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Review by Betak01 
member for 9.5 years, 15 visits, last login: 4 years ago
lodged 9.5 years ago
 Kew Gardens,Queens,NY
 $49 per month about 3 days "Very Fast, realiable, very affordable $49 a month, no hassle!" "Service for 9-months now 3 downtimes, fixed over the phone." "Best in my area DSL can go #&!* it self, especially speakeasy.net!"
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Got service within 3 days of order, two techs came in one for drilling and running new line, the other for cable modem setup. Bought my own modem, they let people do that in my area, so no more rental fees. Had RoadRunner for almost two years before that, all sorts of problems including dropped connection and very slow speed after 8pm. RCN has new Fibre in my neighborhood, low user count per router, so my speed maybe drops 10k during evening time. Very low ping, online games and streaming video are never a problem. Speed 3mbps/800kbps, recently upgraded to 5Mbps FREE!!!
Excellent service, low maintenance, Extremely Fast!
--- Don't wait switch to RCN if you can!
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Review by reptex
member for 10.4 years, 111 visits, last login: 2.9 years ago
lodged 9.6 years ago
- Silver Spring,Montgomery,MD
- $88 per month
- about 3 days
- "It's really fast, but the upload hasnt been what is advertised."
- "Not stable, my cable is usually down about twice a day, with a 2hr~ish duration"
- "It's good when it works....but these frequent downtimes are annoying the hell out of me."
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75$/mon for the first year, then $88 after that. The pre-sales service was good, installation took only 30min, everything went good, TV has lot of channels, more than comcast(previous ISP), speed was really fast. 48xx/6xx, with free upgrade to the MEGAMODEM, but after a little while, service stability is horrible. It would drop off line for a while, sometimes 1hr-2hr is the usual duration. But once was as long as 13hrs. Since I am getting pretty clear picture, I am not sure what the problem is...today a tech was supposed to come out and check, but never showed up, never gave me a call either. Sometimes the service is up, but it would have 80~ish% packet loss. It's really weird, these downtimes and huge packet loss pretty much kills my gaming. I am thinking I need to go back to comcast or go DSL or something, because comcast was not as fast, but it IS however, better in the stablity department. Help I like starpower, I dont wanna go back to comcast, I wish they can fix this little issue and I'll be RCN customer forever. 
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Review by dtmoore
member for 9.6 years, 0 visits, last login: 9.6 years ago
lodged 9.6 years ago
- Silver Spring,Montgomery,MD
- $43 per month
- (12 month contract)
- about 5 days
- "They are fine when everything works! Watch out otherwise."
- "Customer service is terribly slow (30-90 minutes per call). They are horrible to deal with when things are not fine."
- "They are better than he cometition (COMCAST) but only barely!"
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I was originally very happy with RCN/STARPOWER. They offered better quality service than the competition (COMCAST). With their modem I got a DHCP connection with good downlad speeds and the $40/month was not to unreasonable. Service was largely consistent and even in or after storms (not electrical storms) I could stay connected. Each time I called custoemrservice was prompt and answered questions intelligently.
However, something changed during the summer of 2003 something changed. RCN went BAD!
In late August the nightmare began when the modem went out. After a three hour telephone call (most of it on hold) I was told that customer service would come out and replace my defective modem for free IN A MONTH! Or, I could buy my own modem, pay $50 and they'd be out in THREE DAYS. Oh, and if I waited the month I might have to pay for service even though I could not cnnect--what a deal. Since I cannot be without Internet I accepted their not so subtle coercion to pay them. When the tech came out, he made one telephone call -- read the modem's serial number and MAC address, and left. Total time in house about 5 minutes (or $10 per minute -- but hey, who's counting?!). This was customer service? At this time I'd already been on the telephone with them for about 3 hours (and 8 hours of hold time -- I logged every call).
As of the present time, RCN has clearly grown beyond its capability to support its customers. Wait times are at least 30 minutes except at 3 AM. Wait times of 90 minutes have not, in my experience, been uncommon. The only reason I remain with them is that the competition, according to neighbors who have it, is even worse.
This is a case of the lesser of two evils. I for one am waiting for decent wirelessinto the neighborhood -- then we'll switch to satellite for the TV's and go wireless in the house.
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Review by floppydisk
member for 11.1 years, 23 visits, last login: 9.6 years ago
lodged 9.6 years ago
- New York,New York,NY
- $40 per month
- "None yet"
- "Tech never showed up. Never returned calls. 35K upload in NYC's UWS."
- "Awful so far"
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I requested an installation on Tuesday, 9/23/03 and the person said a tech would come over and install the cable modem and set up the PC on Thursday 9/25/03 between 11am and 2pm. I thought that was fantastic! As of 3:35pm on 9/25/03, no one showed up. I called up RCN 3 times, the first 2 times was to see if the tech was going to show up and how much longer I would have to wait. They said they would contact dispatch and dispatch would call me with the status. I waited an hour, no return call. I called RCN again and we did the same thing again. STILL NO RETURN CALL! So I called up a third time and asked to reschedule. They said the earliest I could get a tech was on 10/1/03. I decided to pick 10/2/03 because that day is easier for me.
