i think they very from one end of the city to another......... i lived in the hights and the internet was down as much as up and when it was up it was slow........... now i live in the rich suburbs and its always up and almost always dling at 250kBs/s+
helmand_safi
join:2002-07-12

helmand_safi

Member

i would think twice about sympatico

sympatico ...
i would think twice about sympatico because thier service is not unlimited.
you have only 5gb upload and download limit, after that they will charge you $7 and some change per 1gb.

ben502
@cogeco.net

ben502

Anon

112kps upload?

Wow man, out here in hamilton it's capped at 46kps. and fluctuates between 30 and 50kps.....

pH1
Rawr
join:2001-12-31
Canada

pH1

Member

Poor you guys

Because mine rules. Except for the odd downtime/problem.

Ranma2803
@cogeco.net

Ranma2803

Anon

Cogeco Down and Up speeds

Cogeco in Hamilton/Dundas border is really fast did the speed tests, Upload for first test is over 481Kbps and download was well over 1Mbit i did the first speed test on this site






Review by ozzy_0 See Profile

  • Location: Kingston, ON, Canada
  • Business customer Business customer
  • Cost: $106 per month
Amazing customer service response times
lack of completion on newsgroup binaries
Excellent, balanced service
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I recently switched service plans within Cogeco, going from the residential standard (2000/256) plan to the SOHO business (4000/640) plan. The switchover was seamless. I kept the same modem provided for residential installation and was ready to go in 5 minutes. Tech support is amazing (5 min wait, usually right away). The static IP is nifty (although I was told that I would only be provided with 1...the info chart here shows 3...). In the 4 months I've had the service, it has gone down twice for a total of 3 hours. Speeds are consistant.

member for 21.3 years, 555 visits, last login: 16.2 years ago
lodged 21.3 years ago


lazarus_
join:2002-08-31
Resolute, NU

lazarus_

Member

Swtich over seemless but have port problems

when things go a foul at Cogeco they deny all and blame it on your pc... My friend got the Enterprise account for the fast upload when he recieved the account and tried to connect to his VPN it timed out he tried various other applications and they wouldint work either. The help line denied everything and we finally got a straight answer from the forum. A few other things that shows that Cogco isn't very commercial orientated is the fact that they offer useless stuff and charge you for it even if you wont be using it (and if you want to use it you must request they enable it) I am talking about 250 emails and 75MB of space on their ftp/web server and a few dns options.. Also the upload speed is signifigantly faster but the download remains the same as the rest of the higher costing packages.. And as the accounts get more expensive the bit cap ratio gets smaller (the lite acc is 1/1 then once you get to the Enterprise it drops to 4/1...)
When people want to get a commercial account they want speed as well as (a high bit cap or unlimited) and are willing to pay the $$. I would suggest to anyone thinking of getting the costly Commercial packages to think about SDSL until Cogeco makes quits being so cheap..

[text was edited by author 2002-12-05 18:21:41]

Review by PEverett See Profile

  • Location: Burlington, ON, Canada
  • Cost: $45 per month
  • Install: about 1 days
great reliability
horrid email tech support (1 case)
great on-line presence at DSL Reports makes it 100% thumbs up!
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I once asked tech support by email if I had to do anything to activate more than 1 of the 3 IPs (dynamic) that come with the account and was told, with a bolier plate response, to kiss off and not bug them about my network problems. When I flamed that reply back at them and told them to support what they sell, I actually got an apology and an answer!

Their on-line info and promotional stuff is poor though and I find it hard to use their web site for info. However, you can't beat the connection reliability I have had for a couple years now.

Finally, their on-line presence at DSLREPORTS is terrific and I lurk there a lot looking for insights!

