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Review by Natoma 
UPDATED: 297 days ago
member for 8.9 years, 1282 visits, last login: a few hours ago
 Hollis,Queens,NY
 Contract price not specified.
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I ordered DSL through Flashcom at first. But their wait time was horrendous, and the people that I spoke with on the phone for tech support couldn't answer my questions to such simple things as packet loss and ping. I think it was around 7 weeks wait or so. So I started looking around and I found another company which isn't even listed on the Brooklyn DSL isp list.
IBS Interactive. They gave me a wait time of 4 weeks, and in the past 2 months that I've been using them, I've had 1, count it, 1 outtage, and it occured for about 30 minutes. Turns out they noticed the downed router 5 minutes after it went down, and were working on it when I called 10 minutes after I lost my service.
The people there are HIGHLY knowledgeable. The techs have even questioned me on a few occassions as to how I know so much about networking quality (I'm a hardcore gamer.. 
Their service has been exemplory, and I have been so satisfied not only by their timely responses, but by the level of competency that I have recommended 6 of my friends to IBS thus far... They have over 30,000 newsgroups, no filtering, and their email servers have never failed me thus far.
I have a 768k down/384k up and I'm always hovering around 730k. My pings in Quake are anywhere from 10 --> 70, and my downloads are super fast as well.
»www.4ibsdsl.com/
Adam Hermin and George Sloan are the two guys that dealt with my account and they were very helpful.. Hell if you call George, tell him I sent you.
They have a 'perk' system setup for referrals that turn into installations.. hehe.
--
Natoma
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Review by Skippy25
UPDATED: 3 years ago
member for 7.9 years, 1103 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Hazelwood,Saint Louis,MO
$24 per month (month by month)
 about 5 days
 Southwestern Bell
 "Been with SBC for over 3 years now and never have had a major issue."
 "Support is in India so it is hard to get minor things resolved sometimes."
 "Recommend it."
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Still waiting for real speeds and real fiber.
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 Review by MxxCon
UPDATED: 5 years ago
member for 8.7 years, 3772 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Brooklyn,Kings,NY
$59 per month
"stable and reliable service"
"bad/slow techsupport"
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back in may '99 i signed up 384/128 for $59.95/month
my sale rep was jason, he answered most of my questions. during signup procedure he even told me that he can discount installation cost, and i would have to pay only for modem (i belive it as $400). i was told that i'd get a call in about 2 weeks from flashcom w/ schedule appointment times for BellAtl and Covad. well..2 weeks passed, nothing. i called jason, he told me that i'll get a call any day now..so i waited again, i had no choice since at that time flashcom was the only dsl avaible to me..4weeks passed, i called jason again, he told me to wait again and i'll get a call any day now..6weeks passed..i was really annoyed, i called jason and told him take care of my account that minute or i'll cancel my order. he contacted his supervisor or whoever, and that lady asked me for all my info AGAIN, saying that my order somehow got *LOST*!
2 weeks later BA guy came in and layed down a new phone line. another week later covad guy came in, he removed RJ11 jack and installed RJ45, after that he waited 55minutes on the hold for flashcom to get all info to setup me up.
after that i was flying! ...untill i got my bill..i was charged twice for dsl modem and $100 for installation. i called customer service and i was credited extra $400, but rep refused to credit those $100 saying that i was charged for covad service, and not flashcom. now i don't think replacing a phone jack cost $100 (he even refused to help me configure windows).
after that everything worked fine (i won't mention minor problems).
about weeks ago i noticed that my downloads were somewhat slow, i tested my speed and got 14k/s instead of my usual ~40k/s. i desided to wait a day to see maybe it was temporary(that was monday). on tuesday i got same speed, so was wednesday. on thursday i called techsupport, a couple of times i got *BUSY SIGNAL*, not even hold, finaly got thru, waited about 40mins, talked w/ some guy(he didn't say his name), i was told to call back in 24hours. i called back on friday and was told that that was router problem and flashcom will fix it possibly over the weekend. so that's whole week of terrible speed. i didn't even bother calling customer service cuase i'm sure flashcom would be too greedy to even partialy compensate me.
now a few days ago i noticed that flashcom have some special promotion 416/208 for $39.99; i desided to upgrade to that speed, i called customer service and after a 10min wait i was told that i will have to wait just as new subscriber, even tho i have a dsl line and dsl modem installed, so i refused.
