I'm pretty much going to switch to DirecTV. My TV is bundled with my Cable internet right now, though. I'd like to jump ship completely from AOL TimeWarner; what good alternatives are there in the Raleigh area for a decent ISP?

I don't run too many torrents very often, so pipe size isn't too much of an issue; however high uptime and low latency are big pluses.

8/17/2008 3:23:12 AM

for residential service, at least, they're aren't really any decent alternatives

there's earthlink cable, but that's still twc on the backend
dsl sucks dick

we don't have fios or uverse yet

that's pretty much it.

8/17/2008 3:33:26 AM

So best bet is to stick around with TWC for now until FiOS is available in downtown?

Also, side-question... does DirecTV get RTN, Channel 10 community access TV? I hate missing Monkeytalk.

8/17/2008 3:39:38 AM

dude, monkeytime is awesome as shit
i know todd irl, he's pretty much the man

not sure if dtv has RTN or not - i'd be willing to bet they don't

8/17/2008 4:52:57 AM

phil, get earthlink. cheaper than twc, same speeds, and you don't have to deal with twc customer service (although for internet you need really need to deal with them). I switched every utility I have out of twc and will never give them another dime until maybe they have some competition and a reason to try and fight for me as a customer. With twc->earthlink, my modem was randomly reset while I was sleeping and I just had to change my smtp server in my email.

Also, when you cancel your cable tv, you'll still get enough of a signal that a qam tuner can grab all your local chans, including RTN. Often a tech wont come to your house to disconnect the line and add a line filter since you're retaining internet service.



[Edited on August 17, 2008 at 8:51 AM. Reason : if bandwidth isn't an issue, checkout if you can get embarq, they're real cheap and low ping]

8/17/2008 8:48:12 AM

I'm going to agree with switching to Earthlink. There is no way it could possibly be worse than TWC.

I test my connection bandwidth occasionally, and it dips down to dial-up speeds every so often. That's when they're not having massive outages, or blocking your phone number from customer service.

8/17/2008 8:07:48 PM

Quote :

"they're real cheap and low ping"

especially if you request fastpath ie. disable interleaving/error correction.

50ms ~> 15ms

I tried pulling HD locals with QAM tuner over my suddenlink cable internet-only connection and no dice

8/17/2008 8:10:26 PM

Quote :

"until FiOS is available in downtown"

This won't happen this decade. Monopolies FTL.

8/17/2008 8:21:51 PM

Whelp, looks like I'm switching to Earthlink, if nobody has any other options.

TWC sucked this morning. Cold booting the modem did not fix anything.

8/18/2008 11:18:28 AM

like evan said in the first reply to this thread, "switching" to earthlink doesn't sound like it will be much different. http://www.twcnc.com/earthlink/faq.cfm#whatis

8/18/2008 11:26:04 AM