(2Mbs for $45/month or so)

member for 22.1 years, 128 visits, last login: 11.4 years ago
lodged 21.3 years ago


Review by Imzadi1 See Profile

  • Location: Canada
  • Cost: $49 per month
  • Install: about 1 days
Solid. Awesome speeds. Slightly bias, due to my employment.
Speed fluctuates due to the comitment to deliver as much speed as possible.
For me, for the dollar, there is no other way to go.
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I am an installer for Cogeco, a contracted Employee. But I will post this as a comsumer, due to the fact that I was a customer before I was a Cable Guy. I was the second non-employee to be hooked up to cable during the test pilot progam. I had one of the top dogs do the initial set-up. This was 6 years ago. I havent gone back. Over three years ago, I hear of an opening with the Cable company. No hesitation, I applied. My previous experience is in sales and customer service for the most part, with a hobby job in concert sound. I am now the supervisor, and I expect all of my guys to be as much an installer as a customer service person. I feel it is as, if not more, important that the ability to install cable.

As a subscriber I have had nothing but good service from the service. Now I know that all the wiring that is in my house and my neighborhood is good, because, of course, I know it is. And I think that is the most important part of the system. If Everything is done right, right from the beginning, everything will be great. I dont think I have been down for more than a few hours on, maybe, 4 occasions. That is pretty reliable service. The speed, well, speaks for itself. Cable speeds are as good as it comes for the money.

Tech support is helpfull, and actually useful. They have the ways and the means to actually see problems before they happen, and usually most people dont even know that there is/was a problem.

Like that guy that "Liked it so much, I bought the company", I liked it so much, I joined the company. Love it as an employer, and a ISP.

member for 21.3 years, 97 visits, last login: 14.9 years ago
lodged 21.3 years ago


The_Unforgiven
@cgocable.net

The_Unforgiven

Anon

The_Unforgiven

Well here's been my experience with cogeco in Peterborough. All in all it was good till the last few weeks, maybe 6 weeks. Downloads are still good , but uploads are no terrible.

The limits of 10 down and 5 up, well I kind of disagree with it , especially in this day and age with the sizes of files created now because of high speed, heck just a iso package from a linux distribution I migh have that someone can't find will eat that 5 gigs up in no time. But for now it's alright since I really don't do much of either.

Problem #1 is crummy connection, really bad upload speeds, not so good download speeds.

But I will say this, I play online games, counter strike, and Medal of Honor being my fav's and it has gone downhill too, that alone will make me change for sure.

Problem #2, kept loosing connection to internet.

As for tech support, well, the ones I have talked to try, there's one I did talk to, she kinda sounded a little annoyed that I was telling here what was wrong (had too, last two tech's messed up, and I let them), I'm and CCNA, MCSA, and working on my track to my CCNP. That alone gives me enough knowledge about networks dealing with routed and routing protocols.
Here's the mistakes (keep in mind I have not revealed my professional designations)

First mistake made.
1) I was asked to go to speedtest site and check speed, it sucked. on download, but rocked on upload. He should have went through my nic config to make sure I am configured in half duplex (which it was anyways) because when there is good up's bad downs (4-6 kbs)it is a sure sign of configuration.
2) I was asked to do a trace to google, the trace hit teleglobe and choked, 1200 ms to get past teleglobe. I was asked to copy to text file and email, was sure it was teleglobes problem. Well, thats a router problem for sure, but the routers will sense the bad routes and converge to a better one. I let him do his thing, and did not tell him this. I knew this was not my problem, by the way the routers did converge 10 minutes later and google got a max of 100 ms per hop.

Second mistake
1) Tech support checked everything, and said everything is fine. I insisted on bad modem, I should have been asked why I felt this was the case. This time I revealed my Professional designations.

Here's why I felt the modem was intermittent. When I lost connection each time I could not open the modems internal web page showing stats on modem. If I recreated my problem, disconnected my coax to loose my connection, and tried to open the open the web page it came up. Now kep in mind I have just eliminated cogeco's network. So know when I lost connection and cogeco tech's say it's the internet, I'm shaking my head because I could not open the modems internal web page.

Now I did insist on a new modem, it was changed quite efficiently, I have not lost connecion once in 3 weeks. Still have the problem with the upload speeds, but downloads are fine.

There's my input