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Review by jeffsiver 
Posted: 6.3 years ago
member for 6.3 years, 1 visits, last login: 2.9 years ago
 Carol Stream,Dupage,IL
 $65 per month
 about 14 days
 "Easy installation; easy configuration; fast"
 "An attenae was added to my roof"
 "Great Value"
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I have a 1.5Mbp max connection @ $65/month plus $400 installation. My previous connection was IDSL ($105/month, 144kbps connection) so this is a great deal if DSL and cable are not available.
When the installer left, my service was up and running. And the speed has been very good (I am guaranteed 256kbps but haven't seen anything near that slow).
When I called their tech support, a ticket was opened and a tech called me back in about 10 minutes. Very good from my previous experiences.
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Review by ccfries
Posted: 6.4 years ago
member for 6.5 years, 12 visits, last login: 6.2 years ago
Lake Villa,Lake,IL
$65 per month
about 30 days
"Rockin' speed off-peak. Available."
"Packet loss, speed slows a lot during the week, PPPoE randomly disconnects"
"Only game in town, but well worth it."
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I was originally an 'antioch wireless broadband' customer that got sold to DLS. I would have just signed up with DLS, but I didn't know who owned the tower.
So, my connection in Lake Villa is good, for the most part. Packet loss is about 0.5% while it's connected. But if I try to host a game with my XBox, it disconnects a lot (usually PPPoE disconnecting, and my router or XBox not recovering). I tried connecting XBox directly to my antenna unit (Trango 10mbps) but it reports "your connection was disconnected" after 10-20 minutes. Same result with my Linksys doing PPPoE and connecting the xbox to it.
Another application that sucks is Outlook using a VPN into work. Too much packetloss and Outlook doesn't retry nicely with the MS Exchange server.
So, on the weekends I get about 3 mbps both directions, worst case I get around 200-300 kbps (numbers could be low because of packetloss). Most of the time it's plenty fast (1+ mbps) and my tower has 4.5 mbps running to it.
Install went fine, when it was scheduled. Took a little while, they were backogged.
Tech support seems very competent. Took about 16 hours to fix a major packetloss (3-4%) problem and turn it into a minor one (0.5%). I'll have to pester them again, even with the packetloss pretty low my PPPoE still disconnects when I'm using my XBox.
Hopefully I'll figure out this crap with my xbox. Maybe if I get a static IP instead of PPPoE it won't have a chance to log me off 
oh, another vital stat, $350 for install of user equipment. Kinda pricey, but reasonable considering the work they have to do. Probably close to the actual cost.
-Chris Fries (chrisfries(at)dls.net)
www.dls.net: 0.4% packet loss
Ping statistics for 216.145.234.4:
Packets: Sent = 3897, Received = 3882, Lost = 15 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 8ms, Maximum = 253ms, Average = 49ms
www.dslreports.com: 0.6% packet loss
Ping statistics for 209.123.109.175:
Packets: Sent = 3854, Received = 3829, Lost = 25 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 87ms, Maximum = 360ms, Average = 144ms
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Review by dslmsm
Posted: 6.4 years ago
member for 6.8 years, 59 visits, last login: 2.8 years ago
Crystal Lake,Mchenry,IL
$75 per month
about 2 days
""Dude" rating on speedtest; 1st hop ping < 10ms; Great tech support"
"None"
"Worth the money. Wish I would have done this sooner."
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I had heard about dls.net through dslreports. From their coverage maps, it appeared that I was close to the center of their 10MB coverage area in Crystal Lake. After speaking with the sales dept, I faxed the order to them Tuesday 06/17. Installer came as expected on Thursday 06/19. Did a thorough, professional job installing. The antennae on the roof is relatively small, about 9" X 11 rectangular, sitting on top of a 10 foot mast. If you are worried about how it looks, don't. It looks cool, and in a quiet, dignified manner it bespeaks "Broadband!". After he set it up, he ran a speedtest on their server and it took 62 seconds to download 50MB file. My own recent speed tests are as follows:
2003-06-27 23:35:52 Speed test (www.dls.net) 4472/6655 kbps
2003-06-27 01:29:50 Speed test (www.dls.net) 5610/5931 kbps
2003-06-25 23:23:27 Speed test (www.dls.net) 5017/6342 kbps In the rain. It seems unaffected by weather.
