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Review by prcdc 
Posted: 3 days ago
Fair warning: reviewer joined this week
 Brampton,ON
 $34 per month
 about 4 days
 Bell Canada
 "Best speeds I have never had with dsl and great tech support."
 "I have used the 60$ a month services and the 40$ a month services and for 29$ a month this blows all other dsl providers away."
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quick speeds, great service and little downtime.
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 Review by Turbinator
UPDATED: 4 days ago
member for 1.7 years, 288 visits, last login: 1 days ago
Mississauga,ON
$31 per month
about 7 days
Bell Canada
"Maximum advertised speed, extremly reliable, super customer service"
 "I seriously can't find a single negative point, from my perspective."
"Best bang for your buck in whole of Canada."
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I have been with TekSavvy for over 2 years, during my entire time with them they have always endeavoured to help with any problem I have ever had. In the beginning after I just signed up, they worked with me to bring my connection speed up to its full advertised speed of 5Mbps. Ever since then I have never had any problems, and after Bell Canada started to play with DSL speeds, TekSavvy has offered us alternatives to get around that, and took it upon themselves to communicate on our behalf with the CRTC to fix the issue with Bell.
I seriously didn't thing such a capable and understanding ISP existed until I switched to TekSavvy. Trust me, you wont be disappointed.
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Review by so142001
UPDATED: 4 days ago
member for 2.9 years, 53 visits, last login: 4 days ago
Mississauga,ON
$42 per month (month by month)
about 8 days
"excellent customer service, reps always are friendly most of the time, 24/7 telephone tech support"
"Terrible signal on the lines makes for 1.4 Mbps speed max yet I am paying for a 5 Mbps service."
"Dependance on bell's line's make this company vulnerable"
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I paid for a 5Mbps speed, getting only 1.4 Mbps capped speed. Teksavvy reps blame it on the terrible quality of the signal on my line, however I am 5 KM from the bell office. This makes for sever problems. They consider this a "reasonable" connection and not worth providing a refund for. The worst experience I've ever had with an internet service. I ended up paying 62 dollars for the first month (20 for activation) and I get a connection not worth beans.
[EDIT] I forgot to include a few details about the service I paid for. The service I paid for was a dry loop connection. Also I spoke with a manager and they came up with a reasonable solution. Pending future events I will be editing my review. Thanks and sorry for any inconvenience [/EDIT]
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 Review by Phibian
Posted: 5 days ago
member for 33 days, 8 visits, last login: 2 days ago
Ottawa,ON
$83 per month (month by month)
about 10 days
Bell Canada
"Excellent customer service, cutting edge services (MLPPP), reasonable prices"
"None"
"Best ISP I've found so far"
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Used to be with Magma/Primus. They continued to give us the same service for a higher fee then what they currently offer. Poor support (have to wait on hold and they are always trying to sell me things I don't need / want).
Was looking into SDSL but found that you could bond multiple DSL lines together with select ISPs (TSI being one). Very pleased with TSI during the setup of the accounts and their move to make MLPPP a supported service.
Went with two Premium lines (one dry, one wet) with two SpeedTouch 516 modems not that it really makes any difference (I live very close to the CO). Also went with a static IP and a routed subnet.
Most struck by their transparency on the DSL Reports forum as they discussed officially supporting MLPPP and went through the process of setting up new equipment to do so.
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Review by vintagewino
UPDATED: 6 days ago
member for 5.9 years, 485 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Grimsby,ON
$32 per month
about 1 days
Bell Canada
"Customer service very responsive, high quality, reasonable prices"
"Bell refuses to look after its crumbling infrastructure."
"Should have switched a couple of years ago. One of the better alternatives."
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I have had DSL for almost 8 years. Another option here is cable, but since it goes out or gets noisy frequently, and combining higher costs and bandwidth caps, I will not consider them.
