Internet

[snowwand.livejournal.com]

What are the internet providers in the Somerville/Medford area? Are any of them cheaper than Comcast?

Thanks!

Comments

[dreamgirly19.livejournal.com]

RCN.

never have a problem. i have the cable tv/internet/phone package and people tell me i pay less for that then they do with comcast.

[enochs-fable.livejournal.com]

And how much do you pay?

[billharnois.livejournal.com]

And does RCN offer services like DVR, On-demand, HDMI output?

I think the RCN download speed is slower than Comcast, but you wouldn't notice unless you were downloading huge movies.

[snowwand.livejournal.com]

Is everyone looking for a new provider, also? :)

[jennyelfenmass.livejournal.com]

DVR: Yes
On Demand: Yes
HDMI: not sure

RCN has varying levels of speed, 1.5Mbit, 5Mbit, & 10Mbit. Comcast has 6Mbit. Rcn 5Mbit is cheaper than Comcast 6Mbit, and 10Mbit is more expensive. You won't really notice a difference between 5 and 6 Mbit unless you are doing some crazy amount of downloading.

We pay $90 for 5Mbit internet, cable (channels 1-100), and DVR.

I used to pay $60 for 6Mbit, basic cable (channels 1-23), and no DVR.

[surrealestate.livejournal.com]

RCN on-demand sucks, though. They used to have a large selection of free shows, movies, etc, but now pretty much the only free stuff is advertising. Comcast (which I don't have but have watched at friends' homes) has a great selection of free on-demand.

[jennyelfenmass.livejournal.com]

eh, I've never used on-demand so it isn't a break point for me. It's more about the internet reliability and price for me.

[dreamgirly19.livejournal.com]

I think the on demand is okay...then again i dont know what comcast has we dont.

[surrealestate.livejournal.com]

Like I said, many free movies and TV shows.

I'm not saying it's a make-or-break, I'm just sayin.

[dreamgirly19.livejournal.com]

i understand what you are saying but im just saying there is a lot of free movies and tons of tv shows with my on demand.

[mr-fancy-pants.livejournal.com]

(I'm moving back to the davis area in November yay).
When I try to signup for RCN with my new Medford/ontheSomervilleborder address, they say they only have dialup available. No thanks guys...

Has anyone had a similar problem but gotten signed up w/ RCN? I checked a few neighboring addresses on that street (Boston ave), and got the same result.

Comcast also thinks they don't have any service to my new address, but I know for a fact the downstairs apartment does.

I've never tried RCN but I'd love to give them a shot before giving in to the evil that is Comcast, but they're not making it easy for me...

[dreamgirly19.livejournal.com]

that is strange...we have high speed cable. i live on the somerville/arlington line.

[kateritek9.livejournal.com]

RCN actually doesn't service Medford. I'm right on the border too, but they won't help you out.

[vanguardcdk.livejournal.com]

I've been pretty happy with Earthlink. The DSL is about $30/month (and they have assorted "new customer" type deals)

Verizon DSL...

[nowalmart.livejournal.com]

I had Verizon in one of the apartments I lived in (Powderhouse Square area). It was a little slower than the Comcast I had in another apartment, but *a lot* cheaper. I think we were paying about $20/month for Verizon's cheapest plan.

When signing up for it, though, do not call them. They try to upsell you to the point of saying they do not have any more lines available in your area. If you sign up online, it is not a problem at all.

[librarybrandy.livejournal.com]

We used RCN (cable internet, 5.0 mbps) for three weeks when we moved up here. Poor connections, dropped connections, low bandwidth, lousy techs who hooked us up wrong in the first place, tech support that didn't know how to fix it, all that. ("Low bandwidth", in this case, means I ran the cnet.com bandwidth meter, and it suggested we upgrade to a 56k dial-up modem.) I sat on hold with tech support for literally hours for them to not fix the problem, and then I sat on hold with customer service for another hour to cancel. And then another half-hour when, a month later, I got a bill from them. And then another 45 minutes a month after THAT, when I got another bill and a threat to disconnect our service if we didn't pay.

They've finally sent me something telling me I have a $6 credit. Will I see that money? Stay tuned to find out!

We switched to Comcast and had no problems at all. It's more expensive, yes, but it WORKS.

[snowwand.livejournal.com]

Interesting...I've never dealt with RCN so its good to hear stories like this

RCN

[masswich.livejournal.com]

I guess every experience is different - I had a very bad experience with Verizon DSL when I moved from Inman Sq. to Teele Sq. and then switched to RCN 5.0 - no problems, very reliable and fast, $17 a month.

[phoenixy.livejournal.com]

That sucks. I have to say that my experiences with RCN have been pretty good--the tech who came to install it was great, it works fine in general, and when we had an outage, the phone technician spent around 15 minutes trying to fix the problem from his end, then set up an appointment for a technician to come by in two days. The problem magically fixed itself the next day, however. I do agree with you that the hold times when you call are really long (like 25-40 minutes), but I've generally gotten good service after reaching a human.

[librarybrandy.livejournal.com]

We had similar problems when we lived in Newton, with the dropped connections and all. Then we moved to Providence, and when we came back up here (Teele square), I'd forgotten it was RCN we'd had so much trouble with. By that time we had entirely different equipment, so that couldn't have been the problem. I'm honestly surprised to hear that nobody else has problems with them.

[out-2-lunch.livejournal.com]

I live in Newton and have lots of problems with RCN. Our internet goes down at least once a month.

[omacg.livejournal.com]

They do have HDMI output its an almost identical box to Comcast. I moved from RCN to Comcast and have not noticed much of a difference in internet speeds/service up-times etc. Wait times and customer service are about what you can expect from either side. Though I do know that availability is very odd I could get RCN but someone 2 streets away quarter mile at most could not.

SpeakEasy

[jwinter.livejournal.com]

My geek friends all prefer SpeakEasy:
http://www.speakeasy.net/

They're more geek friendly about the ports they allow open, static IP addresses, and in their customer support. If you care about that stuff, they're probably worth it.