Meanwhile, I found out from the sales person (from my initial call), RCN in my area, which is the Upper West Side in NYC has old technology where the upload is done thru your phone line and is only 35K (or 36K). It uses a frickin modem to upload! You can't use your phone while you're on the internet! He said the download speed is 1500K which is great, but I have a web page. How the hell am I supposed to upload my web page which has a ton of graphics with 35K upload?
I'm seriously thinking about cancelling with RCN and going over to DSL. Anyone know of a good reliable DSL company on the UWS in NYC? Good pricing and good speed, reliable, ... you know, what everyone else who looks at this site wants. I used to have Verizon a couple of years ago but they were awful (constantly down). Unless they've improved alot, I have no interest going back to them.
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Review by IamHydrogen1
member for 9.7 years, 2 visits, last login: 9.2 years ago
lodged 9.7 years ago
- Takoma Park,Montgomery,MD
- $75 per month
- about 7 days
- "Cheap, fast cable modem"
- "Very poor cable TV reception"
- "you get what you pay for"
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I got some sort of special where I get phone, cable TV and cable internet for $75/month, and I'm not supposed to pay for installation. Techs arrived as scheduled, and everything went ok. I ended up renting a modem from them - they said my Motorola wouldn't work with their system.
The phone works fine, the modem is very fast, but the TV reception is *horrible*. Lots of static and some pixelation effects from the digital signal. I put in a service request, and the tech said the reception I'm getting is "typical" and I have a very strong signal to the house.
Right now I'm trying to decide if I can live with this or not.
I'm also concerned about the bill when the time comes, because the price seems too good to be true, and I didn't get a whole lot of confidence from the salesperson.
UPDATE 2/29/04 - SURPRISE!! The price has jumped up to $100/month.
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Review by Wojski
member for 10.1 years, 300 visits, last login: 7.4 years ago
lodged 9.8 years ago
- Chicago,Cook,IL
- Contract price not specified.
- "Decent price with bundled packages"
- "Unreliable connectivity at times and unexplainable outages"
- "RCN is a decent provider for the average Joe, but don't expect too much"
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I have been an RCN customer in Chicago since they took over 21century. It has been a rocky transistion at times, and technical support seems to have there hands tied when it comes to explaining outages (canned responses) in my area.
Also, what ever happened to contacting your customer base before taking down a segemnt for planned maintence. I recall an email notification system years ago (probably 21century) that alerted users of planned maintence on the network.
Overall, RCN is providing me a what I consider basic service for a modest fee. What I am looking for is avaerage quality with a an average price tag. If things do not change in the next six to eight months, when I move I will not be taking my RCN service with me.
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 Review by fifty nine
member for 10.6 years, 2408 visits, last login: 1 days ago
lodged 9.9 years ago
- Astoria,Queens,NY
- $79 per month
- about 5 days
- "Great connection speed with mega modem, upload is 800k"
- "Sluggish DNS, you pay more if you don't subscribe to cable TV"
- "It's probably worth it for you, but I like it."
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I had Earthlink DSL, and I was totally fed up of all the problems I was having. One day I would lose dialtone the other day I would get it back and lose DSL. So I decided to get cable instead.
The initial install was great, they set up an appointment for me 5 days from the date I called them. Installation was professional, cable was well hidden and the cable modem was set up properly. They also didn't install any bloatware on my PC, which was good. They just gave me the pipe and basically I get to decide what happens from there. They even used BBR to test my line speed and it came up to about 3000/800. This was fine for me. The only thing I noticed was that DNS lookups took a couple seconds. I later added a caching DNS to my network and solved that problem. File downloads from a test site were well in excess of 400 kb/sec. Ping times to sites near to me were less than 10ms.
On the same day, as fate would have it, my vonage cisco ATA-186 arrived. I plugged it in to my LAN, and set it up and it worked great. I tried downloading files from a couple of sites, and I could still use my vonage with no problems. I have experienced no call drops, no echoes no nothing. Local and international calls complete without a problem. RCN and vonage worked well, it would seem.
RCN even gave me a nice welcome kit with a very friendly manual that explains all their services. I thought this was a nice touch. You call their 1-800 number and you can get a customer service rep in less than 5 minutes.
All in all, RCN looks like a company that actually wants your business. I think this is absolutely superb, and I'd recommend them to anyone who can get them.
My bill may seem a bit high, but I pay $25 extra for mega modem service, which basically raises the cap on your line. I'm also not a cable TV subscriber, so I end up paying more because of that.
They also gave me three months at $49.95 with mega modem, and they waive the installation fee. To get this they basically run a credit check on you and if you have good credit they'll give you this promo. I don't know if this is ongoing or if it's just a one time offer though.
Update 11/7/03:
RCN's megamodem tier is now 5000/800. All I can say is WOW. I've only had one outage which was fixed in less than 2 hours. Way to go RCN!