History with old ISP's:
I was originally with Sympatico (1MB profile) for a few months, then switched to my last ISP (Look) for the last 4+ years. They kept me on the 1MB. Price went up when 3MB came through, and I was eventually put on a 1728/384 profile. Price went up again, as they said they went to a 5 MB capability. No speed change visible at my end, though. Was told my phone line was junk, & that's the best that can be done, end of story. Then features & 'perks' started disappearing. They wouldn't even talk with Bell about speed issues. This is the speed - live with it. I also had to buy their DSL modem. I prefer that. It came with their software CD, but NOTHING from the modem manufacturer -- no CD, no manual, NOTHING. And, they REFUSED to give me the password the unit. If it was a rental, I could see it. But NOT when you outright purchase it.
January of '07, old ISP's bubble burst. The DSL went out for 24 hours. When it came back up the speed was fantastic! Within 72 hours, it dropped back to the 'normal'. Queried my modem, so I bought and installed an ST516 modem. No difference. More complaints, nothing done. In October, I guess I finally got the right person, because they raised my profile to 3008/512. A week later, I got a letter from them stating fees were increasing 5% ($2) the next month. I went to cancel them, but was told I had to give old ISP a full 30 day notice. Fine. Next call was to Teksavvy to get an account activated and to try and co-ordinate as reasonably 'seamless switchover' as you can get between old ISP, new ISP and Bell. Old ISP disappeared Dec. 16th around 16:30, and Teksavvy came online Dec. 17th around 9:30 AM.
The Switch:
The speed was blazing, then everything disappeared. Seems Bell pulled the old profile about an hour later. Half an hour later, the connection was back up, but the connection has been a bit flaky, as I think the profile I'm on now is pushing the line. Very little headroom for noise. 3776/672 profile. There's still a bit of tweaking to be done to get things 'right'. The noise margins & attenuation factors aren't exactly the best due to 12000 feet of older lines between CO & home.
If you like being misled, treated like a number, fighting through multi-depth menu systems and listening to some awful elevator music for a very long time just to try to TALK to someone who won't LISTEN to you, and pay a higher price for less value, that is your prerogative, and you had better stay with your original ISP, because that is not Teksavvy's way. In about 10 calls to Teksavvy with questions, concerns, planning, my longest wait was about 3 minutes. No menus. Maybe a quick message saying everyone's tied up and to hang on. Then a real person comes on who will actually try to help you. What a concept!! E-mail queries from tech support have been answered in less than 4 hours. Oh - I forgot -- I had not gotten that inane message to go to the website for assistance as I got with old ISP.
Will update as the dust with Bell settles.
Update 12/21/07: Dust has settled. Line profile is 3008/512FP (as I expected due to less than ideal line). At least a higher speed was attempted. OK, we know now what the line can handle. Speed test: 2528/419.
Final results: great, responsive tech support, optimum speed connection, newsgroups, lower cost.
Should have done this a long time ago.
Update 3/27/08: Speeds are erratic courtesy of Bell's inept traffic shaping. Bad pings.
Update 04/22/09:
Well, beginning of March, there was some excitement. Speeds went into the dumper; horrible time keeping sync. it took me some time to ascertain the problem was not my side of the demarc. Called support March 9th. It took until March 27th before everything was resolved back to normal. What got me upset was the eager willingness of everyone just to drop my profile (originally set at 3008/512FP 12/07, and working properly) down to 1184/512 IL. After 2 no-shows, Bell repair shows up 03/14 mid-afternoon. He changed the drop from the pole to the demarc, but didn't change the 14 year old demarc. More screwing around with profiles. I was beginning to think I was on a profile-of-the-hour plan. On the 18th, checked and found another neighbour (on Sympatico) was having grief as well. On the 19th, I was put on a 2496/640 IL profile, but the speeds were still varying wildly. On the 26th, everything snapped back to normal. Same 3008/512FP profile, same occupancy, as to when I started back in Dec/07. Never did hear as to what happened. My understanding was there were a significant # of tickets opened to Bell to correct the problem.