P.S. in my rating for "mail,dns,news" i gave flashcom 5 cuase they have excelent news server. i had a few problems w/ dns servers that flashcom provided so i switched to servers that i found on my own. mail server responce time as good, mail delivery time is around 5-10min.
i used to be MindSpring dailup customer and i just love their service. Flashcom, here is a couple of points that you can work on.
1) MindSpring emails invoice to their customers every month and/or on request.
2) MindSpring provides free webpage..nothing fancy such as cgi or php, but good enought for casual user
3) you can use a web page to see how many customers are on hold
4) mindspring provide some support for linux..i emailed flashcom for some basic help but was told that flashcom doesn't support linux and i have to research this topic myself.
Larry Webb, i would like to hear your comments on this post.
thank you.
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Review by latenight2
UPDATED: 5.2 years ago
member for 8.5 years, 101 visits, last login: 35 days ago
Saratoga,Santa Clara,CA
$39 per month (12 month contract)
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Signed up with Northpoint & Flashcom SDSL 416 by 416 for $39 a month plus $5 for an extra IP. Free install and 3com SDSL modem. 2 static IP addresses. START UP in DECEMBER 3 days to get the line working (they had to activate it and forgot). About 5 hours of calls and emails or more to get the second IP address. Never have received an email address. Yahoo is probably better anyway. The system has been reliable. I am just wondering if I can get a faster service for the same price. I consistantly get ~50kbytes/sec for downloads.
FEB UPDATE - One IP address died tonight. After about 6 hours of reinstalling IE drivers etc. I tried the other IP address It worked like a champ. I called and tech support had the 2nd IP up and running in 30 minutes. Thanks to Paul and Dave.
Latenight2 in Saratoga CA
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Review by byronshock
UPDATED: 5.3 years ago
member for 8 years, 181 visits, last login: 118 days ago
Boston,Suffolk,MA
$50 per month (12 month contract)
about 35 days
Verizon
CLEC party: Covad
"99% uptime, consistent connection (6 months downtime free, 7 hours of downtime today)"
"7 weeks to installation, 100 ms ping latency, hard to get 300kbps streaming throughput without dropping frames"
"Au revoir, Flashcom. Still, it was many times better than my Bell Atlantic DSL experience."
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Today I noticed the first significant downtime on my Flashcom DSL line that I have had for six months; it appears that the gateway failed. It's up again after about 7 hours. Having previously had a service that subjected me to extended periods of downtime, utiltized flaky equipment, and struggled to maintain even a 64 kbps media stream between Boston and Washington, DC, I have appreciated the consistent connection I have gotten from Flashcom. It's supposed to be about 600/128, and my occasional tests have verified that I am getting the full speed of the line for file transfers. (See below for my comment regarding 300 kbps media streams.)
I switched to Flashcom when we moved to a new apartment; Bell Atlantic DSL told me it would be many weeks before they could restore my service; even though I was already a customer, I would have to go to the back of their queue! I realized my chance to jump ship and I have not regretted it. The install process for Flashcom was as promised, except that their appointment with Bell Atlantic was about a week later than Flashcom had planned. C'est la vie.
I have been happy with my setup. I have a tiny Efficient Networks Speedstream 5260 external ADSL router and a static IP address for my machine, which makes remote access and monitoring a breeze.
The only problem I currently have is that I have a hard time getting a 300kbps media stream, particularly during evening hours. I don't have a problem getting higher throughput with other protocols, however, so I suspect that this is really a problem with streaming servers and/or network congestion. Akamaized content seems to stream much better.
* Update: 4/28/2003 - Adjusted Value for Money downward from 4 to 3 and Connection Reliability downward from 4 to 3 to be in line with my current (2002-2003) RCN Cable review. This has historical value only since Flashcom is no more. The bases for these adjustments are that $50 for 600/128 bandwidth is no longer a better-than-average price, and that any connection that speed that will not support 300 kbps video streaming can hardly be considered to be above average in connection reliability, even if the uptime is near 100%. Three years ago, 99% uptime was a revelation, as I had suffered through Verizon's hellish initial implementation of DSL.
