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tdumaine
Premium Member
join:2004-03-14
Seattle, WA

tdumaine

Premium Member

Why dont many of you vote with your wallet?

Pages and pages of slow speeds, high ping, oversold. Not in one city even but everywhere.

I can relate if its the only choice besides dialup, but how many of you fall into that category? I'm sure not everyone does.

Companies take notice once thier income starts going away.

Not a flame, not taking a shot at you guys, honestly curious
Slipen
join:2010-04-18
Cairo, GA

1 edit

Slipen

Member

If it was a viable option you can believe most if not all would switch. You can say 98% of the people on here complaining about speeds and disconnects are the ones that have no other choice or are locked into a contract and can't switch yet until it is up. I for one would not think twice about leaving if I could play games on sat internet.

Verizon has expanded 4G LTE in the towns on each side of us, and are expected to be in my area in 1st qtr of next year. I have tested it multiple times in each while visiting friends 17MBPS down or higher and 3-10 up. When it is here and I can check it I will glady forget I even knew a company named Windstream.
tdumaine
Premium Member
join:2004-03-14
Seattle, WA

tdumaine

Premium Member

If they arent even close to giving whats in the contract its fairly easy to get out of the contract, they are in breech of contract. Even if the wording is "up to" this speed, there is reasonable expectations.

ISDN available to you? I know its not high speed, but it would do gaming well.

Bodybagger
Premium Member
join:2010-03-30
Saint Matthews, SC

Bodybagger

Premium Member

That's just it.. Rural areas need more competition rather than useless satellite and low capped wireless. Nobody, and I mean nobody would stick with a company like Windstream if there was another reasonable choice for broadband. It takes too much time and money to sue them and chances are their lawyers are better than what you could afford. I'll never touch wireless with their low caps. They are just as greedy as Windstream in that manner.. even if their networks are better. Satellite is useless for my broadband needs and that's the only other choices we have. Windstream understands this and continues to provide sub par service. It makes me wonder if they are trying to make people leave, then they fix their network, and the only way to come back to Windstream is to get locked into a contract. We already see what is happening with Kansas City and Google Fiber. Once some real competition comes along, the ISPs that have been rolling in profits and providing 1/80th of the speed for the same price are struggling to keep customers. It's a damn shame this couldn't happen all across the country.

Liv
@windstream.net

Liv

Anon

Dont you think we would if we could? We have no choice, windstream knows this they are preying on rural communities where they hold a monopoly. If they were to do business like this in a major competetive area, they would be out of business. They are a predatory company, I would live for comcast, At&t, verizon anyone to come to southeast Missouri and give us a choice. And I am sure 99% of the posters here would like the same.

Brian_M
join:2004-06-19
Manchester, GA

Brian_M to tdumaine

Member

to tdumaine
And then there are people like me... waiting out the 6 month contract that they refuse to let me out of.

Not much I can (afford) to do till then. But my money will be going to the only other option... comcast. I'm not exactly thrilled about it either.
LostInWoods
join:2004-04-14

LostInWoods to tdumaine

Member

to tdumaine
said by tdumaine:

ISDN available to you? I know its not high speed, but it would do gaming well.

I hadn't thought about ISDN since I last had it 10+ years ago. Assuming that you can even get ISDN in your locality, the issue would be finding a rural dial-up ISP that supports it, with a POP that's not a toll call. And since Windstream would provide the ISDN line (monopoly provider, remember?), and they consider the ISDN line a business class service, it would likely cost as much or more as the DSL line you would be dumping. And then you have to add the dial-up ISP cost.

The fact is that most of the folks on this forum who are having problems simply have no other high-speed option than satellite. I doubt wireless data would be any faster for most of us than WS's broken DSL. I know I get EDGE speeds on my phone, and VZW is no faster - no LTE in my woods.

What galls me most is that WS is given federal stimulus money, borrowed from my children's future prosperity, to extend their network deployment. That's bad enough by itself, but in addition there are no strings attached to ensure that their network is worth a damn. Uncle Sugar pays them to deploy DSL, only to have them deliver dial-up speeds. Such a deal.
Bashlin
join:2011-06-20
Douglas, GA

Bashlin to tdumaine

Member

to tdumaine
we are stuck with this carrier as of now.. other companies are beginning to come into my area but it'll be mid to end of 2013..i don't think anyone in their right mind would be here if we had any other choice.

Piggie
Just A Pig With A Computer
Premium Member
join:2005-11-23
Orange Springs, FL

Piggie

Premium Member

There isn't any choice in most of the Florida areas. Now they are doing something in my neighborhood but I can't find out what. New fiber line. New remotes on every corner. No word. Meanwhile for the last 3 years I have been lucky to see 1m in the evenings. I have used everything you can imagine. Sat and wireless are worse.
Slipen
join:2010-04-18
Cairo, GA

Slipen to tdumaine

Member

to tdumaine
ISDN if offered would still run through the lines Windstream owns.. You would still be dealing with them for your internet service and before dsl the top dialup where I am was 26,400.
sethf
join:2008-08-29
Danielsville, GA

sethf to tdumaine

Member

to tdumaine
As others have said, it's because I have no real choice. Usually my 3mbps line gives me around 2mbps, but sometimes it's dialup speed. The hspa+ I get through AT&T is almost always faster but I only have a 10GB pool of data shared between 4 lines. I tether on particularly bad nights, but could not live with a 10 GB monthly cap. Satellite is more expensive and the caps are no better. Charter passes by my road with a 100/5 package but according to their last survey our "homes passed per mile" formula is barely short of their roi formula (we have 30-something homes per mile on my rd, definitely not urban but not middle of nowhere either). Therefore we're stuck with crappy speeds and can't do anything about it. I'll leave the first day I have a better option. I'll just continue to have a 10Gbps link at work and a 3Mbps connection at home for the foreseeable future.

auraxoxo
@windstream.net

auraxoxo to tdumaine

Anon

to tdumaine
I do vote with my wallet. I call and get a bill credit every single month and spend at least four hours on the phone a month getting tickets open with tech support so I can get that bill credit when I call in.

As it happens the only other choice in my area is satellite with the high data cap at 5gb. Yes you read that correctly 5gb. That is no kind of choice.

Crazy Dave
Formerly known as Seph83
Premium Member
join:2004-04-29
Homer, GA
Askey TM-RTL0102
Ubiquiti UDM-US

Crazy Dave to tdumaine

Premium Member

to tdumaine
Vote with my wallet... and pay a rip off rural power company to resell me Windstream's 3mb for the price I pay them for 12mb. Or... I could try their fiber that isn't Windstream's... 15mb/768k for $60 a month... And... $1300 to dig the fiber line to my house... I'd burn through Satellite's pathetic caps in a couple days streaming Netflix on a couple TVs, plus I might as well just throw my PS3 in the trash, since it would be useless online.

By the way, I'm not normally a complainer, but I had the best, most stable 12mb Windstream connection in North Georgia, and I'm 1800 line feet from what was a good RT, and now during the heavy usage time I'm very lucky to see a 3rd of what I pay for.
GearheadX
join:2010-05-11
Hilliard, FL

GearheadX to tdumaine

Member

to tdumaine
I would vote with my wallet if a Comcast rep had not literally laughed at me when I called up asking if they had service in my area. So, yeah, I have no other options.