What bothered me about the whole experience was:
(1) the eagerness between Bell and TSI just to lower the speed profile, rather than looking for the cause of the problem.
(2) everybody I talked to gave me a different distance from my place to the CO. No 2 replies were the same. One Bell person actually told me I shouldn't have DSL available as I was too far (even though everybody stated my line attenuation was 52 dB).
(3) throughout this, I was left with the impression nobody believed me when I mentioned my original profile, attenuation, SNR, RO, at Bell and TSI. This really annoyed me.
(4) I was left under the impression that as long as I had some sort of DSL, that was supposed to be "good enough". To my surprise, my direct chat was locked on March 18th, but the real problem wasn't cleared up until March 26th. However, more phone calls back and forth and an e-mail to TSI "higher up" finally seemed to get the problem resolved.
Final results are same speed what i was used to, and improved short distance pings.
Although the problem was resolved, it seemed like there was a lot of unwilling cooperation on the part of the wholesaler to get the problem fixed.
Update 6/28/09:
After almost 2 months of normal operation, the line started misbehaving again, although nowhere as bad as in March. The D/L SNR varying from 14 dB to under 6 dB (resyncing). RO varying from 73% to 100+%. Even u/l SNR changing by 2 dB. Lots of CRC's (10000+/day) D/L, few CRC's U/L (under 50). Again, pointing to a possible line problem. Ticket to check line & repair - Bell tech checks line, says found problem in my CO, fixed. Yeah, right!! He's in TO, I'm in Niagara!! He drops my profile from 3008/512FP to 2568/640_IL. As we're chatting on phone, I told him profile change not acceptable. He says will ball back in 5 mins. Never did. Left me on crappy profile. I called back to TSI an hour later, found ticket closed. I'm afraid I lost it. Reopened ticket to restore profile.
So far, status quo. No resolution with line problem. Wish there was an alternative to Bell's lousy copper. Cogeco is an alternative, but not an option.
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 Review by HiVolt
UPDATED: 6 days ago
member for 8.5 years, 4393 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Toronto, ON
$40 per month
Bell Canada
"Honesty, great DSLR tech presence, no port blocking, MLPPP support"
"Currently P2P is being forcefully throttled by Bell Canada (read about MLPPP)"
"Great deals for either premium or unlimited whatever suits your need."
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Update June 28/2009
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TekSavvy has added more capacity in recent months as well as dedicated hardware for MLPPP. All is well!
Update March 17/2009
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No issues, still receiving great service from TekSavvy.
Update December 14/2008
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Well, the CRTC decision came and went, and they sold out to Bell. They are supposed to rule on the subject of Net Neutrality as a whole for all ISP's in July. I'm not holding my breath, as we know big ISP's & content providers have deep pockets.
As for my TekSavvy service, everything's been great. They've have added more capacity & redundancy in the last couple months to handle the growing demand.
Update September 21/2008
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No problems to speak of, all is well. The CRTC decision will be handed down October 31, I await anxiously and hope they will strike down Bell's traffic shaping. Until then, I'm still using MLPPP.
Update July 15/2008
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No issues, everything working fine. Still using MLPPP to evade traffic shaping, as CAIP continues to battle Bell at the CRTC. I referred my cousin two months ago, one quick email to accounting and I got my referral credit applied!
Update May 27/2008
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Well, some good news... As of a few weeks ago there has been a nice workaround for Bell's traffic shaping. MLPPP (MultiLink PPP) is working great with the help of some Linksys WRT54G router firmware modified by two determined forum members. Other methods of using MLPPP also exist, so read the forums, there are ways around the throttling!
Update April 16/2008
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On Apr.9 my area became affected with the throttling that Bell has imposed on its entire wholesale ISP customer base. While this is obviously out of TekSavvy's control, I feel its worth mentioning here. TekSavvy & other ISP's that are a part of CAIP (Canadian Association of Internet Providers) are currently fighting this issue by filing a formal complaint with the CRTC. I fully support TekSavvy in their fight, and props to them for sticking by their customers!