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Review by Jacob
UPDATED: 5.4 years ago
member for 7.7 years, 3017 visits, last login: 35 days ago
Los Gatos,Santa Clara,CA
Contract price not specified.
"-"
"-"
"-"
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n/a
[2 years later, flashcom has long since passed away]
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 Review by MrNo
Posted: 5.5 years ago
member for 7.2 years, 2247 visits, last login: 1 days ago
Munster,Lake,IN
$49 per month (12 month contract)
about 7 days
Ameritech
CLEC party: Ameritech
"Reliable, No Downtime (so far),"
"Slow Upload, Can't host servers or a web site, PPPoE"
"If you can't get anything else get SBC. ANYTHING is better then dialup"
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I got SBC after I moved to a new area which did not have cable internet access. Before that I had AT&T Broadband for 3 years and I had Telocity SDSL for about a year or so. Out of those 3 Telocity was the best deal EVER. The speed, static IP, free DNS forwarding etc. You will not get any of these with SBC and they charge the same price. Upload is slow, however I have them for 3 months now and I had no downtime whatsoever. My line was up and running even before the scheduled installation date. On the other side I have a friend who got the same deal as I, and he lives about 10 minutes from me. His line is capped at 384 and they just don't want to uncap him. We called and complained and no one helped. Nightmare.
So I guess it depends how lucky you are
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 Review by sporkme
Posted: 5.5 years ago
member for 8.1 years, 3926 visits, last login: a few hours ago
Montclair,Essex,NJ
$2 per month (month by month)
about 3 days
Verizon
CLEC party: Focal
"wonderful!"
"Horrible!"
"good and bad"
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I just want Flashcom in my annoying avatar-area.
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 Review by bresni
UPDATED: 7 years ago
member for 8.1 years, 1024 visits, last login: 15 days ago
Waxahachie,Ellis,TX
$39 per month (12 month contract)
about 35 days
Southwestern Bell
CLEC party: Rhythms
"The service is solid, and performance exceeds expectations."
"Turnup was delayed weeks, due to Rythms rejecting the SWB loop 3 times."
"Great service once working, but dont hesitate to get personally involved in order to expedite turnup"
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I've been running nicely since May on what appears to be 384/384, according to the DSL Reports speed tests. The verbally negotiated deal was for 384/128 with one static IP. For a 24 month committment, the Cisco 675 and installation would free. I opted for the free install and router, but never did sign any sort of a contract. They did quickly charge my credit card for the required $100 order deposit.
Here's an interesting (but probably not unique) installation story:
Within 2 weeks after placing my order with Flashcom, Rythms initially phoned me to advise that the ILEC (SWBell) would be visiting my home to install a new copper loop. I advised the Rythms coordinator that the outdoor mounted NID was readily accessible from the street and no coordination with me was required for this part. SWB actually pulled a new drop from the pole to my house for the DSL circuit about 2 weeks later. After the new loop was in, a Rythms installation coordinator sent email advising me that their "inside installer" would be paying me a visit. This technician, a subcontractor with Carolina Cable, was a pleasant and courteous chap who arrived right at the scheduled time, with my new Cisco 675 router in hand. Try as he could, he was unable to get a solid WAN LINK on the router though. After trying many things for over an hour, he was going to pull new inside wiring from my computer to the NID as he thought my existing IW might be bad. While he was getting a spool of cable from his truck, I ran an AC extension cord out the window near the NID and suggested he look for WAN LINK on the LEC side of the NID. He acted as though this was some incredibly ingenious idea, but scrambled up the ladder with the powered up router in one hand. Anyway, still no WAN LINK at the NID, but at least he didn't have to run new IW. He informed Rythms of the problem and departed graciously. He was a bit embarrassed (and I was a bit annoyed) that Rythms did not pre-qualify the loop prior to dispatching him. I did make sure to get the IP, GW, and DNS assignments before he left, as well as making sure he left the router with me.
Here's where the real fun starts. About 3 days later SWB shows up at my house to do "line testing". My wife has the SWB tech phone me at work and he explains that he did their standard testing, and "no trouble was found".
