If we were just cynical opportunists in search of pageviews, every week we’d find a way to talk about internet and cable access and our local provider, Broadstripe. Numerous posts have been started in the past by unhappy community members, always running into the scores of comments.
Tomorrow the Hidmo Community Empowerment Project is sponsoring a community event to talk about neighborhood connectivity issues. I’ll be part of a panel discussion about neighborhood internet access, and I’m interested in a quick survey of our readers to see where things stand:
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Stop by tomorrow and join in the discussion. It’ll be an interesting and informative event.
I switched to CLEAR from broadstripe since they’ve been heavily advertising in our area. It is actually WORSE than broadstripe, at least where I am. QWEST DSL is up next… anyone using it and like the speeds?
Quest DSL is better and cheaper than Broadstripe “gehetto vision”.
Is the new mayor invited to this discussion? He should be I remember one of his early promises in the campaign was to bring municipal fast internet to Seattle. Is he still on board with this?
http://mcginnformayor.com/tag/issues/#infrastructure
I still get pixilation and dropouts on hi def channels.
At least in my part of the CD I can only get 1.5 MBs QWEST service. It’s way too slow and wish there was a better alternative. QWEST has been promising/advertising new deployments for faster speeds since last December at least and keep pushing the date back (Til April for my house, last I heard). You may be fortunate to be closer to the node or near a different node, so you may have a better experience, but don’t go expecting much.
Living through Millenium and now Broadstripe, I’ve resorted to begging Google to bring their “fiber for communities” test to the CD.
http://www.google.com/appserve/fiberrfi
If I’m not mistaken, there is a lone pipe that runs from Beacon Hill to the CD that has been ignored by bankrupt company after bankrupt company. A lone pipe that would be perfect for Google to step into and take over. One that could easily house their fiber test. The City was talking about approaching Google to be a part of the test, but who knows where folks down at City Hall want to put it. If you want to bring it here, I can’t see any harm in going to the above link and putting a good word in for the CD.
The speakeasy folks are the only ones who’ve been able to satisfy our “quest” for broadband. You’ll regret the qwest thing…they will only blame whomever else is involved. I’d love to see us part of the google experiment too!
I have had so many problems with Broadstripe. I currently have cable tv with them and I dropped the internet service they offered. I was paying about $55 a month for “high speed internet’. I was getting speeds around 750k to 1 megabit most of the time. The service was spotty and I eventually switched to clear. Decent speeds with their new wi max network (if you have an old modem turn it in for a new one. Much better speeds and they make it easy) and I pay only $35 month. Now the tv cable service does not offer much and over priced. No nfl network, bad selection of hd channels and horrible customer service. Half the time they do not mail me a bill and charge a $5 late fee. I could pay online but I do not want this incompetent company with my cc info. I have had so many problems and frustration with this company it would take me all day to write them.
My question is why do we have only one choice? I never though I would say this but I am begging I can get comcast soon. I would think competition would be good for everyone. I love living in the cd and my lease is up soon. I am seriously considering moving to a neighbor hood that does not have broadstripe. I have had it with them.
I use Qwest. They were up front about the speed I would objectively get, and I agred to it. So if they do not have the infrastructure for your area and the speed won’t be up to par, don’t use thm. It is perfectly functional except for multiple Facebook chat windows, which I attribute to FB since I run can run skype with 10 chatrooms open at the same time.
They came over to my house and made SURE it worked, even rewired the phone outlets downstairs and split the voice from the DSL. There was a period that the speed was atrocious, I used speakeasy to verify. I called their support people and patiently explained that every night about 10PM the speed took a bad hit. I made them walk me through all the diagnoses and was pleasant and patient but peristent, would not hang up until I got a resolution. They put me on a different server and it has been fine ever since.
The only thing I do is periodically, like every other week, is power off and pwer on the modem since it seems to get a bit hot after some time…
I had Comcast before that and it really sucked eggs.
