I'm a novice with computers. My neighbor gave me one of her old computers, a few years ago (Windows 98). I have AOL (9.0 Security Edition LE), dial-up @ $20.00/month.

I'm getting disconnected multiple times/day. In the last couple of days, I've lost a couple of long posts & got so mad that I didn't bother re-writing them. I've contacted AOL but, my posts were too long (245 characters, max.). So, I can't even complain, to them. My sister has AOL, also, & has similar problems.

To add insult to injury, AOL just informed me that the dial-up prices were going up to $25.00/month. An additional 25% for increasingly lousy service.

I was a Radio Shack, yeaterday, & picked up a CD from Netzero. Their dial-up is $9.95/month & the Netzero "HiSpeed"(5 times faster) is $14.95/month.

Is anyone using this service & how do you like it? Anything I should "watch out for"? How does it compare to AOL? What about Netscape or other providers?

Thanks.

Joe F.(Buffalo)

 

I would recommend almost anything over AOL. Netzero is ok, but I would check and see if there are any local companies, they often offer better service and it is easier to get ahold a real person. I used to run an ISP and AOL was probably the biggest provider people switched from.

Nick

 

At home, we use Everyone's Internet (ev1.net) at $10.00/month with virus protection, web accelerator, etc. included. If they serve your area, they're worth looking into.

Rusty

 

we used to use them also when we had dial-up. i was very happy w/ them.

 

Does Verizon offer their 768k/128k DSL service for $14.95/month in your locale? Its certainly something to look at if so. My DSL service is rock solid.

 

I used to get dropped with my old computer, and the ISP said that most likely cause was not enough free memory, and that perhaps an application was not earmarking memory as available when it was done...

Eventually that machine died, and I don't have that probem with my Dell (1 GB ram).

Anyhow, I am looking at dropping my dial-up, but for a different reason. The phone bill, with all the little fees and taxes gets up above $40 with very little long distance.

I called around, and it looks like I could get 3mps wireless service, drop my $20/mo dial-up and drop my land line, just use my cell phone, and come out cheaper going high speed.

Might be something to look into, especially if you don't use the phone much and have a cell plan where you don't use all your minutes...

 

Welcome to AOHell.....Anything would be better than that

 

Did you guys know that AOL is now considered a virus because it infultrates every part of your computer?

 

If you are getting disconnected make sure that if you have call waiting on you phone that you disable call waiting in the AOL setup. The incoming call sometimes screws it up (they may have fixed it in later versions, I do recall something about never missing a call). Another cheap dial up is people PC. You can download their software from their website. 9.99 a month (I think). It's what I use at home (nothing but dial up in my area) and I have no problems with it.

 

I've got AOL dial-up and have no problems whatsoever...accept slow web page loading....and $25 a month

 

I can't comment on Netzero or AOL but a work-around for lost posts is to write them in wordpad or a wordprocessor and then cut & paste into the forum.

 

Would you consider getting *** cable for $40/month. Probably not, then maybe check out Fry's internet for $10/month. www.frys.com.

I would not bother with the "hi speed" service. Dial up is physically limited around 56kbit/second.

 

POTS are actually 64k..or should be.

 

I don't know what the physical limitation is but modems are limited to 54000 kbps by the FCC. So anyone who is saying 5X faster! is fabricating a little. It could be caching or compression or something else on the ISP end but nothing that is worth another $5/month.

 

I hate AOL! I've used it a couple of different times and it's like being forced to use training wheels on a bike. It's also hard to get out of your computer when you stop using their service. One good thing no one has mentioned is that you can get access to an AOL account almost anyplace in the world. For people who travel everywhere, that is a major benefit. My advice is to use the lowest cost dial-up ISP which ought to be about $10/mo. A step up from that would be the $14.95/mo Verizon DSL. If you ever get into moving graphics around, go to something like a $30/mo 3000k DSL.