I phone Rythms the next morning and ask to speak with the provisioner handling my circuit to see if all is well now. She invokes a remote test and says the *same* splice fault still exists at xxxxx feet. I ask her to phone SWB for ticket status. After a long on-hold time, she tells me that SWB closed the ticket yesterday based on their tech's NTF. I'm fuming, but she's probably seen this hundreds of times before. I asked her why SWB did not see the problem. She went on to explain that Rythms testing is much more stringent than the simple continuity and pair balance testing the LEC does. Her testing includes TDR tests, to catch anomalies that would degrade DSL, but wouldn't noticably affect standard voice service. The LECs dont usually do TDR tests until tickets are escalated a couple of levels.
I feel we're getting closer to resolution here so I hook the router to my NIC and bind the NIC to IP with the assignments I received earlier. I keep watching for the WAN LINK to go solid green
Anyway, Rythms opens another ticket with SWB. SWB Tech show up again the next week while nobody's home, and closes the stinkin ticket again, as "no trouble found" without even consulting anyone at Rythms. Rythms TDR re-test now shows the splice fault at a different distance from the CO, than the previous test did.
We'll here we go again. Rythms opens another ticket with SWB. 3 days later SWB shows up at the house. My wife phones me to let me know they are at the house. I told her to make sure the SWB tech phones me before he leaves. When finished, the SWB tech phones me at my office. Real nice guy, he explains that "regular" I&R techs like him dont do TDR testing. "That's another group", he says. I quickly bridge him on with the Rythms provisioner. They have a nice chat and come to an understanding that Rythms should have specifically requested DSL qualification testing and TDR testing by SWB. (Well duhhh, does SWB really think that Rythms is selling voice grade service??)
Something is finally done by SWB, or Rythms, or both the next day. I'm actually seeing a solid green WAN LINK on the router. I can now connect on the DSL circuit, WHOOOPEEE... I phone the provisioner at Rythms (who I'm now on a first name basis with) and she explains the SWB fixed the last splice fault, so she was able to patch my circuit to a live DSLAM card. I told her I was up and running, with good performance. She thanked me for my patience, and complimented me on my tenacity.
But wait, it's not over yet...
About 10 days later I get an email from a Rythms installation coordinator. The email says they will be sending out an installation tech out in a week to perform the router installation and inside wiring......
Oh, by the way, my only contact with Flashcom themselves was my first phone call to order the service which they confirmed back to me with some emailed Word docs explaining the order/install process. I've never had any need to contact them for tech support or anything since that initial phone call.
Also, at the time I ordered service, Rythms was the only DSL CLEC in my small town, and their only ISP partners here were Flashcom and Phoenix. Phoenix wanted $10/month more for a smaller downstream rate. I believe that SW Bell, our ILEC, has recently started offering DSL here.
B.R.
UPDATE 12/15/2000
Recently got the news of Flashcom's demise. Too bad, because I never experienced any outage or degradation on my 384/408 Flashcom service. The service has been 100% solid and dependable. NEVER had to call Flashcom for anything since turn-up. Rythms now owns my service and wants to sell my account to Earthlink to help pay some of the millions of $$ that Flashcom owes them.
I'm now a bit leery about the state of National ISPs like Earthlink and national CLECs like Rythms due to all the red ink in this business. I don't want to have to keep changing ISPs or CLECs every few months, so I plan to go the "safe" route. I won't take the Flashcom to Earthlink "transfer" deal offered by Rythms.
I placed an order with the local ILEC, Southwestern Bell, today for new DSL service. I feel more confident that that they will be around longer than any of the others. I just hope that SW Bell can turn up the new service before Rythms pulls the plug on me. I will miss the bridged static IP that I had with Flashcom, but I think I can get a external device to deal with the PPPoE that SWB runs.
BR
UPDATE 12/18/2000
Just got notification that the plug was going to be pulled on my Flashcom service on 12/28. No way that SWB can get me running in 10 days. I just can't imagine going back to dialup, even if just for a couple of months, so I cancelled the SWB order and signed up for the Earthlink transfer. I'm stuck with their 6 month commitment now, but I'll look into SWBell service in about 4 months.
