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Thread ID: 34263 2003-06-08 11:07:00 What is the best ISP to use? vanman (959) Press F1
Post ID Timestamp Content User
150963 2003-06-09 01:29:00 So much anger at Xtra, out of all proportion to its satisfied user base. :O

I have been with Xtra for years without anything to complain about whatsoever. I have freenet as a backup in case Xtra goes down but it never has. I paid one single $14.95 fee to freenet which entitles me to 200 minutes a month and I've never paid anything else. Mind you, I only use freenet once in a blue moon to send emails on that address that won't relay through Xtra (or any other ISP, before somebody claims that to be an example of Xtra's disadvantages).

I used to have a clearnet account (provided by others) but dropped it when I didn't do their work any more. It never gave any problems either.

Every ISP has people who swear by it and people who wouldn't touch it with a barge pole. IMHO a goodly proportion of ISP problems lie with the user's location, phone lines and/or equipment.

Xtra will do me just fine.

Cheers

Billy 8-{) :|
Billy T (70)
150964 2003-06-09 02:10:00 I signed up with Ihug when I got my first PC. For the first year, had problems getting connected, too many busy signals, but for the last 6 years, I've had a good, stable connection. Pricing has been relatively competitive - as a student, I get unlimited hours for $19.95, though they don't advertise the fact, and it's only available as a Direct Debit option. AFAIK, they don't need student IDs or anythign, so presumably it would be easy to get (not that I condone that sort of thing!). Only complaint is their helpdesk - really s l o w. People are pretty helpful, when you can reach someone, but I've only called them twice in 6 years, and that was only because I changed OS and lost the login password (second time was because I forgot their dial in number!)
Agree with the comments that location and phone lines make a difference. Probably would stick with a big name, despite concerns about overloading (which aren't that common in my experience), against the possibility of a small, local firm going belly up. Then you would have to redirect e-mail, etc.
Lizard
Lizard (2409)
150965 2003-06-09 03:17:00 as the son of a telecommunications/data engineer, i've heard a few horror stories with xtra and paradise being the worst . . . with xtra it was a matter of a slack helpdesk (basically they flip a few cards, then usually revert to "its the line at fault" which is very rarely true) and with paradise it seems to be a problem of bad resource management - most of the complaints for them are "Internet gets really slow in the evenings"

subsequently we went with ihug and never had a problem . a few months back I was visiting my parents and dad mentioned to me "we finally got a call from an ihug customer today, and the ihug helpdesk was right - their line was FUBAR"

Inspire is another ISP that he's never had to deal with, I'm with them at my flat and havent got a single bad thing to say about them either .

But I do agree that every ISP will have its fans and its dislikers, and my opinions are based on feedback from dad and his workmates in the Central Districts . . . could well be different for the chch area
whetu (237)
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