Just wondering how many people are happy with their ISP. I've only had experience with 2 and really not happy with either:

Cox - Techs said my hardware was bad - upgrade $300 and same problem still existed and they couldn't seem to fix their end so I dropped them. Ping times were not very good except to Dr Wakko's server who had the same ISP, and the Up/Down speeds were not as advertised due to the line problems.

AT&T: DSL and then Uverse

AT&T DSL - Not bad at all and seemed as fast or faster than their Uverse flavor. I "upgraded" to get all my services in one package.

AT&T Uverse - Lousy support tech changed my password w/o authorization because I had the nerve to ask him why he was doing something (language barrier didn't help) - took over a month before they said he did not access anything after changing the PW (yeah, I don't believe them when they said they checked the IP access to my account). Even at their 12 Mbps service, pages load slow on the different computers in the house (Ethernet and wireless (G and N) connections). Ping time is ok, not great, but ok. Dunno, maybe the Internet is slowing down in general with all the video. TV service has momentary "freezes" and their receivers seem to have issues when power drops on getting restarted.

               / Promethius / Enigma / Wolfen /

"A man who has no skills can be taught, a man who has no honor has nothing."

i have time warner roadrunner. other than the attempts to get me to spend more money (like, they took away some of my channels and tried to get me to pay for them again. dicks.) the inet seems ok, up/down is fast. i havent tested my ping yet tho...

I had a nightmare finding a reliable service. I live about 20 minutes from O'Hare airport (not in the country). I have been in my house since 2001 and at first I tried DSL with 2 different companies (speakeasy, then AT&T) before AT&T finally told me the reason i kept having dropped connections was that my subdivision had a screwy setup. The line feet from the CO(source) was over 25,000ft even though I was only 9800ft based on line-of-sight. When the lines were laid, they snaked it around and around in my subdivision. So, I went with Comcast Internet service over cable. It was not terrible, but I did have service interruptions about once every 2 months that lasted up to 8 hours.

Comcast does have great speeds but there is more initial lag before you jump to those speeds. It feels like it has to ramp up.

About 3 years ago, I heard that AT&T had been working at upgrading and laying new wire in my area so I checked with them and they were confident that the DSL Elite package would work well for me due to the upgrades.

I tried it and haven't looked back. It is rock solid with constant speed at my location and there has only been 1 or 2 service interruptions in 3 years. One of those was because of major flooding that filled up a "hub" according to a buddy of mine that works for AT&T.

U-Verse sounds very good, but I hear rumblings that they lock down ports and make life difficult for people who do any type of hosting. I wish I could get it in my area to try it out (again I am in a weird pocket were it is not available even though you can travel 5 minutes from my house and get it).

To sum up - I recommend AT&T DSL Elite and I have even been pleasantly surprised by their somewhat improved customer service people - I would like to hear from more U-Verse customers.

The Best ISP provider I have had in the past is a company called RCN. I used their 20 MBPS download and 2 MBPS upload Package. Never had any lag issues. I only switched to Comcast since I have moved into a house. But I also have no problems with Comcast here in the Philadelphia area.

I'm a Comcast fan. They've completed the rollout of the 50 Meg service here... so I'm drooling, but can't justify it. Still, 22 Meg for $99 isn't too shabby.

Tip: People seeing lag when loading web pages, it could be your ISP's DNS servers. You will typically see a noiceable improvement, especially on pages with lots of links, by using OpenDNS servers. Just statically set your PC's DNS servers to:
Primary: 208.67.222.222
Secondary: 208.67.220.220

+EP+

Or google easy to remember ... 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4

comcast throttles your speed if you are on too much. to hell with them...

@booger, so what happens when your on all the time??...am I running at dial-up speed?

I've run ATT DSL for years and once I got my initial issues figured out it's been rock solid. I had drop issues for almost a year and techs rewired my connection from my house all the way to the hub, tested, changed to different equipment at the office, till suddenly one tech called and asked what my firmware version was on my modem. We flashed to newer version and no problems since!

Comcast in my area is expensive compared to DSL. They offer really low rates for great speeds, but then the price goes way up after your "trial" period. They also throttle the speeds and have rolled my IP address multiple times a day around here (I had them prior to my DSL)

Comcast offers higher speeds here, but ATT Uverse hasn't arrived here yet even though they've promised for two years now.

hit your cap and you will... if you have CC dont DL. ive seen it ruin online game accounts...