 jmcgeejr
join:2000-05-15
Kirkland, WA | step in the right direction its great they are offering faster speeds but they could be a little bit more price savvy. I expect to pay 49.99 or 59.99 for 10/1 and 39.99 for 5/512 and 29.99 for 3/256 but oh well ... | |
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wdoa
join:2001-10-16
Spencer, MA
1 edit | Re: step in the right direction Charter has never been known to be "price savvy", here in Central Mass their HSI has always been much pricier than DSL.
Charter's Corporate rule #1 seems to be "don't compete on price". | |
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AMDUSER
Premium
join:2003-05-28
Earth
clubs:
 ·RoadRunner Cable
2 edits | Re: step in the right directionHere in North-Central WI, Charter is overpriced.
A sampling of prices locally, per month:
...Charter------------------------------- Verizon
$36 384/128 kbps $14.95 768/128 kbps
$46 3meg /256 kbps $29.95 3 meg/ 768 kbps
$35 3 meg/ 768 kbps Dry Loop
For Charter add $10 if not subscribed to any other service.
For Verizon add about $5 to regular price if subscribed to Dry Loop DSL.
Both: add applicable sales taxes / fees. Prices show, if not specified are the 'bundle' rates for those services. | |
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| | | cluth
join:2004-01-06
Anchorage, AK
·GCI.net
1 edit | Re: step in the right direction Ugh, you folks in the Lower 48 make me mad!  Up here, GCI's a great provider and has good customer service, but we're paying $99.99 per month for 10/384--and that's on TOP of a subscription to "The Ultimate Package" (a telephone/cable TV/broadband lite bundle, as GCI is both our cable provider and our local CLEC). The Ultimate Package is $79.99 per month. Without the Ultimate Package, $99.99 gets you 4/384. And add $7 if you don't have cable TV with GCI.
The competition's almost worse: the ILEC, ACS, offers 320/240 DSL for $49 and 1/320 for $70 (add $5 if you don't have ACS long distance). They offer nothing more than 1mbps unless you're a business.
I subscribe to GCI'S Ultimate Package, some extra long distance minutes (total of 500), a DVR, and the 5/256 cable modem plan (only a $49.99 upgrade to the Ultimate Package), and my GCI bill is $170-ish per month. Yikes. I've been thinking about ways to trim that down, but I don't have a reliable fallback (both my EV-DO and my GSM cell phone service is iffy around my house, despite that it's a well-populated area of the city), and I'm too much of a techno-geek to give anything up.
My point: be grateful for what you have down there at the prices you do! (And if any state regulators are reading this, hint: it'd be nice to figure out how to get a little more competition up here...how about adding another franchise license up here or something...) | |
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Rick
Premium,MVM
join:2001-02-06
Waterbury, CT
clubs:
| said by AMDUSER  :Here in North-Central WI, Charter is overpriced. A sampling of prices locally, per month: ... Charter------------------------------- Verizon
$36 384/128 kbps $14.95 768/128 kbps
$46 3meg /256 kbps $29.95 3 meg/ 768 kbps
$35 3 meg/ 768 kbps Dry Loop
For Charter add $10 if not subscribed to any other service. For Verizon add about $5 to regular price if subscribed to Dry Loop DSL. Both: add applicable sales taxes / fees. Prices show, if not specified are the 'bundle' rates for those services. Aren't you kind of comparing apples, and oranges here?
Those appear to be Verizon's promotional prices, not what their price will be when the specials end at the end of the contract term.
Cable companies also offer special deals. It's just that they don't advertise them in such a way as to make people think they'll get it forever.
In fact, here's one from Comcast.
»www.comcastoffers.com/1/?cid=53069
When you combine the 19.99 month pricing plus the 75.00 cash back plus free modem, this is in fact a much better deal than even the much lower speed DSL providers would offer.
The problem here is with the Telco industry and the fact that they've advertised these very low rate specials in such a way and so intensively that people now think that's their regular pricing..when it's not.
3MB dsl service for 39.99, which the price will go up to after the promo ends, is not competitive with 6MB and higher speeds from comcast for the mid 40.00 range.
And, 30.00 384k to 1500k dsl speeds which the lower tier dsl packages will go to is hardly competitive with that either.
This pricing scheme is the kinds of tricks the DSL industry has had to resort to to try to win customers.
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The life you help save just might be your own Team Discovery | |
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pb5k
more cowbell
Premium
join:2005-11-16
Glendale, AZ
·Cox HSI
| Re: step in the right direction 3MB dsl service for 39.99, which the price will go up to after the promo ends, is not competitive with 6MB and higher speeds from comcast for the mid 40.00 range.
And, 30.00 384k to 1500k dsl speeds which the lower tier dsl packages will go to is hardly competitive with that either.
This pricing scheme is the kinds of tricks the DSL industry has had to resort to to try to win customers.
I can't speak for other providers, but verizon's yearly contract isn't a limited promo. You can renew your contract and keep the $30/month rate if you like. I don't see anything tricky about that, just call them and let them know you want the contract rate instead of month-to-month.