Finally... the coveted "Dude" rating on the speedtest scale!
Latency is extremely good, I am consistently receiving first hop ping times of 5 - 7 ms. Average latency on the dslreports line quality test is about 32ms.
In real-world performance based on regular surfing and downloading it is "way" fast. Much faster than my previous adsl connection, and much faster than my 812kb SDSL that I had in the days of the "residential dry pair" before Telocity/DirecTV discontinued their dsl service.
Tech support is superb. After they set me up with a static IP ($10 more/mo) I needed to call them to have the IP address updated in the domain name servers. The tech on the phone (who answered right away) knew exactly what I needed, and updated the dns on the spot. It filtered through the "tree" and I was online at my workplace within minutes. What a welcome change from the "...have you rebooted your computer and mo-dumb?" response that seems to be prevalent with many of today's dsl ISP's.
Although the install cost is not cheap ($400), for me it was worth it. Bottom line: you get what you pay for. These guys are great and I would recommend them without hesitation to anyone looking for a super-fast service.
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Review by sharkette
Posted: 6.4 years ago
member for 7.5 years, 19 visits, last login: 6.2 years ago
Mundelein,Lake,IL
Contract price not specified.
about 3 days
"OUTSTANDING connection, service. tech support"
"none as of yet"
"Where have I been?"
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Fought w/ Sat provider for the past 6 weeks while they were doing a mail downgrade. They referred to it as a mail upgrade..hahaha... I had constant packet loss @75%, hours on tech support with junior rookie reps who havne't a clue, only to be told the mail works even though it only partially or sometimes made it to the destinations, ichy browsing...a total headache...
I read about DLS here on dslreports. Emailed a person in the hood, who had a review posted, he validated my thoughts. I ordered the service, they installed in 3 days and I am rockin". Installer was knowledgable and curtious! They answer their phone in a few minutes, (don't even hang up on you, nor do they argue with you,)
actually treated me like I'm paying their salary instead of inconviencing them, just like a client should be treated. Wow. What a concept!!
The wired PC is getting about 4300k, the wifi toys are anywhere from 1200-3900K, one of which never got beyond 250ish w/SAT provider.
I think I'm about 5-6 miles from the Lake Zurich tower and am thrilled with a provider that really provides true QOS.
65.00 per month, is a value to me.
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Review by mprimus
Posted: 6.4 years ago
member for 6.4 years, 1 visits, last login: 6.4 years ago
Crystal Lake,Mchenry,IL
$65 per month
about 3 days
"Quick install, great speeds most of the time, helpful sales associate"
"High install cost, antenna on roof (ok with me, but wife has an issue), higher per month cost"
"2-3x faster than the dsl, so well worth it."
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Most of my speed tests are between 1.5 mbit and 4 mbit. There have been some times when the speed was not so great, but they almost always coincided with a system wide issue which was usually solved very quickly.
Great install, great response time (ordered on a Monday, it was up on Wednesday).
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Review by Ghost1971
Posted: 6.4 years ago
member for 6.7 years, 73 visits, last login: 2.6 years ago
Lake In The Hills,Mchenry,IL
$65 per month
about 11 days
"Installation was quick, the speeds are very good."
"hefty installation fee"
"Worth it even though the installation fee was a bit hefty."
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I am very pleased with the order to installation process. I called up DLS on 06/02/2003 and it was installed on 06/13/2003. I ordered the 10Mbps PPPoE service at $65.00/month. The installer showed up as scheduled. I was impressed by how quickly the installer set up my service. I believe it took about an hour. He was EXTREMELY professional. When he came into the house, he took off his shoes. He did not leave any mess, he cleaned as he went along. The antenna used is small... a lot smaller than a satellite dish. It can not be seen from the front of the house. Overall, I am a happy customer and the installation fee is worth it.
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Review by Gary1126
Posted: 6.5 years ago
member for 7.8 years, 264 visits, last login: 5.7 years ago
Algonquin,Mchenry,IL
$65 per month
"Great Tech Support, Excellent Install, Good Sales Support"
"Different Sign-in ID's for mail, news, login etc."
"Excellent service!"
