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I have internet america, but lately DSL speed have soared and I am getting connection problems when performing the upload testing, it is really slow. member for 11.3 years, 2 visits, last login: 6.5 years ago updated 11.3 years ago
First, the monthly cost includes my landline, which I pay for solely to support IA's DSL service. It formerly was worth it... Phone $48 + DSL $30 = $78. Ive been a long time customer and have pretty much had a good experience even through their move away from Dallas (to Houston). They discontinued 24/7 support long ago and the L1 crew now must be reading from a script. Recently, IA reneged on the free static IP address they gave me as an inducement to purchase their services a long time ago. I was provided more than adequate time to decide whether to keep the static IP and pay them an extra $25/month or to switch to DHCP. After exhausting all avenues with them L2 support finally told me "look, they know they are going to lose customers over this, but you really have no choice. They have switched to a new provider and are 'required' to charge everyone for static IP." OK, I gave in after they shut off my connection a couple of times - which caused me to go through support calls with them which took over 2 hours each. Not only did I lose my static IP, they also shoved PPPoE onto my service at the same time. The other day, I went to use the internet and had no connection. I scoured my server, my new settings, retrained the DSL modem, and still - nothing. Finally (thinking "no way" they shut it off again), I called them just to eliminate the possibility. After going through the scripts with L1 for about 15 minutes I finally got to L2. I reached a very patient soul there who told me that "yes, they did make a switch that requires a change in your DSL modem settings". I asked why they didn't let me know first and they blamed it on the "obscure" modem I have (Alcatel 1000). Hmm, I bought it from them when DSL first became available. Admittedly, it is old, but my credo has always been 'if it ain't broke don't fix it'. So we went through the process to modify my modem settings and it is back up - for now. OK, I guess this has been a personal rant, but it irks me. I am switching to a new provider in 3 days. Did I mention that my TCOE is dropping by $43 (no landline required) while at the same time my 1.5/256 is going to 6/768 ? You won't hear any remorse from me. I will review my new provider when I have been on their service long enough to work out the kinks. See ya Internet America! member for 22.8 years, 61 visits, last login: 2.7 years ago updated 15.1 years ago
I've used several other wireless broadband options over a span of about 5 years, and none of them have been very good. The satellite broadband's "fair usage policy" left a sour taste in my mouth due to how restrictive it was. The only option left available was wireless internet by antenna. I have used Internet America in the Ford Bend, TX, region for almost 2 years now. In the beginning, the service worked great. The speeds were good and there was little to no down time, then there was a storm in the Houston area and they said their network had been damaged, which was about 3 months after I got the service. Since then, it has never been as good. I use the internet to play online games, which (according to their website) are supported by their service. The problem is, I play World of Warcraft, the most popular online game in the United States and due to lost pings and lag spikes the game is nearly unplayable. I opened a notepad document and ran a constant ping to google.com (run/cmd -> ping google.com -t) and whenever I would get multiple timeouts in a row, I would go to google, type in a word, and search for it... if there was no response for a few seconds, I would conclude that my internet was experiencing heavy lag (due to some network device timing out because of errors / packet collisions) and I would write down the time in the notepad document. This was the result. 6:37pm 6:39pm 6:41pm 6:44pm 6:46pm 6:48pm 6:50pm 6:52pm 6:55pm 6:56pm This kind of network connection makes online gaming impossible, because online gaming (though not bandwidth heavy) is very dependant upon a reliable connection. If the connection is broken (even for a few seconds) you are kicked off of the game or your connection has to reestablish itself (which is usually completed 15 - 30 seconds after the connection comes back "up" from a lag spike). So, in effect, my internet service allows me to only keep ~75% uptime while gaming online. I have contacted Internet America multiple times, and had my problem "escalated to level 2" multiple times with no resolution. For months it was talk of "we're currently upgrading our towers and the Fort Bend tower is on the list" but now when I call they don't have an answer for me. They call it "minor packet loss" but it's pretty significant to me, as it results in about a 25% downtime. If you enjoy doing any online gaming, or anything that requires an open connection across the internet I would advice against using Internet America's wireless broadband service. member for 15.3 years, driveby review (so far) lodged 15.3 years ago
not happy with the service. *************I DO NOT RECOMMEND THIS INTERNET PROVIDER********** member for 20 years, 804 visits, last login: 7.1 years ago updated 16.5 years ago
