Historically, people have complained that AOL is slow and expensive. Now they have formed a partnership with Verizon [disclosure: Verizon is a financial contributor to Mouse Print’s parent, Consumer World] to offer a combination package including Verizon DSL and AOL for $25.90 a month. That price is marginally more than AOL charges for dial-up service. (Unbundling that price, $17.99 is the Verizon DSL charge, and $7.91 goes to AOL. That is a real bargain for unlimited AOL.)
AOL also promises “high speed” and “true broadband” with this package, but what they consider “high speed” may not be what you consider fast.
*MOUSE PRINT: “Fast high-speed DSL: Up to 768 Kbps connection speed.” [Insert in SuperCoups envelope, newspaper supplement, April 2006.]
Standard dial-up speed is 56Kbps, so 768Kbps is about 14 times faster. But that is not a fast broadband connection compared to other DSL speeds offered by Verizon, competitors, and by cable companies. It is actually one of the slowest broadband speeds offered to home consumers. Verizon’s “regular” speed is 3000Kbps (or 3Mbps), by comparison, for $29.95. Â AT&T just announced it was raising its DSL Internet speed to 6000Kbps (or 6Mbps), and Comcast is already at that speed. RCN (a regional provider) even offers 20000Kbps (or 20Mbps).
So, what you consider fast, what competitors consider fast, and what AOL considers fast may be very different things.
A few months ago I called AOL and told them that I recently acquired broadband service through Comcast, when I told them that I was considering canceling my AOL service they informed me that they would only charge me $10.95 a month. I think this price was offered to me because I have subscribed to AOL for almost ten years and this was their way of retaining me as a customer. This is not something that they adverstise. I got this rate not only because I asked if they had something less expensive but because when I called I had planned on canceling my AOL. This is a good example of not being afriad to ask for a less expensive fee and getting a much better price.
Read the comments about the guy who tried to cancel and recorded his conversation for all to hear. Apparently, others who have attempted to cancel have gotten MUCH BETTER OFFERS to remain an AOL customer than you did.
So call to cancel again, and you might end up with service costing only $3-4 a month, instead of $11.
Not sure if I am comparing apples & oranges but locally [NE OHIO] the warner cable Co. who owns AOL
charges $44.95/month. AOL is offering 1/2 cable speed [768 Kbps] for $25.90/month. I am tempted but
do not know “How much slower” that is for $20.00 less. The instant on is more valuable to me than
the speed. I continue to hesitate. glofs
Gloria you can get aol broadband for 25.90 a month also Time Warner does the installation, it is still the same speed as your current provider, still the same modem etc…. you may want to give TWC or AOl a call and see about it….. Good Luck!!! You would not loose speed that way
I signed up for Verizon DSL awhile back and it’s only $16 a month plus I get
free MSN with it. Pretty good deal. Not sure how to find out what speed it is
but it’s certainly much faster than dial up. AOL dropped my monthly charge
to $9.95 since I was Bringing my own Broadband. I was going to cancel AOL and
just use Free MSN, but I’ll try what Cable Guy suggested and maybe AOL will drop
the rate even more. It pays to shop and also to read the fine print!
At age 77 my computer is so valuable to me in keeping me in touch with friends
andfamily and up to date on the news here and all over the world! If I had to
choose between my computer or my TV it would be ‘bye bye TV’!
Use this website and you can test your connection speeds.
Requires sign-up but it’s free.
http://www.broadbandreports.com/
Good Luck.
If you have your own Internet connection, AOL now has a plan that’s entirely free. Go to keyword FREE AOL.
I’m actually continuing to pay the $9.95 a month because the free AOL doesn’t come with all the XM radio channels (and all the Internet radio they offer is mono, rather than stereo). But if you don’t use AOL Radio, then the free AOL is a great deal.
http://www.speedtest.net/
best site on testing speeds nice interface also
The service in our area (Charter Internet SW Wisconsin) has just announced 10 Megabit per second internet… 768 k Pales in comparison. Yes it is pricey (roughly 70.00 a month which if its worth it to you, go for it) but what they are offering is not that great…
Charter in MA said I had to pay more to get an increase in performance (1.2 MB/s)or they would cut my speed in half to ~300K from 768K. I told them to cut away! For routine shopping, downloading and emailing the cut in speed was virtually unnoticeable. Don’t pay for what you don’t need!
It all depends on what you are looking for, really. Most people have absolutely no used for true broadband and would not even notice what they are missing! As for AOL, they will do anything to keep you as a customer. Years ago when cable internet first came out, I called AOL to cancel and for 6 months I fought with them! They gave me all 6 month free trying to keep me from cancelling and kept ofering me the $10.95 program … SIX MONTHS to finally get it through someone’s head that I wnted nothing to do with AOL and it was completely deleted off my computer!
“Not sure if I am comparing apples & oranges but locally [NE OHIO] the warner cable Co. who owns AOL
charges $44.95/month. AOL is offering 1/2 cable speed [768 Kbps] for $25.90/month. I am tempted but
do not know “How much slower†that is for $20.00 less. The instant on is more valuable to me than
the speed. I continue to hesitate. glofs”
I use Road Runner Lite and pay half the regular $40/month fee. The difference is very noticeable but fair for the price compared to dial-up. To give you an idea, on regular RR, I averaged download speeds of about 600 – 800 kbps. On RR lite, my average speed is about 80-100 kbps (kilobytes per second). Dial-up users are lucky to hold onto 3 or 4 kbps so there is still a big advantage.
It’s so great reading your posts,
I always find there’s light at the
end of tunnel……
Just to add something: There’s some Interesting
points in your articles, it’s a must read for me
hope everybody else see’s your posts that way.
“I’m actually continuing to pay the $9.95 a month because the free AOL doesn’t come with all the XM radio channels (and all the Internet radio they offer is mono, rather than stereo). But if you don’t use AOL Radio, then the free AOL is a great deal.”
I have FREE AOL and still get the XM channels, in STEREO! Nothing about my original service has changed, except that I no longer have 24/7 Tech Support. Which I don’t miss, as they were of no help to begin with!
This need for speed is normal (like everyone needs a 42″ flat panel TV 😉 )but there are a few caveats that even the ‘squint print’ doesn’t tell you.
(1) the InterNet is a spider web of gateways and depending on whether a gateway is down or traffic, things can get very circuitous. If you’re in NYC and attempting to connect with a server in LA, you could be routed through London, England or Sydney, Australia! It almost never follows a straight line.
Try doing a trace route and you’ll be astounded at the number of hops and latency.
(2) Cable, offers very fast packages but you’re sharing bandwidth with your neighbors and 4-11PM is prime time and will be slow compared to say after midnight.
(3) DSL, the speed DEPENDS on the distance to the C.O. (Company Office..->switching station). ADSL maxes out at 12,000 feet. So, the closer you are to the C.O. the faster the speed. Always ask your potential ISP how far am I to the C.O.?
(some Telcos will have repeaters to offset this)
I have a 5meg connection ($45/mth) and share it with two of my neighbors. Running a Wi-Fi network, they’re getting a solid 1meg connection and charge them each $10/month. I do all the maintenance (which isn’t much) and we’re all happy as clams. 😉
Suggest others do likewise.
Disclaimer: some cable/dsl suppliers take a dim view of this practice and can ‘throttle’ you down….but quite easy to make the wireless router ‘transparent’. 😉 😉
If you have time warner cable you should pay nothing for aol.