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Review by bijumathew
member for 10 years, 21 visits, last login: 9.8 years ago
updated 9.9 years ago
- Upper Darby,Delaware,PA
- $90 per month
- about 5 days
- "Way better than the dial up I had"
- "So far none"
- "From todays perfomance ! RCN ROCKS"
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OK I know that I might not have enough information to post a review , but Ill update it if any changes occur. I got the Essentials/CPI package where the first 3 months are $76 and the rest $90. To be frank I gave the value for money that much because previously with only 2 services my bill was going over $80. AOL and Verizon. Install started on Monday, Unfortunately we needed access ot the basement but our landlord wasnt in so they temporarily tied in the phone lines and left after setting another appointment for Tuesday 8:00 to 10:00. Now that we had access to the basement they came at 8:30 took out all the old stuff which wasnuselss and placed new wires and then hooked everything up and voila. Got cabel and intrernet working. I checked the speed initially at a different site other than dslreports actuall 8-( hence i couldnt find upload speed but the downloadspeed is 1 Mbps. I dont know if they rounded it up or something but that was the result. But anyway I tested it only for a half an hour and it was great during that time.
NOw my question is should I get the megamodem upgrade? Is there anything I should do to tweak my settings or is there any utilities I shoul download?
Updated: 06/11/2003:---> I have the connection till nowe and not once has the connection failed me in any way. Each day when I logo on I always check my speed here and everything has os far resulted in 1.2 Mbps / 700 + speeds. Anyway I find that the connection is absolutely stable and is working for me.
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Review by user94402
member for 10.4 years, 20 visits, last login: 9.9 years ago
lodged 9.9 years ago
- San Mateo,San Mateo,CA
- $75 per month
- about 10 days
- "It's not Comcast. Good speed off-peak."
- "Slow during peak times. Lousy news servers. Static IP is questionable."
- "It's not Comcast."
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Pre-sales: OK, I called the RCN 800 number 3 times. First time the sales person on the phone quoted me the wrong prices. Grossly wrong prices at that. Second and third time the prices and services quoted were consistent with the information on the web site, with one major exception. The RCN web site claimed there was a particular promotion for my area. The phone sales persons told me the information on the web site was out of date.
Installation: The installer called to ask if he can show up early. 11AM appointment became an 8AM one. I can't complain about that. Installation was professional and efficient.
Connection reliability: The first week I had the RCN service, the connection was extremely unstable. During peak hours of late afternoon to evning I would see packet drops of 5% up to 27%. This was fixed after the first week. Now the connection still seems sluggish at times, but it's at least usable. I would still see occaional afternoon packet drops of up to 20%.
Static IP: I ordered the static IP option for $10. As it turns out, this only means that the IP would be static for a MAC address. If the MAC address changes, the "static" IP changes also.
Tech support: Clueless. Mostly polite, though I had one guy who told me, "Since you seem to know everything that's going on anyway, why don't you fix it your self?" Then he hung up on me when I asked to speak to his supervisor.
Mail, DNS, News: I only use their news server, which is *abysmal*. Low retention times, and lots of articles missing. It was unusable, and I ended up subscribing to an outside USENET service.
Value for money: Costs about the same as Comcast. When Comcast was stable in my area, it was a better service (better USENET, more usable during peak times). Unfortunately, Comcast has been having daily outages in my area, so there is no comparison. Also, the price increases coupled with lousy service have left a bad taste in my mouth. I wish I have another option, but I live a bit too far from the nearest CO, and I am stuck with cable modem and RCN.
I actually subscribed to the cable modem + telephone service bundle from RCN, and my $75 monthly fee was for the bundle. Phone service from RCN seems to work fine for me.
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Review by shammyh
member for 11.4 years, 167 visits, last login: 3.1 years ago
lodged 10 years ago
- Brookline,Norfolk,MA
- Contract price not specified.
- about 4 days
- "High Speed, Ok Upstream, Fairly Reliable, and Fast Human Tech Support"
- "Phone Tech Support is slow"
- "Great Service, Recomend to all who can get it!!!"
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I live in outside Boston, MA. I have many high speed interent providers available to me, incuding GalaxyDSL, RCN Cable, Comcast Cable, AT&T Cable, and Verizon DSL. I have know people who have tried them all and I am happy that I have RCN. I do have the Mega Modem service which expands your downstream and I HIGHLY recommend it to anyone who has RCN. I actually get the full line of serivces from RCN and MegaModem comes free. I live in one of the most updated areas of the RCN network so I tend to get very good speeds. I also run a server on my cable modem (don't tell RCN) and I still get great speeds. My cable modem is cappped at over 415KB down and 100KB up. Even at peak hours I still usually get full down and up speeds. The service is farly reliable as long as you have good signal quality in your location. I also recomend the new Toshiba modems for best proformace. I only have a few minor problems with RCN. One problem is that their tech support isn't the best. It takes a long time to ever get thorught on the phone and when i do half the time I get someone who doesn't know what he/she is doing. The other half of the time I get someone very knowlegeable you fixes any problems very fast. The same goes with the human techs who actually come to my house. The other minor problem/complaint I have is that RCN doesn't offer an expanded upload service. As far as I can tell MegaModem just increases our download. Overall RCN is a eeat service and while not cheap it is in my opinion the best cable ISP around Boston.
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