Internet America has now almost fully digested fledgling 2Fast Communication, my first wireless DSL ISP. Overall, this change of ownership has improved signal delivery. San Antonio Ranch subscribers have recently begun to look forward to extended periods of predictable signal strength and quality, as well as a boost in surfing speed, from 800-1000/1000-1200 kbps to an irregular pattern topping out around 2150 kbps to 2700 kbps.Together, these changes were a God-sent for all compelled to weather service and signal deficiencies from day one of a fledgling ISP's business. Also, service calls had been routinely routed to Dallas, as opposed to less satisfying responses from San Antonio-based techs. This puzzling move, however, was perceived as an improvement, since most problems were being resolved by phone, as opposed to the mixed success of a local tech house call. Finally, though 2Fast had wooed its subscribers with free installation, upkeep, tech support,"toaster" roof antenna, router, radio/receiver, mast, Mohawk 5E cable, AND an in-line ethernet booster, the new owner has been slow to publish his service charges, despite piece-meal billing for all services and equipment. member for 17.2 years, driveby review (so far) lodged 17.2 years ago
IA bought out the local wifi service. They left a message that we needed to schedule a change over. We called many times but only got a recording. We left messages but never got a response. Then they shut down the old service so now I have no service at all. I finally got the support department to patch me thru to the person who was not returning my calls. She said it will be a couple of weeks before they can get to me because they are booked up converting other customers. If there are that many customers who are still not hooked up to the system then clearly they should not have shut down the old system yet. This is the worse service I have seen anywhere. We don't have an alternative at this time, but I will be very receptive to getting rid of these bums as soon as someone else offers service in my area. DO NOT USE INTERNET AMERICA!!!! member for 17.9 years, 4 visits, last login: 17.9 years ago lodged 17.9 years ago
HISTORY I have been with Internet America (IA) since 1995 and was one of their first customers. I had a 24/7 dial-up account for 5 years. Initially the service and tech support and reliability were great. However their tech support and reliability have degraded over time. My main complaints about Internet America's service are in regards to disconnects during a dial-up session and too frequent problems with e-mail (outbound often gets bogged down and undelivered for up to 8 hours, inbound has similar problems though not as frequent). TECH SUPPORT / SERVICES (Mail, News, etc.) Their tech support constantly denies that their mail server queues outbound mail for later delivery, however it is easy for me to verify the opposite since I have more than one POP3 account through other providers (not AOL) and can run tests between more than 5 e-mail accounts. This is the reason for the average 3 star tech support rating, and the poor 2 star rating for Mail service. Also, during the past two years, disconnects during a dial-up session have become more frequent and annoying. Long downloads from Microsoft (usually Windows Updates or patches/service packs from MSDN) were almost always interrupted by disconnects from IA's server. IA told me it was probably due to phone line quality, but my phone line hasn't changed in 5 years and GTE/Verizon ran tests on the line and reported no problems. PRE-SALES INFORMATION So I decided to upgrade my service from 56k dial-up to avoid the dial-up frustrations altogether and to increase my Internet access (I needed to do that anyway, I guess... time marches on). I looked at Cable options (ATT@home) and DSL. When I first asked IA if my fax/data phone line at home qualified for DSL, they indicated I was well within range for 1Mb connection. I did some research and weighed the DSL/Cable pros and cons and elected to go with DSL. Three weeks had passed since I first asked IA about my phone line and DSL. When I contacted them again and indicated I was ready to upgrade to DSL, their account rep said I was not within their DSL coverage area and would not be for at least a year. What?? How could this critical factor have changed in just three weeks? I chalked it up to a totally inept/incompetent sales staff. This is the reason for my rating of only 2 stars for pre-sales information. INSTALL COORDINATION IA suggested that I contact my local phone service provider which is Verizon (formerly known as GTE) and see if I qualified for DSL service through them. So I called GTE/Verizon and they said I qualified for 1Mb service. I told them I wanted to get DSL through them (768/384) and keep IA as my ISP. They said no problem. We swapped details over the phone and they told me it would be about a four week wait for my self-install cable modem to arrive. Three weeks passed and I received a CD in the mail from Verizon. It was for their ISP service. I did not open it. I waited another week. I called them back when no modem arrived and asked them the status of my order. They said my CD had been sent more than a week ago and I should have it by now. I reminded them that I had requested DSL service. That was news to them. No record of it. This turned into a battle with GTE/Verizon that lasted about another four weeks. I finally reached a competent tech/sales person at Verizon and she took care of everything for me. IA provided complete information to GTE/Verizon regarding my account, circuit, phone line, etc. GTE/Verizon got everything right without having to contact me. No hitches there. This is the reason for my 4 star rating for Install co-ordination. (The initial GTE foul-up was not IA's fault, so I did not factor it in to my Coordination rating.) CONNECTION RELIABILITY DSL modem arrived, I installed it (easy) and made the necessary config changes to my TCP/IP settings in Win/98 per Internet America's