Update March 13/2008
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No problems, enjoying great service so far.
Update Jan 11/2008
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It's been a month after the official switchover, and it's been smooth sailing!
Dec 10/2007
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Woo, finally fully switched to Teksavvy! I've been using an unlimited login since about April '07, with very few issues.
I contacted TekSavvy mid November to schedule a switch, and provided them with a cancellation # from Sympatico. Sympatico cancellation was on Dec.9, and it was processed successfully and it looks like I've transitioned smoothly with no downtime.
I will update periodically as I have with my other ISP reviews.
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Review by Martian3
UPDATED: 8 days ago
member for 4.7 years, 20 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Lindsay,ON
$29 per month
about 30 days
Bell Canada
"Reliable service, knowledgeable reps, good price"
"None come to mind"
"Great service at a great price, highly recommended"
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I subscribed to Teksavvy a little over a year ago, when looking for a service that wasn't quite as exorbitantly priced as Bell. At the time I found myself routinely going over the 60 GB usage allowance Bell provided me, and thought Teksavvy seemed too good to be true.
The migration process went smoothly, although for some reason when I switched providers Bell decided to lower my line profile to 3mb. Once I detected the switch a quick call to TSI tech support had the issue resolved.
Upon moving to a new apartment, I ordered my home phone through Teksavvy as well. I'm pleased to say that both my internet and phone service were up and running on moving day, and that I have had very little issues in regards to that.
There have been two outages since the move and I did receive several emails due to a server bug. Unfortunately due to these issues I can't give Teksavvy full marks on reliability, but in all cases when I've called and spoken to tech support they've been friendly, knowledgeable and forthright. As a network technician myself, diagnosing my issues is much easier when dealing with representatives who are knowledgeable and do not blindly follow a script, as is the case with most major ISPs.
Overall, I am highly pleased with the service provided and make a point of recommending Teksavvy to all of my friends and family.
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 Review by TOPDAWG
UPDATED: 9 days ago
member for 4.1 years, 1565 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Midland,ON
$36 per month
about 5 days
Bell Canada
"Cheap price no blocking of any kind of internet traffic. Also you can pick no cap and with that I stil get great pings for games"
"Not much really. Everything has been fine so far."
"Great for the money and they let you use your net to it's fullest. Also the CS can speak clear English."
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I had rogers but after reading about the BT blocking caps and other BS they like to do and the price hikes every 2 months I want with DSL. I ordered the 5/800 plan. I had a static IP added. I called and the lady turned it right on just asked for my name and boom it was done. No let me move to you this person or please hit 1 now.
The order with them was easy and fast and the install was 5 days. I called to order cause really their web-site is crap.
So speeds are good the CS I can understand and the price is low and I can do what I want when I want with my net and use it as much as I want.
I've had it near 2 years now and I'm very happy with it.
The cost of the service is $42 a month I pay a extra $4 for the static IP.
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Review by didcrywolf
Posted: 10 days ago
member for 6.5 years, 31 visits, last login: 10 days ago
Mont-Royal,QC
Contract price not specified.
"consistent on phone service , dsl service never affected"
"chocking sometimes without warning"
"DSL days in Canada are numbered if Bell is allowed to throttle back"
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Much cheaper than Videotron... best deal around if you have your own equipment... check set-up fees can add up
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Review by frozenclaw
UPDATED: 10 days ago
member for 30 days, 21 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Canada
$34 per month
about 5 days
"Great Value, tech support, speed, reliability, service"
"None at all"
"This is probably the best ISP choice in Canada"
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I moved from Rogers to TekSavvy because a friend used it and recommended it. After calling and telling them that I wanted to jump on the TSI wagon, everything was set up extremely quickly and effective. The 200 gig cap is mighty and I can't even begin to use it all up. Everything so far so good. The connection is fast and solid reliable.
I'll definitely recommend to anyone who's tired of spending money on crap service with the majors.
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