strangely out of place

Finally, we have an Internet connection at home *cheers* We decided to go with Globelines broadband (1 Mbps, data only) as PLDT was taking a very long time to respond to our application. Last Sunday, Globelines had a booth at our barangay hall (which was just across the street from our building) and the lady there, Thelma, told us that all we needed to do was fill up a form, present an ID and five days from the application, technicians will come to install and activate the DSL. No sign-up or installation fees.

I got good feedback about Globe from several people who have used them, so I was willing to give it a try. Tuesday morning, I got a call from a technician saying that they'll be heading over to install it. I told Nunik and he was the one who met with the techs.

The techs were confused at first because they knew our building was PLDT exclusive, but they went anyway. Unfortunately, the building admin wasn't around so they couldn't get the line activated. They came back yesterday, opened the line, installed the modem drivers and got us connected. The speed of the activation earned them bonus points from me.

Nunik started using the DSL then. Browsing was ok, but after an hour or so told me that he was having trouble installing YM. It went through the installation, but once it reached 100%, it'll stay that way (and it did, for about 3 hours). He did a speedtest and said that the download speed was very slow. The tech support people told him that it was normal as the connection was new, and we should give it 24 hours. He was also told that it would be best if the modem would be right next to the CPU for optimal performance.

I'm willing to let the first comment go, as we are the first to use Globelines in our building, and from experience it sometimes has an effect. But the second one is laughable, because I used that line myself back when I was a DSL TS, and I wanted to get out of the call ASAP. Why do local TS people presume their customers are idiots about technology?

I used it last night and yes, the browsing is ok. However, there are some sites that take so long to load (these are sites I access everyday at work), and sometimes I have to stop the page from loading and refresh it. I checked the speed and got 32 kbps for the upload. I did the usual things I usually ask people to do when they complain of slow speeds: powercycle modem, change the cable, switch ends, reboot PC, turn off other programs, do a speed test on various sites, optimize browser, flush DNS, release and renew IP (I wanted to force the IP but I didn't know what to use)... nada. I still keep seeing 10 Mbps as the speed on my system tray.

As of 11:30 AM, Nuks said it was 27d/148u on speedtest.net. Waah, that is ugly.

Technicians will be coming over later today to check it out. Wish I was there to poke and prod as they troubleshoot. I probably won't argue with those techs as they most likely know what they're doing (at least, I hope they do), but if I call and get a tech who tries to brush me off, hala, buhusan kita ng technical jargon hangang mag epistaxis ka dyan (Sorry, my snotty TS self is emerging after more than a year of sleeping).

I also checked out some blogs on feedback about Globe's DSL services. I found one who said that Globe technicians paid him a visit after he was interviewed by Probe and he complained about the service. Whoo. Ayus yun ah. Though this was late last year pa.

There were also several threads in various forums complaining about the services of Globe DSL, but there were others who said that it was good. I still have my reservations, but I'm hoping that things will work better after today.