instructions and things have been great ever since. However, because of my previous 56k dial up disconnects, I rate Connection Reliability at 4 stars instead of 5. If my new DSL connection proves to be 100% reliable, I will update this rating to 5 stars after 6 months or so. I signed up for 768k/384k service and according to the speed tests here at DSL Reports, I am averaging 500k+/150k on west coast servers and 600k+/250k on east coast servers. This is average or slightly better than average for 768/384 DSL lines. I also made the registry modification to increase the RWIN size (DefaultRcvWindow) as found here: »/tweak ··· /Windows. Prior to applying this tweak, speed tests were just slightly lower. So this tweak improved my performance a bit. I am running BlackICE firewall by Network Ice (find them here: »www.networkice.com) and the security tests here at DSL Reports indicate that I am well protected from attacks and intruders. VALUE FOR MONEY I am paying GTE/Verizon $30+ per month for the line and IA $19 per month for ISP service, for a total of about $50. I think this is average for 768/384 service, which is the reason for the average 3 star rating for Value. member for 23.3 years, 17 visits, last login: 20.6 years ago updated 20.7 years ago
My story starts out on dec 26, 1999. I called Verizon to setup DSL. They asked me to chose an ISP. I looked for some local ISP in the webpages and called them up and they offered me a decent price(cant remember the name) and started the process. Well this ISP started taking too long and I called Verizon and asked if I could chose another. They told me I could. I was quoted $34 384/384 by Verizon for the "silver plan." I asked the rep if they could give me any idea of a good ISP in my area. They gave me the number of a company called Cyber Ramp. So I called them and at this time Cyber Ramp had been purchased from Internet America. I informed the rep that I had the 384/384 silver plan and would like a comparable connection speed with them. I was told that it would cost me 19.95/month(faster plan 768/384 with NAT) + a 29.95 setup fee. I agreed and the ball began to roll. Hower a mistake got my credit card billed for a year of DSL service but a quick call to the accounting dept had that cleared up in about a week. In less than a week (I wanted my DSL!) I called Internet America and asked about the status, according to them everything was ready on thier end and I should call Verizon. I did so and found out my order had been confused because I chose to change ISPs. Within a day or two the information was sorted out and I just waiting on my modem and filters. When it arrived, I plugged it all in and I was online. I soon found out that I didnt like NAT and upgraded to a single static for $10 a month (since changed) and then changed to the fastest plan (1.5m/768) to 39.99. I actually got lucky and called Verizon to increase my line to the platinum plus and got a deal for $41/month for a 1.5/384 line. Shortly after I also acquired a block of static ips for 12.08/month making my total 100ish a month. Well to this day I am a 100% satisfied customer of both Verizon and Internet America. In over 3 years of dealing with both I have had a grand total of 3 downtimes 0 of which have been on Internet America's side. However , I will note that the Tech support for both companies was prompt and informative and my rare outages with Verizon lasted 1-3hrs at the most. I thank both companies for a wonderful DSL experience. I might pay alot, but I get what I pay for. member for 21 years, 2 visits, last login: 20.4 years ago lodged 21 years ago
We were using Internet America, and although they were expensive, $208/mon. for 5 individual IP addresses, it worked fairly consistently. However, on Thursday, January 16, our SDSL lines were working fine. Friday morning I got a 7:30 am call from my office asking what was wrong with our service; we could not connect to the Internet. We were in the process of switching telephone/sdsl services to another provider, which entailed a loop installation at the "d-mark" of our building. An SBC rep. performed this, and we thought he had done something to cause the interruption. After spending almost all day trying, unsuccessfully, to get SBC to return, we finally called Internet America. They informed us that "IP", the co. that actually furnishes the line to them for our use was in bankruptcy and was supposed to shutdown providing the line Feb. 23. However, they apparently decided, sometime Thursday evening or Friday morning, to shut down their delivery of the service, without notifying anybody. Internet America said in the interim, they could set us up a "dial-up", until something else could be worked out. The next day they sent us a letter stating they would no longer furnish an SDSL line and would only offer ISDN lines costing, I believe, about $343.00, or thereabouts per month!!! Talking about leaving someone in the lurch! Fortunately our new service, Ionex Telecommunications, expedited their installation and gave us a combination router/hub which only requires one IP address. They indicated our SDSL service would be under $100.00/month! Our up/down speed is 512 kb compared to 300+ before. Hope nobody else has to go through the treatment that we experienced with IP/Internet America, whom we won't likely forget. member for 21 years, driveby review (so far) lodged 21.1 years ago
NO problems so far.. fast switch over from COVAD/Internet America.. reliable connection.. not as fast as I would like, without mortgaging the house and kids.. but a decent connection. member for 23.3 years, 858 visits, last login: 15 years ago updated 21.6 years ago
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