> I just have to throw my two cents in here.
And let me add another penny to the pot. I completely understand the war
over who's at fault. You are correct in saying that a customer goes out
to buy the $10 modem and expects $250 worth out of it but you have to
remember that most customers are blind to the fact that they dot know
what's good or not until the obvious happens. So who is really to blame?
If all ISP's had the same kind of modems that the customer does, then
the grass would be greener and the sky a little bluer but it is not so.
Until there becomes a strong standard on what to use, the blind will
always bump into walls.
> When my customers complain
> about poor connections, our drill starts at "What brand of modem do
> you
> have installed in your machine?" If they have some "crappy" modem, we
>
> start the generic troubleshooting process and when that is exhausted,
> in
> a very nice way, I simply tell them. We charge a premium price for a
> premium service. We invest in state-of-the-art terminal servers to
> answer your calls. As technology moves forward, your "crappy" modem
> will continue to degrade in performance. At some point, you will need
>
> to invest in "quality" equipment for your side of the connection if
> you
> want all the bells and whistles you've read about in PC Magazine.
>
> I keep modems in the office and offer them for sale to the customers.
> This fixes the "crappy" modem issue and lets us add yet another source
>
> of revenue. Now, sometimes of course we eat a little crow when they
> buy
> a modem from us and they still have problems connecting, but then it
> is
> ALWAYS the Telco's fault :)
>
> This "crappy" modem issue did not begin with the 56K cards and the
> PM3's
> it has been a factor for a long time. Our customers see the ads in
> the
> magazines and want their 10$ modems to perform like a 249$ modem.
> Well,
> you get what you pay for.
>
> There may indeed be some bugs that need to be worked out by LE with
> the
> current code but that will never replace the "crappy" modem on the
> client side. I don't have anything to compare LE against, but I have
> seen the hate mail about remote access products from other mfg's. I
> think it is safe to assume that all ISP's, regardless of their
> equipment
> (Cisco, Ascend or whoever) will continue the battle of the "Crappy
> Modem"
>
> --
> Ron Long
> WNSC