Re: Ameritech.net

[Janina Sajka <janina@afb.net>]

I was a Verizon DSL customer when the company was still called Bell 
Atlantic and when consumer DSL service was still very new beginning in 
February 1999. In those days, DSL customers were assigned static IPs. My 
personal experience was that the service was great when it worked, which 
wasn't quite enough of the time. I had long periods of down time--about 
two weeks every three months or so. Calling tech support was a nightmare. 
First, I would sit on hold listening to the same clip of Vivaldi for tens 
of minutes. A half-hour wait was common, and the Vivaldi never 
changed--always the same snipit from the first movement of Spring. Once I 
got first level tier support my problems only got worse. Clearly, it was 
my fault because I wasn't in Windows. Clearly, when I rebooted into 
Windows, it was the screen reader. Once I pushed up to second, and even 
third tier support, it was, of course, never my fault. At least twice they 
moved me to ppoe without even telling me they were doing it. Mostly, they 
just couldn't explain it--system upgrades at the CO, please call back if 
the problem persists.

I will not be a Telco DSL customer again, mostly because of their terrible 
track record with me, but also because they've moved away from DSL 
technology I care to buy. They have indeed found ways to provision DSL in 
ways I don't fully understand--and don't care to. It's more than dynamic 
IPs. I was surprised recently when a friend was installing Verizon DSL on 
his Windows computer--surprised to learn that the install added an icon to 
his Dial Up Networking program group.

In essence, I suspect the telco's judge ip space and general network 
resources insuficient to support the millions of customers they want to 
sell. They want the customers money, but expect they will not use 
persistent connections any more than they use dial up connections. My 
friends DUN based DSL would disconnect on inactivity. Voice phone service 
network capacity is based, as I understand it, on the expectation that the 
average phone call will last four minutes. I'm sure they also have a 
number of calls per month in mind as an average. Of course, they have to 
make those kinds of predictions in order to build out adequate 
infrastructure. But, I have no desire to be part of a broadband service 
that expects casual and occasional web surfing. So, no more telco DSL for 
me.

My advice is to seek a quality provider. My answer, for myself, was 
speakeasy.net for two crowning reasons:

1.)	They actively support linux. In fact, I believe their servers run 
Redhat;
2.)	They actively have no problem with home networks;

Most providers have problems over linux even if their technology doesn't,
and have fine print that prohibits multiple machines accessing the
service. So, I choose to go with the provider that supports the OS and
features I want and support.


 On Thu, 6 Sep 
2001, Karl Dahlke wrote:

> For what it's worth, and it isn't worth much,
> I used Ameritech dial-up service for almost a year,
> and was very happy with it.
> I left only because I wanted a cable modem.
> 
> Of course I was happy because everything worked for me straight away,
> and I didn't have to ask their technical department for help.
> 
> I'm a bit confused by this whole thread.
> I thought dsl was a static always on connection.
> Why ppp?
> Why pppd?
> Why ppp0?
> Don't they give you a box that looks like a cable modem,
> with a nic interface,
> and don't you just plug into that, like an ethernet?
> Don't you just set up for an ethernet connection and go?
> I guess I don't know much about dsl,
> so I'll stop talking now,
> before I do more harm than good.
> 
> Karl
> 
> 
> 
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> 

-- 
	
				Janina Sajka, Director
				Technology Research and Development
				Governmental Relations Group
				American Foundation for the Blind (AFB)

Email: janina@afb.net		Phone: (202) 408-8175

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