The raw connection speed (while important) isn't the deciding factor for my broadband anyway, it's the price to performance ratio. And in my area, DSL is superior in that respect. ($30 for 3000/768 DSL, or $55 for 3000/256 cable.) Sure there's a 5 meg cable tier, but I have no need for that kind of speed and it's double the price I'm paying now.
The cable co's are free to offer 10 meg service if they like, but if they charge too much they aren't going to have any takers. | |
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Varlik
Without Honor You Will Never Be Free
Premium
join:2002-01-06
Anderson, SC
1 edit | said by Rick :3MB dsl service for 39.99, which the price will go up to after the promo ends, is not competitive with 6MB and higher speeds from comcast for the mid 40.00 range. Is the price range listed for Comcast HSI including a fee for not having cable tv?
With Charter 3M / 256 runs me $42.95 that's with Cable tv. Without cable tv it's $52.95.
With Charter 5M / 512 would run me $52.95 with cable tv. Without cable tv it's $62.95. A little absurd.
10M / 1M would run me$72.95 with cable tv. Without it's $82.95 . Ridiculous!
I've yet to see a bundle (non promo) package with anything above their 3M / 256.
It should also be pointed out that Charter keeps a large amount of customers by retention measures. Often by offering folks promos, sometimes ones that were only intended for new customers.
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"Sir SIR! We don't use DHCP servers. We only use IBM & Microsoft servers." From there my call to tech support went steadily downhill. | |
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lemkepf
join:2003-06-12
Elkhorn, WI
| What about WI??? Yea, i love the 10Mbps service in other areas that's fine... but i bet they are just trying to compete with the other service providers in the area.
Why can't they upgrade my *maybe* 3Mbps... oh wait, i'm in the middle of nowhere with no other providers competing with them. Yea, i have a feeling i'll be 3Mbps for a very long time. | |
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tstolze
Premium
join:2003-08-08
O Fallon, MO
 ·CenturyLink
| Re: What about WI??? said by lemkepf :... but i bet they are just trying to compete with the other service providers in the area I can tell you in the St. Louis area the most that is offered by ATT is 6/768, and Centurytel is at 3/512. Of course these are both PPOE so throw 15% of that out the window. Although the 10 meg is nice, I went for it for the upload, with two gamers, a website being updated every 5 minutes and with my wife loving to upload pictures for processing this seems just right..
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My Foldy Monitor, My Weather Page , | |
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| fiberguy
My views are my own.
Premium
join:2005-05-20
| ... and if you are in the middle of no-where, aren't you glad you even have 3MB? Consider the fact that MANY people in "the middle of no-where" have nothing more than 53kbps...
It's also more costly to provide data services in the farther remote areas. | |
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| markopoleo
join:2003-04-02
Bonne Terre, MO
·Charter Pipeline
| There is hope, im in a hick town and called about it and got it. You know what makes it great? Charter is pretty much the only provider here and they offer VOIP AND 10meg.1meg HSI.
Not bad for a town of only 4k people and about 50 miles from St.Louis eh? 
Its about $82 a month for me, but worth every penny.. | |
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haplo2112
join:2003-05-12
Charlton, MA | Yeah 10/1 wonderful...but 69.99...insane! I am a Charter Customer, rumor is if you call in my area (Charlton,MA) you can get the 10/1 speeds...however at $69.99 that's just way to expensive. 10/1 should have been an automatic upgrade from 5/512 for the same price. Not $20 more. | |
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| jmcgeejr
join:2000-05-15
Kirkland, WA
 ·Verizon FIOS
| Re: Yeah 10/1 wonderful...but 69.99...insane! said by haplo2112 :I am a Charter Customer, rumor is if you call in my area (Charlton,MA) you can get the 10/1 speeds...however at $69.99 that's just way to expensive. 10/1 should have been an automatic upgrade from 5/512 for the same price. Not $20 more. yeah but you iknow what thats never going to happen cause too many people will call and order it and pay those prices now if noone ordered it then mabye charter would change thier pricing structure. | |
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| | aglinka
join:2005-10-21
Saint Johnsbury, VT | Re: Yeah 10/1 wonderful...but 69.99...insane! Yeah -- people will take it not thinking, because 10Mbps is faster than DSL, however overpriced it is | |
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| | haplo2112
join:2003-05-12
Charlton, MA | Ha...if no one ordered it at 69.99 Charter would turn around and say there was no demand for 10/1 and claim that the 5/512 is just right and its price is justified... | |
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| fiberguy
My views are my own.
Premium
join:2005-05-20
| Being one of the first DSL customers out there, I can't say that $69.99 for a 10/1 line is expensive since it used to cost me $79.99 for a 384/384 line from Pacific Bell back in 1998. The installation fee, also, was $300.00 and it REQUIRED a 1 year contract - there was no "no-contract" version.
