After too many months of struggling with a bad Internet Service Provider, I pulled the plug on PeoplePC this week and went back to – gasp! – MSN. When I inherited my sister's old Dell, I was thrilled at last to get online with the PC. No more getting online solely with the balky, really outdated WebTV. I still use the little black box for some basic routine online tasks: email, quick editing of pages, and keeping up with the WebTV newsgroups. But using the box to access certain sites, such as Yahoo or Gmail was next to impossible.
So I searched for an affordable ISP and settled for PeoplePC. Hey, it was cheap, less than $12 a month, and very basic. You know that old saying, "You get what you pay for"? Well, it rang all too true these past weeks when I got increasingly frustrated with PPC's lackluster performance. Bad connections (Yes, I'm on dialup), no connections, bad scripts which Windows doesn't handle very well if not at all, and clueless tech reps whose help was no help at all. I called PPC back in April after nearly 2 weeks of no Internet, at least on the PC. I had to uninstall the software and do a workaround so I can at least get online and stay connected longer than the usual ten minutes. No joke! They sent another software CD, the same version of what I had. So I installed the thing, and problems persisted. When I called again, the tech could tell I was really pissed. I was angry and told him my old webtv, despite its slowness and age, outperforms PPC which is not saying much for this sorry excuse for an ISP. He then asked, after my tirade, "What is the color of your Start button?"
Okay, so I stayed with PPC for a while, and the service continued to perform fair to poor. The last 2 weeks, I had to delete "bad" access numbers, thinking that would help. It didn't, and PPC continued to slide into non-performance. I got kicked offline too many times, and I kept getting the Windows popups about bad scripts. Last week I had it out with the PPC rep. I wanted to cancel the account but the rep kept telling me "You can't have two internet accounts." I was referring to dumping PPC and going back to MSN. At least with them I can keep my webtv for free while paying for a full service ISP. The rep tried to talk me out of cancelling, and I threatened to call the state attorney general if my PPC account wasn't cancelled right now. That wasn't a light threat or bluff. Then the rep changed his tune and canceled the account. He said I could keep the peoplepc email account, but he lied about that. My sister tried to email me at PPC but the message bounced back as undeliverable.
Now that I'm back with MSN, and it's a joy to use, despite the flack Gates and company get for their products. I can actually connect and stay connected, and I don't need no stinkin' "accelerator", thank you very much.
To all WebTV users who are considering a good ISP: Stay away from PeoplePC! You'll get nothing but crappy service and big-time headaches.