BR
UPDATE 8/10/2001
Been running fine with Earthlink as my ISP on my Rythms physical connection since December at only $39/month.
Deja vu has struck again though. A few days ago Rythms filed for bankruptcy protection, and today they announced they were ceasing operations in 31 days.
Another ISP switch is I something I probably could have handled, but when the company providing the physical connection goes away, so does my internet access.
It's time to select a new line provider and ISP that will be around for the long haul.
Helloooo SW Bell. They will cost me $49 but at least I wont have to deal with this bankruptcy and service disconnection crap anymore.
I'll keep my Earthlink account until the SW Bell DSL is working as they also provide dial access with my account
This will be my last update under this Flashcom review topic.
Any new DSL review by me will show up under SW Bell.
BR
DUE TO THE IMPENDING RYTHMS SHUTDOWN I ORDERED SWBELL DSL SERVICE. AS OF 8/23 I'M RUNNING ON MY NEW SWBELL CIRCUIT. SEE MY REVIEW OF IT AT »Review of AT&T Southwest by bresni
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 Review by Hpower
UPDATED: 7 years ago
member for 8.2 years, 1423 visits, last login: 1 days ago
Glendale,Los Angeles,CA
$49 per month (12 month contract)
about 7 days
SBC
CLEC party: SBC
"Totally AMAZING connection stability and speed! A blast!"
"Nothing really. You just have to know a little big about the technology and be prepared."
"I am so amazed with pacbell ADSL on pronto RT! It's just too good!"
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THIS REVIEW IS FOR PACBELL DSL, NOT FLASHCOM! Have 4 reviews, which is MAX!
Prepare for a perfect DSL connection!
Review memory jog:
Q:What speed did you order, at what monthly price?
A:Pacbell ADSL 384-1.5mbps/128
Q:How was the order/install process?
A:Totally flawless...excellent!
Q:What was the home equipment?
A:Efficient Networks 5260
Q:Static IP, dynamic IP, or PPPoE?
A: PPPoE
Q:Other bad/good experiences?
A:Too many positive experiences! No bad experiences! Too good!!! My pings are very awesome, low, and stable 24/7.
-=INSTALLATION=-
I used to have Charter Pipeclog and canceled it this morning. Glad I did!
I ordered Pacbell 384-1.5mb/128 for $39 a month for the first 3 months (which will turn to $49 a month after the 3 month period) on July 20th. I am on a 1 year contract. This service comes with a $149 rebate that I can use to pay off the first $150 bill i am expecting using a mastercard.
Talked to someone rather not very knowing about DSL and ordered ADSL after 2 years of trying. Was told i should expect the equipment by next week, and it arrived exactly 1 week later, with everything I expected. Did the install myself, of course and got perfect sync.
I am running my connection behind a linksys 4 port router and do NOT have ANY ppoep software (or protocol in the network settings in windows 98) installed. I have a username and password in the setup page of the routuer, using dynamic routing settings flawlessly.
-=REGISTRATION=-
I registered my username and password at the pacbell's sercure website using my friend's computer next door on his cable connection.
The email server is so blazing fast! Never expected these speeds! I just did 3 speed tests and got:
Test running..........
** Speed 1227(down)/134(up) kbps **
(At least 24 times faster than a 56k modem)
Logging result
Finish.
Test running..........
** Speed 1220(down)/134(up) kbps **
(At least 24 times faster than a 56k modem)
Logging result
Finish.
Test running..........
** Speed 1221(down)/135(up) kbps **
(At least 24 times faster than a 56k modem)
Logging result
Finish.
Ping stability:
Max ping 109
Min ping 102
No difference, and 100% transmit with no packetloss everytime I did a tweak and speed test.
Man, this is stability heaven...
Settings:
RWIN: 35000
Windows Scaling: No
Timestamping: No
Selective Acks: Yes
Path MTU Discovery: Yes
Black Hole Detection: No
Max. Duplicate Acks: 3
TTL: 64
MTU: 1492 (and 1492 on linksys router using latest firmware 1.39)
-=FINAL NOTES=-
One thing, i have good wiring in my house. I use CAT 5 wires, and have every computer in my network tweaked: 1 laptop, and 2 desktops.
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Flashcom