The best part is, since you don't want to pay that much, there are still other tiers with slower speeds that will meet your price needs, I am sure. | |
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| | haplo2112
join:2003-05-12
Charlton, MA
| Re: Yeah 10/1 wonderful...but 69.99...insane! Actually my needs are for the fastest speed I can get at a reasonable price...$69.99 is unreasonable...I might feel different about that under other circumstances, but presently $69.99 is to much for what you get...I might consider 10/2 or better worth that but not 10/1 | |
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Varlik
Without Honor You Will Never Be Free
Premium
join:2002-01-06
Anderson, SC
| said by haplo2112 :I am a Charter Customer, rumor is if you call in my area (Charlton,MA) you can get the 10/1 speeds...however at $69.99 that's just way to expensive. 10/1 should have been an automatic upgrade from 5/512 for the same price. Not $20 more. I'll agree with you they are way to expensive. I also feel that 5M customers should be upgraded to 10M keeping the 5M price. In conjunction with that 3M customers should be upgraded to 5M keeping the 3M price. To bad Charter is going to make oh so much more money with their pricing structure. 
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"Sir SIR! We don't use DHCP servers. We only use IBM & Microsoft servers." From there my call to tech support went steadily downhill. | |
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TonyC999
@bellsouth.net
| price too high I just switched from Charter 3/256 to BellSouth DSL 6/512 a few months ago....double the speed for about the same price. I'd be tempted to switch back over to Charter for 10/1, but $69.99 is about 50% more than I'm paying now. So I doubt I'll do it. $55 would be about the most I could afford, and I really can't afford that, but I would do it anyway. $70...no way. | |
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BoMarty
join:2001-02-01
Ballwin, MO
| Have Charter's 10/1 for one week in St Louis All of a sudden, the complains that "I NEED MORE UPLOAD!" are gone (except for the markets that have yet to see Charter's 10/1 or even 5meg)
Was on 5/512, the double upload is a big enhancement for me personally.
Still have to fix the unstable download speed. Was solid on 5meg package, but far short of getting 9 or 10meg with new package. Work in progress...............
My upload is great and very stable, speed test 99% of time are at or higher than 1meg | |
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jarablue
Always be true to yourself
join:2001-06-11
Worcester, MA | Re: Have Charter's 10/1 for one week in St Louis I would love to have 10meg. I'd be using my giganews connection even moe! They don't offer it here even though they offer it to towns that come out of the same headend. Odd. Ah well go go go Charter supa speed! | |
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wjr110
join:2005-02-23
North Salem, NY | "500Mb/s" ? 1.2 megabytes to 500 megabits? They mean 500 kilobytes, right? | |
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BetaTron
Sinz
Premium
join:2002-08-18
Brooklyn, NY | Re: "500Mb/s" ? I think what he meant was 1.2 megabits to 500 kilobits. | |
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| | jriskin
join:2001-10-11
Topanga, CA
·Verizon FIOS
| Re: "500Mb/s" ? First response was right....
He must mean it was jumping from 1.2Megabytes/sec to 500Kilobytes/sec. aka 500K/sec to 1200k/sec...
Its weird most Apple trailers give me full bandwidth (15MBit FIOS) which is 1.875Megabytes/sec which is enough to watch the full HD 1080i trailers in real time (they are roughly 9-12megabit). But some of them are on different servers that max out around 300-600kilobytes/sec...
My guess is the smaller independent films don't get the higher bandwidth. | |
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wjr110
join:2005-02-23
North Salem, NY | Re: "500Mb/s" ? Do you get the full 15 megabits download? I have OOL and I get 12-13 mbits download out of the 15 that is advertised. | |
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| | ac3boy
join:2005-09-07
Lawrenceville, GA | Yes, I meant 500KB/s. It is much more stable in the evening which is expected but still pretty solid during the day.
Cheers, John. | |
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kd6cae
P2p Shouldn't Be A Crime
join:2001-08-27
Lancaster, CA
·RoadRunner Cable
·DSL EXTREME
| bring higher upload to Riverside California! As one of the unfortunate west coast Charter users, I haven't even received any kind of speed upgrade whatsoever. I'd love to see even 5/512 and for those of you on 10/1, I think I will kill you now, lol. this crap upload of 256kbps is for cave men, so Charter in Riverside CA, get your act together and upgrade your speeds or I'll just have to spend my precious dollars on a local phone line just so I can get real upload speed. Thanks for listening to my rant, and caring so much about it, yeah right!!! | |
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odreian615
join:2006-01-18
Chicago, IL | I wish 12.95$ 30 down 15up by 2010 as the cheapest package you can get for BB in the U.S
one could only wish | |
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Axekick
join:2005-05-01
Saint Louis, MO
·Charter Pipeline
1 edit | Charter "specials" I met a independent sales person for Charter some time ago after he came to my door trying to lower my cable bill. Since, he keeps me informed anytime they are running a special and I am currently locked into a one year contract where my internet portion of the bill is 19.95/month for 3/256 service. Until recently I had always got these speeds too, but as of late I am lucky to connect at all. In my area, St. Louis metro East I was told Charter is selling to Comcast though no official announcement has been made. It makes sense as they closed our local call center months ago and are either incapable or unwilling to troubleshoot my connection problems in lieu of sending tech's out on three occasions. So I encourage you to routinely call or check their website for any specials that may exist and then contact their office and insist on them offering you that price. Has been my experience with Charter that if you complain enough about a legitimate problem, it will be resolved. | |
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Charter Offering 10Mbps