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Switching to AT&T U-verse Today

 
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dystopia
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Switching to AT&T U-verse Today
« on: May 28, 2009, 12:34:53 PM »

So with the tv season ending and the dvr looking bare, I decided it was a good time to switch from Comcast to AT&T U-verse for tv and internet access.

I've read some horror stories online about installations, so this should be interesting. Fingers Crossed

I'm curious to see how they handle the wiring.
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stroh
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Re: Switching to AT&T U-verse Today
« Reply #1 on: May 28, 2009, 12:37:36 PM »

 Thumbs Up  Cool.  About the same price/service?  I haven't heard of it.



I'm curious to see how they handle the wiring.


Really long cables, etc., etc.
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dystopia
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Re: Switching to AT&T U-verse Today
« Reply #2 on: May 28, 2009, 12:49:21 PM »

Our comcast bill is about $150/mo now for tv and internet.  u-verse will be about $110/mo, but there's a $250 cash back promotion.

It looks like the wiring is done with either coax or cat5.  I'm not sure which way is better.  Quality is supposedly to better with cat5, but if I want to switch back to comcast it will be a pain with the coax cable gone.

Anyone here gone through a u-verse installation?
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birdymaker
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Re: Switching to AT&T U-verse Today
« Reply #3 on: May 28, 2009, 02:29:34 PM »

We got u-verse in March. our comcast bill had just gone up to 210.00 a month for phone tv and internet. they used all of our coax cable we already had and ran a cat5 line to the room where the residential gateway is located. There were a couple of small glitches at first with the boxes but they seem to have solved themselves.
we have the 3 megabit internet which is noticeably slower than comcraps 16mb and i may bump this up to the next level which is 5.00 more a month. but we don't download any large video files so it usually is more than sufficent.

The tv interface/guide is light years ahead of comcast's and i would really have a hard time going back to comcast due to this alone. we have three times as many Hd channels with ATT without having any premium channels.

our intention was to switch and then in a year switch back and keep playing them against each other but so far we are happier with att so we'll see what happens when the years up. they knocked almost 70.00 off our cable bill. when we called comcast to see what they could do to give us some relief on our bill they basically told us to get bent.
When i called to get the service disconnected after the att install their tune changed dramatically and they said they could match att's price. It was my turn to tell them to get bent.  Devil   
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dystopia
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Re: Switching to AT&T U-verse Today
« Reply #4 on: May 28, 2009, 04:13:10 PM »

That's encouraging to hear.  We're doing this primarily for cost reasons.  If we get more channels and a better tv interface, that's a bonus.
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dystopia
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Re: Switching to AT&T U-verse Today
« Reply #5 on: June 01, 2009, 05:40:56 PM »

So the u-verse install turned out ok.  Took longer than expected, but I'm happy with the end result.

On Thursday the installer wasn't able to run the new cables underneath our house because the crawlspace was too tight, so I told him to leave the cables and I'd go under there and get everything set for him the next day.

I've been under the house a few times for other cables and during the home inspection, so I know the best routes to avoid getting stuck.

He showed up the next day and things were up and running in an hour.  He also had AT&T send out a line tech over the weekend to replace the line from the utility pole to the house since ours was very old.

I was impressed with the customer service of both of these guys.  Maybe I'm just used to Comcast complacency, but these guys seemed generally interested that things were installed correctly.

I'll write up my initial thoughts about u-verse in a separate post.
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dystopia
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Re: Switching to AT&T U-verse Today
« Reply #6 on: June 01, 2009, 05:59:56 PM »

After a weekend of U-verse here are some thoughts:

Positives

- HD quality looks great, better than Comcast.  Internet service is fast.  It could just be the new wiring.  We're also pretty close to the point where the fiber-optic line ends, so we don't run over that much copper.  I mainly did this for the cost savings, so I would have been ok with losing a little performance, but I haven't run into that yet.

- We only have 1 dvr in the living room, but being able to watch recorded shows from the receiver in the kitchen is great.  I'm surprised how important this turned out to be.

- Hiding Channels - We have none of the pay movie channels so it's a pain to have to scroll through all those in the guide.  The feature to hide channels we don't even receive as well as the home shopping channels is great.

- The dvr and receiver are both small compared to the honking Comcast box.  Even the remote is small, which at first bugged me and my sausage fingers, but I've started to appreciate it.


Negatives

- The Blue LED on the front of the box is annoying.  After the first 10 minutes of watching, I turned to my wife and we both remarked how bright and distracting that light is.  I wasn't able to find any codes online to dim it, so it's now covered by some black electrical tape.

- View Listings by Genre - Some weekends I just want to sit with a beer and flip between sports until I fall asleep.  I really miss being able to quickly see what sports are currently on like I could with Comcast.  Same thing with movies, I liked being able to easily see what movies will be showing in the next 24 hours, so I could record one if it looked interesting.

- Disk Space Used/Remaining.  I'm surprised they don't show this in the Recorded TV screens.  you have to go under Options|System Info to see how much disk space you've used up. Angry

- Show Priorities - I don't see a way to set a series priority, so it'll be interesting to see how conflicts between recording simultaneous shows are handled.
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stroh
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Re: Switching to AT&T U-verse Today
« Reply #7 on: June 02, 2009, 05:17:05 AM »


On Thursday the installer wasn't able to run the new cables underneath our house because the crawlspace was too tight....


LMAO.  Ya'll fat.  You eat too much.



I've been under the house a few times for other cables and during the home inspection, so I know the best routes to avoid getting stuck.


 Lips Sealed



I tell you what though, you ain't gettin' my ass under no house crawl space.  Way too much spiders and bugs and *feces*.  Probably snakes too.  Hell, that's California;  Could be some dead teenage boys too.






Some weekends I just want to sit with a beer and flip between sports until I fall asleep. 



Amen brother.


 

Thumbs Up  Thanks for the review.
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hobbit
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Re: Switching to AT&T U-verse Today
« Reply #8 on: June 02, 2009, 01:16:18 PM »

Although I have DirectTV, I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one annoyed by the damned blue light (especially on the smaller units).  Freaking piercingly bright eh?  Nice solution Thumbs Up

I'd like to be able to watch recorded shows on other TVs - but I get by without.  I do get two 'favorites' guides where I can specify what channels I want to see in the guide, then change between guides.  Kinda nice.

I would have gone U-Verse, but they didn't have Setanta  Devil

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dystopia
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Re: Switching to AT&T U-verse Today
« Reply #9 on: June 02, 2009, 01:22:47 PM »


I tell you what though, you ain't gettin' my ass under no house crawl space.  Way too much spiders and bugs and *feces*.  Probably snakes too.  Hell, that's California;  Could be some dead teenage boys too.


Yeah, there's a crapload of spiderwebs down there.  Really thick webs too since they can build them without many disturbances. (until I go down there and stumble through all of them)

For some reason the spiders don't bother me.  My flashlight isn't that great, so I don't actually see any spiders, only feel the webs around my face/hands.  I can then trick myself into believing that the webs are all unoccupied at the moment.

The thing that really lurks in my mind is that there'll be an earthquake while I'm under there.  Even a small tremor would be bad news if I'm in a tight space and the house shifts.
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