Qwest DSL is pretty reliable and quitefast. I am surprised to read that people can only access the slower version since they just laid new fiber optic cable here. It seemed like the basic (lower speed) worked better some time ago and then during the last year we were always a little lower on the hierarchy of good access and the speed would at times become infuriatingly slow. Finally, we gave in and subscribed to the higher speed. Life on the internet has been great ever since. Our land line is with Qwest also. They have some other packages. Since we are not interested in cable or in giving up the land line I don’t remember all the options.
Sometime ago we decided that we have only so much time for TV and that cable wasn’t worth it for us. Nonetheless, I have actually lived here long enough to remember the original debate and never understood how the CD ended up with Broadstripe with all the complaints for cable and the rest of the city was given a better choice which over the years has merged to Comcast. It was some type of political decision. If you want access to the public access cable stations Direct TV is not a good choice. We deserve better for our dollars.
Reading others’ comments is weird to me, ‘cuz I have to say, I have had no problem with Broadstripe, or at least no problem greater than that with any other comparable provider (Comcast or Qwest). I’ve been a Broadstripe/Millennium customer here in the CD and previously in Belltown for maybe over 10 years now. Speed is fast enough (has been right on target when I’ve run a check), and certainly compares favorably to what I’ve experienced in other settings (work, friends’/family’s houses, cafes). And I’ve always experienced helpful customer service – received credit for outages/billing errors in Belltown, and, in recent months here, have had the late fee refunded when I didn’t receive a bill. Also at that time, the customer service rep took it upon herself to adjust my service package so that my bill was reduced by a third. So I really can’t complain . . . oh, except about the cable tv choices, maybe, but I shouldn’t watch so much tv anyway . . .
Hey sports fans… Do any of the internet providers carry espn360 (non-sports fans, if you’re still reading, espn360 lets you stream lots of live sports and replays for free if your ISP springs for it)? I think Comcast does. Others?
We’ve had Broadstripe (formerly Millenium) for many years. For the most part, it’s been trouble-free, and lately we’ve been getting speeds of 15-17Mb/s during the day. It kinda sucks to have such an obscure provider, but it is hard to complain about that kind of speed.
Can’t stand the midwest accents from their CSR’s though…
The votes showing “dial up” were zero when I voted. I believe that people who have “dial up” are less likely to read this blog or browse the internet in general since it would now be very slow or given low priority for access. They most likely limit their time to reading and sending email. Just a thought.
hehe i applied for the google fiber as well
Honestly – And this is a really sad statement – I’m regretting my condo purchase on 16th and Union b/c of the terrible service from Broadstripe and Qwest (I’ve had both and am currently suffering with Broadstripe). I enjoy that we supposedly live in a tech city, but are trapped in a broadband ghetto. To rub salt into the wounds even further, Comcast service is available a mere two blocks north.
The only possible time you can get those speeds are during the work day. During any peak-hour use, the best I ever receive is 2 m/b. Sure, if i wake up at 6 a.m. you can get 15 megabyte speeds with Broadstripe. However, I don’t getting reliable broadband speeds should impact my sleep schedule.
Troy-
I tried to sign up for Comcast a few weeks ago. I had talked to a rep a few weeks before that who said we could get it at our address. When I called to finally hook up service, I was told that my address didn’t have Comcast … but the house *right next door* did. Grrrr….
Qwest in the Yesler/MLK area. They only offer 5Mbps here, and I do manage to get 3.7ish consistently. Much less expensive than Speakeasy was, which was the reason I changed.
There was no way I was even considering Broadstripe. However I’m the laughing stock of all my friends, as they all have FIOS.
Hands down the worst company I have ever had the missfortune of dealing with. I would rather go without TV/Internet than work with that JOKE of company. Now have Dish Network for TV and Quest for Internet…….DISH ROCKS!!! Quest definately slower than I was use to with comcast…but not a bad company. PLEASE EVERYONE IN THE CD GET RID OF BROADSTRIPE, perhaps they will pack up their CRAPPY service and get the hell out of Seattle. COMCAST come SAVE US!!!!