I still use Earthlink DSL because it's cheap. dammit.
Well, I still use Earthlink DSL because it's cheap. I get a fixed IPv4 address at a reasonable cost [which I need for various reasons, from incoming mail to sshd and DNS] for about $65/month, but the 3rd party DSL service that they contract to is the *WORST* [and, no doubt, the CHEAPEST].
A lot of the mediocre service level is ALSO the phone company's fault [old wires], a lot of that is the quality of their DSL equipment, and all too often they acted as if they were just "writing me off". For a while, when the lines were having trouble, and even when THEIR NETWORK had trouble, I resorted to SCREAMING OVER THE PHONE to stop them from doing a 2 hour "boiler plate" to figure out what _I_ ALREADY! KNEW!!! And that overly-thick India accent... they didn't even TRY to disguise it! Bluh-duh-bluh-duh-bluh it sounded like to me, over the phone, and half the time they'd let the microphone drop too far from their faces and so I was CONSTANTLY saying "*PLEASE* speak LOUDER" or "CLEARLY" or just "I can't understand ANYTHING you are SAYING!!!".
And I've known and worked with MANY people from India before, including a good friend when I was in High School. None of them talked THAT way at all. THEIR accents were mild, and easy to understand. However, THESE Earthlink "SUPPORT" idiots must be "THE CHEAPEST" phone support on the PLANET, because they're acting like CRAP-QUALITY BOILER-PLATE ANAL-RENTENTIVE ROBOTS stuck in a "GOTO 10" loop. And the people on the PHONE had ALL had HORRIBLY THICK ACCENTS, and talked TOO quickly, and were CONDESCENDING, and ROBOTICALLY FRUSTRATING, and IRRITATING as HELL. "HELL DESK" indeed...
And since the problem was *ALWAYS* either a) bad phone lines [which the phone company admitted to, and fixed, when the actual VOICE connection stopped working], or the EARTHLINK NETWORK [when my login stopped working, but I had "decent" loopback response and SNR and tones and modulation on the diagnostic screens], they would STILL want me to REBOOT MY COMPUTER, and took NEARLY a FREAKING WEEK to fix it. And when they just HAD to say "what operating system" EVERY! FREAKING! TIME! I said 'FreeBSD', and repeated it a dozen times, and it's like I was speaking MARTIAN to them or something. So I just gave up on their INCOMPETENCE and INSISTED on SPEAKING WITH A MANAGER, EVERY! SINGLE! TIME!!!
The WORST thing that happend was when they CAPPED MY BANDWIDTH at 384kbaud for a while. I didn't know they'd done that, until AFTER the phone lines had been fixed, and I SCREAMED at them over the phone for at least an HOUR until they REMOVED it. THEN, I got the expected 768k to 1mbit [depending on the weather, time of day, etc] since the phone lines had been re-routed by the phone company [they were tired of coming out to fix another high noise or outage on my line]. Lucky me, the house I'm renting is at the END of the phone cable. Literally. And because of GOVERNMENT INTERFERENCE, even though there's a BUDGET for "undergrounding" the lines [meaning they get REPLACED], the phone company hasn't gotten to "my neighborhood" yet because they *HAVE* *TO* *UPGRADE* *A* *POOR* *NEIGHBORHOOD* *FOR* *EVERY* *MIDDLE* *CLASS* *NEIGHBORHOOD* *THEY* *DO* (because, STUPID POLITICS) so they've put off "undergrounding" for at least 10 years in MY area, and the wires are 50 years old, yotta yotta yotta. you get the idea.
The ONLY saving grace is that it's CHEAP. The service "was what it was" back in the early 00's, and seemed to be a BETTER deal than 'business cable'. I needed the FIXED IPv4 ADDRESS. So THAT became the determining factor. AND, 15 years later, if it did not cost more than $120/month to upgrade to something BETTER now (like 'business cable'), and I had the $$$ up front and 3 year contract requirement wasn't a problem, I would have DUMPED them already. But the cable company was recently changed from 'Time Warner' to 'Spectrum', and now the DSL service is changing, too. Instability. Yeah.
Today I'm getting ~800kbits which is "acceptable" for what _I_ normally do. It's PATHETIC by MOST people's standards, sure, but it's what _I_ can get. I don't have DAYS to spend searching for better, either, nor the cash to have a PROPER wire run to a house I'm RENTING. I need to spend my time EARNING MONEY or seeking the opportunity to earn money. So I continue to put up with the BARELY ACCEPTABLE service, and DIETIES HELP ME if I *EVAR* need tech support from Earthlink, or whatever it's called now.
(at least they support USENET)