I posted a few weeks ago about getting myself a laptop.  Well I finally did.

Now I need to find a decent ISP so I can surf the web and get my e-mail etc when I'm away while working. The company I work for doesn't provide us with internet access so that was out. I was going to use the service I use at home, but it's a cable modem and they don't have a dial up service.  So I'm trying to figure out who or what I want to use.  

The laptop came with 6 free months of AOL but I hate AOL.  So I was looking at MSN or Earthlink. Mainly because they are accessible nation wide.  

Has anyone used JUNO or NetZero ( they pay versions not their free crap)?  Can anyone recommend a few different providers that have national coverage as far as dial ups go?

I'm using a firm called access4less.net.  They seem to be ok.  Not too bad on load times for dial up, they have webmail or pop3 mail.  If you don't expect much other than a working connection, they seem to be decent.  Check their web page for coverage, I recall it's pretty good.  Cost is like $6/mo.  

Try http://www.hawkcommunications.com

Couple of diff plans - $6 to $8/mo depending upon dialup coverage.

No problems, no BS - got tired of EarthStink jacking up prices...

Bill Wiese
San Mateo, CA

A decent ISP???

"uh dee scent I S P iz when I S P'n no burn!!!" [:D]

Seriously,
I don't remember their name but they advertise in [u]American Rifleman[/u]. They donate a percentage of your monthly bill to a pro 2nd, hunting, fishing, outdoors group of your choice.

They have nationwide access numbers and a flat rate for unlimited access.

Earthlink has been pretty trouble free as a dial-up.  They are a pretty big player, having gobbled up many a ISP over the years.

EarthLink stinks as far as customer support (i.e, when your email stops working or they change email servers and then mail you bad instructions) - and they're EXPENSIVE, about $20/month - they're trying to compete against AOL.

You should only have to pay $10 or less per month (esp if you pay on 1/2 year or yearly basis. I'm paying about $7/month right now for Hawk Comm. and am quite happy.

While the NRA-adverstised "pro-gun" ISP may be a nice concept, it's WAY overpriced at around $20/month. And prob only a buck or so of that, best-case, goes to NRA or hunting/fishing interests.  They are prob just a reseller program for AT&T or EarthLink or some other bigger.

If you live out in the sticks, your options may be a bit limited (for free local dialup). But if you're anywhere in/near suburbia, look at Hawk or NetZero, etc.

Bill Wiese
San Mateo, CA

My ISP at home is ATT.net.  They have been very reliable and have some inexpensive plans.

I rarely use tech support, but I'm not surprised as most tech support gurus will tell you anything to get rid of you.

[aol-rant]But I would use anything over AOHell.  Even if I had an hourly usage cap.  Those plastic disks are creating a landfill nightmare.  They must have punched out over 20,000,000,000 disks since their inception.  Grocery store, cereal box, magazines, banks, post office, must I be inundated with AOHell disk sightings everywhere I go?  Not to mention they literally take over your computer and add an aol adapter.  Bring back [i]alt.aol-sucks[/i]!  Disclaimer, I have never used them and never will, but I do know of these AOHell problems exist.  My brother used their crap back in the days of their infamous hourly service charge crap.  Guess he didn't care about money too much back then because I saw one stinking bill for the month that was like $94.00 dollars!

Anyone catch the new Netzero/Juno commercial?  Pretty funny advertising.  They make fun of AOHell and it's, "You've got mail" line.[/aol-rant]

I started out with Netcom and the service was average at best.  There were sometimes busy signals and unexplainable lost connections.  I would always email them warning of my impending cancellation if they didn't get their shit together.  Mindspring bought them out and service improved a great deal.  Threats were literally non-existant.  Very rarely would there be a busy signal or connection problem.  Then Earthlink bought out Minspring and I haven't had to make any threats since.  The only minor problem is that sometimes the smtp mail server would be busy, but it's usually up in a bit.  Only happens about once a month.

bwiese- What was the problem with your email?

With the price increase last year or so, the cost is now up to a staggering $21.95 a month!

My friend uses Netzero Platinum and is satisfied.  $10.00 bucks a month.

My problem with my email is that it wasn't left alone ;-)

I was originally a JPSnet customer for about $9/month. JPS got bought out by OneMain in about 1999 or so. Price increased to about $12/mo, service declined slightly (busy signals on occasion and slower email system). Then OneMain got bought out by EarthStink. They rejiggered the email servers completely but I was still kinda a OneMain/JPS customer for several months until the conversion was complete. Can't remember exact details: I'd miss email, "lose" my email service for days on end, and tech support assumed I was a 'normal' Earthlink customer instead of a convertee that had special email issues. (Mail server names would be changed without warning, I couldn't even log in to system sometimes - password not recognized.)

And $19.95 or $21.95 (after increase) per month to get the 'real internet' was ridiculous even without all these problems.

Got my own domain name, got a Hawk Communications ISP yearly subscription ($80 ish per year) and just autoforward my domain-name email to my regular email and I can check it with webmail system anywhere (of course I also change my reply-to address to reflect my domain name...


Bill Wiese
San Mateo, CA

I have Telocity (DirectTVDSL now).  I'm happy with them.  I think they offer a dial up access (10 or 20 hours) if you need it.  However, its all up to you if you want just dial up or DSL as well...

Heh once you have DSL you never want to go back...

i think you are refering to "Outdoors Unlimited"
i have had no problem with this service.

www.outdoorsunlimited.net

They donate $1 every month to the organization of your choice.

Am I the only one who [i]likes[/i] getting AOL CDs?

[img]http://dcine.dyndns.org/stuff/shotcd.jpg[/img]