Comcast v Verizon DSL

[Yugl]

I'm soon going to be in a situation to choose one over another. I hear nightmare stories about Comcast customer services, but Version DSL is ridiculously slow and we cannot get fiber optics. Is Comcast faster than Verizon despite the lousy customer service?

[Tekki]

Despite the hate over Comcast's pricing based on speed, they are leagues better in customer service compared to 5 years ago. I've been with them since 2003 and grow happier about their customer service but I'll never be happy with how much American's are charged for the shit speed they get.

[Byrd]

I'm soon going to be in a situation to choose one over another. I hear nightmare stories about Comcast customer services, but Version DSL is ridiculously slow and we cannot get fiber optics. Is Comcast faster than Verizon despite the lousy customer service?

At home, I've been with Comcast since they bought AT&T's internet service. I've never had a problem with their customer service, and their down time has been almost negligible in the last 5 years. I'm sure experiences vary from customer to customer and region to region, but I have no qualms about being their customer.
When our work offices changed service providers a couple of years ago, I was the one in charge of it, and switched them both over to Comcast. I preferred their service vastly over Opus, and it was comparable to Qwest. I have no experience with Verizon DSL.

[Callisto]

Despite the hate over Comcast's pricing based on speed, they are leagues better in customer service compared to 5 years ago. I've been with them since 2003 and grow happier about their customer service but I'll never be happy with how much American's are charged for the shit speed they get.

This pretty much. Comcast customer service isn't great, but it's improved immensely. Compared to what friends tell me about their experiences with other carriers, they're actually better in many areas(mainly when they make a service appointment, they show up, and on time).

As far as the physical product, it depends what kind of speeds you're looking for. Comcast is overpriced, but their product is top-notch. My internet is extremely fast, and over the course of the year there's really not much downtime to speak of. Cable is not 100% without weather interruptions, but it's certainly more reliable than the DSL products I've seen. Comcast's business ethics are sketchy at best, but as far as the actual product I can't complain.

[mallister]

i've had no issues with comcast's customer service, just got off the phone with them after setting up our move next week.

[Yugl]

I do recall that pay-by-the-speed policy from other threads. It's interesting because the person asking me to check the speed for them (They're just old and think I'm good with computers because I can locate stuff in folders...) is saying it will be cheaper to use Comcast. If that's the case, it looks like a good deal then?

[Tekki]

Just go with the basic speed. I pay $30 a month for it. I called until I got a rep willing to find "Comcast Special" codes on her end to get me $30 a month and I did a self install.

[Callisto]

The package I have is a holdover from their old tiers, but I still pay $63/month for 33 down/7 up, their newer packages are a bit more expensive per speed tier, but not greatly so. I still pay more for standard definition basic digital cable than I do for the actual internet service.

[xopher]

The only bad thing about comcast is the 250gb a month bandwidth cap.

I don't believe verizon has that.

[Callisto]

It's not really a hard cap either way, on the rare months we've managed to top that(like 3-4 a year tops with 3 people using it) I've never had any throttling/cutoffs. If you're consistently doing something that puts you over 250GB month after month you're either doing a massive amount of legit stuff that would likely mean you should be signing up for business class anyways, or you're torrenting an assload of shit and don't have room to complain. For most everyday users it's not something that should sway your decision really.

[Yugl]

I don't torrent; just FFXI+Streaming movies. I guess that doesn't put me at the cap? I'm looking forward to testing this out now given the input I've received (Quite opposite of what I expected tbh!).

[Tekki]

The only bad thing about comcast is the 250gb a month bandwidth cap.

I don't believe verizon has that.

You really have to try hard to hit this with normal usage, even with pirating. I've exceeded it as well, with a roomate who downloaded the shit out of everything. I've never had them even call me on it...

[Pocketrockets]

If you read the fine print about the 250 GB/month cap, if you exceed it twice in a 6 month period, they can cut off your service. However, it also says they will contact you the first time you exceed it, and the 2nd month I had internet through them i did over 800 GB, and never heard anything from them.

[Dizzy]

I have comcast at home and verizon DSL at work. Comcast customer support is vastly superior from what I've experienced over the years... I emailed verizon last week because our DSL modem is shot (I'm thinking we got a lemon; it still works for web access but has to be reset roughly once a day and I can't connect to it to configure ports etc.) and they replied 4 days later saying I had to call them about it.

I'd suggest comcast from a philly area perspective, not sure where you're at.

[Cephius]

DSL sucks especially if you're in a remote area that's far away from the relay station. The further away you are the more the signal degrades.

Cable is the opposite, distance doesn't matter but if you're in a crowded urban area the signal can weaken when everyone is using it. So it technically depends on where you live, but in (almost) every case Comcast is the way to go.

[Denchi]

Getting Qwest Fiber Optic 40down/5up for $30 a month (which is a promotional price). Dude at the store told me to call and complain 6 months in and they'll keep me at $30 a month. Otherwise cancel and re-sign and get the same deal over again. It's not contract based so if the deal ends or gets compromised I can cancel and just get comcast.

Just did that today, so until the box gets here on Friday I won't be able to test out the speed differences/reliability, but as far as purchasing everything I'm pretty satisfied with the Qwest guy I talked to about everything.

Also, apparently there are modems/routers out there (Docsis 3?) that don't allow Comcast to cap your speeds or date rates. Maybe look into those too. Buddy has one and swears by it.

[Yugl]

I should also mention the comcast one is a deal too; $20 for a year's subscription. I'm not sure if that comes with cable though.

[Vandole]

it's not even an argument. dsl is a dying technology.

i hate to say go with comcast, but it's your only choice in this.