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Cable or DSL is not available in my area. I have been using Satallite for the past year and a half. With Sat I was getting down load speeds in the 1 meg range and uploads in the 75k range. With DLS I am getting between 3 and 6 meg depending on the time of day. Pings are also great at about 53ms. With Sat I was getting pings of 900ms or greater.
The install went flawlessly, taking only about 90 min from start to finish, and the installer was on-time.
Nice Job!
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Review by thebigfoges
Posted: 6.5 years ago
member for 7.3 years, 403 visits, last login: 2.9 years ago
Crystal Lake,Mchenry,IL
$65 per month
about 28 days
"Fast Downloads, Good Pings, Great Tech Support"
"Minor downtime and slowdowns + some choke and loss spikes"
"Semi Solid need upgrading of tower."
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Well, I couldn't get DSL or Cable so I went with DLS. I have been very happy with it in every possible way except it goes down sometimes for like 20 seconds and I get some Choke and LOSS in online games. Im not gona write some real long reveiw on it but let me say that this service owns. And there tech support is great. I only hope that it will always stay the same or get better and not get over crowded.
Loss spikes in online games becoming very common.
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Review by thenetguy1
Posted: 6.6 years ago
member for 6.7 years, 64 visits, last login: 5.2 years ago
North Aurora,Kane,IL
$65 per month
"Has a lot of potential."
"Unstable connection, poor customer communication"
"The only game in town."
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I have had DLS.net since mid February, prior to that I was running Starband (two-way satellite, the absolute worst!!!). Installation from dls.net took ~45 days from order to install, I think some of this can be attributed to high growth rate and weather (winter time).
When I first used the service I was very impressed, after coming from a high-latency environment (satellite) I was happy once again to be able to VPN into the office and return to online gaming.
After having the service for awhile I have experienced many issues relating to PPoE authentication, disconnects, bandwidth dropping to as low as 56K and high latency. Each time I contacted tech support, they were very helpful, they acknowledged the issues and called the ISP that manages the tower. Apparently the tower that I am on (North Aurora) is shared with another ISP, which as business practice makes sense, but becomes a finger pointing issue when problems arise.
I am in the IT field, so I am fully cognizant of the technical issues that arise, and am fairly patient when given a valid explanation. Throughout the last month when I called with problems, it was always a problem with the tower, and DLS would contact the tower admins to resolve, which it would clean up for a day or two. I was told that in addition to configuration issues on the tower, there was also a bandwidth issue that DLS was resolving by dropping in their own T's, from my own professional experience I am fully aware of the horrors of dealing with Ameritech/SBC and the delays that are involved, and don't hold DLS fully accountable for this, after all they acknowledge the problem and are making or at least saying they are making attempts to resolve the issue.
In addition, to bandwidth there appears to be a configuration problem on the tower. I was called by a representative from DLS after a neighbor posted another comment on here, and he apologized for the service and assured me that they were going to take control of the tower and gave me a tentative timeline for the repairs.
The issue was supposed to be taken care of on 4/14, DLS would climb the tower and make the appropriate adjustments (would correct latency problem). When I came home Monday night my connection had not improved and seemed worse. I called tech support they didn't have any information, then they found out that the other isp was refusing DLS to work on the tower and that they would correct it, but had no information as to when it would be corrected. The next day 4/15 there was an email posting on DLS's website saying that service was postponed until 4/16 and to check back for further updates. At the end of the 16th there was still no sign of improvement and no update on the website. I found out later from another user (not DLS) that the repair was postponed due to weather (understandible if notified). The fix was then scheduled for the 17th, when I got home on the 17th, there was still no change and again no update to the situation. I found out again from another user that they had not completed repairs and would complete them on Friday 4/18. I was home all day on 4/18 and my connection was extremely bad, which I took as a good sign that perhaps they were making modifications. I checked DLS's website as instructed and still no update as of 4/15. I called DLS and they said that they were working on the tower (as I expected) and that they should be complete within 2 hours, at which time my connection did improve. My latency was somewhat stable although my bandwidth was still very low some times less than 200K.
Today I was disconnected again and tried to reconnect and it took approx 10mins to connect. I called tech support to see if they were perhaps working on the tower again, because of course the web site wasn't updated to say that they would be. The tech that I talked to said there was an open ticket on the tower and that he had no knowledge of there being any work done on the tower that week.
This raises a huge red flag. Not only is the customer kept in the dark as to the status of repairs, the poor guy that answers the phone is kept out of the loop as well, which I would assume makes his job more difficult.
Now that my rant is done, here is my bottom line. For North Aurora, and most surrounding areas, DLS is the only game in town. Prime Directive is out there, but that is a whole other nightmare you want to stay clear of.
I am hoping that DLS will take to heart the business importance of being the only game in town. If they grab the marketshare and keep the customers happy then it's a win/win for everyone. If they fail to do that people may still use them until other alternatives make themselves available.
I feel strongly about the technology, I think it is an excellent alternative to cable/dsl. I also strongly believe that DLS is technically compentent to offer a superior performance to their competitors. I chose DLS because of all the postive things that I have heard from other postings. I want to stay with DLS and make it work, but things have to change for that to happen.
I have had numerous converstations with the folks at DLS, and from day 1 I believe that they genuinely want to provide the best service to their customers. However, I think that they are missing one key component, and that is the customer. To be the best doesn't always mean 99.999% uptime and blazing fast speeds. It also means customer service and communication. I have been in IT for many years, and I know the old sayings like "it would be a great place to work if we didn't have these users", unfortunately it's the users that keep you in the job.
DLS needs to correct their communication skills immediately. This isn't going to be done by apologizing and agreeing that it needs to be done. It needs to start with action. From my perception the communication not only needs to be improved to the customers, but internally as well.
I have banded together with some neighbors (also on DLS) as a mini support group. We share e-mail and conversations daily so that we can start putting the puzzle together. That's not how it should be done. I think we would all agree that we don't expect DLS to be perfect, problems arise, things break, etc. and yes a lot of it is beyond DLS's control. However, when something is outside of DLS's control they need to focus on what they can control, and that is customer relations. Let people know what is wrong, and a timeline for correction, and if and when the timeline changes let us know too.
I really want DLS to succeed, but have been very concerned these last couple weeks. I finally decided to post on here, becuase I know that they do monitor this site, and I'm beginng to believe that they don't monitor their voice mail, because calls aren't returned.
So one final plea, to DLS, turn being the only game in town to your advantage, get the technical issues resolved, and start keeping your customers informed. I would like nothing more than to turn the comcast or sbc guy away when they start calling, and that will happen if I'm satisfied with the performance and customer service.
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Review by sherold
Posted: 6.6 years ago
member for 6.6 years, 2 visits, last login: 6.6 years ago
Elgin,Kane,IL
$75 per month
about 7 days
"1 week from contact to install. SMALL antenna (6in X 6in) on side of house, no 15 ft pole on roof."
"None so far"
"Only solution available in this area, but far exceeds expectations for not having any competition."
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So far, after a full's day worth of use, absolutely no complaints. I've been running speed tests regularly and have consistently been getting 115K/sec Downloads. I am using a Nortel VPN Client and have not had a disconnect while working from home. I was able to have a static IP address assigned at the time of install, as opposed to having to wait for a complete reconfiguration of DSL equipment that I've experienced in the past with other providers.Great Ping times to yahoo (shown at end of emssage).
A far cry better than the 144k IDSL line, which is the only other service in this area. I have a clear view of the South Elgin Water Tower on McDonald Rd, which is less than a mile to the south. Installer was professional and here less than an hour. I am using a "new" Alvarion BreezeAccess antenna that is less than a half square ft in size. It is mounted outside the window of the home office against side of house. Installer was showing an rssi of 90+ while testing. I run my own DNS, and don't plan on heavily using email service through DLS, so gave those services a rating of 4. I also have not had to work with tech support yet.
Reply from 216.109.125.66: bytes=32 time=58ms TTL=49
Reply from 216.109.125.66: bytes=32 time=53ms TTL=49
Reply from 216.109.125.66: bytes=32 time=51ms TTL=49
Reply from 216.109.125.66: bytes=32 time=48ms TTL=49
Ping statistics for 216.109.125.66:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 48ms, Maximum = 58ms, Average = 52ms
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DLS Internet Services
