What are your High Speed Internet Choices?
What are your choices for High Speed Internet in metro Atlanta?
Some providers may not be available at your location. Go to the various provider websites to determine this.
- ATT
- best solution when compared to Earthlink and Comcast. ATT still
smells bad, but it does not smell as bad as the other solutions.
Support will drive you crazy. Grab a cup of coffee, a magazine and a
tranquilizer when you call.
- Earthlink - uses ATT copper line to
get to your house. If the problem is with the ATT line, be prepared for
some finger pointing. Getting Earthlink to call ATT to fix the problem
is difficult at best. You cannot call ATT because you are not an ATT
customer. ATT repair techs do not care if your problem is solved
because you are not an ATT customer. I have seen ATT techs lie about
coming out to fix a problem. They do not come out, yet mark the problem
as solved. Earthlink is a sinking ship financially and it shows.
- Comcast
- Horrible customer support. Horrible reliability. If you dropped your
telephone land line and use the Comcast home phone line solution, I
hope you have a cell phone because your home phone line uses the
Internet connection and your Internet connection goes down at the drop
of a hat for days. Run away from Comcast if you can.
- Charter -
cable company in Smyrna. This is what HTHC uses. Very fast and
reliable. Good customer care. This is the provider of choice if you can
get it.
- You
will lose your email address. You will need to contact everyone in your
address book with an email blast telling them you are changing. You
will also need to go to multiple websites that you do business with and
change your profile to point to your new email address. If you are
using something like Yahoo instead of an ATT (or other Internet
provider) email address, this will not be an issue.
- Comcast
will offer, for a price, the ability to keep your email address when
you get rid of your Internet connection. You cannot send email using
your Comcast email address. You can only receive emails delivered to
your Comcast email address. I see this as a way of buying time until
you send out your email blast and cut the tie all the way with Comcast.
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Windows vs. Apple Laptop 
Is a laptop purchase in your future? Is it time to consider an Apple laptop?
We use both Apple and Windows based laptops. Both have their place in my business.
Let me lay out the basic differences to help you make an informed decision.
- Apple Laptop will cost much more. (Win Tel $550 vs. Apple $1300)
- You
will have to buy/re-buy software for the Apple platform. Adobe
PhotoShop that runs on your Windows laptop will not run on your Apple
laptop. You need to buy an Apple copy. PhotoShop will look different
from one platform to another. It is possible that the Apple version
will have less functionality than the Windows version. Factor additional
software purchases into the equation.
- Microsoft Office for
Windows will not run on an Apple. You need to buy Office for Mac. Your
other choice is to use the software that comes with Apple (iCal,
Address Book, etc.) or buy Apple iWork. I prefer the Microsoft solution
for office applications. Please, no hate mail!
- Apple
Laptop harder to upgrade/repair. (42 screws to replace keyboard on Mac
Pro vs. three screws on Dell laptop. Replacing a hard drive is
stripping the Apple laptop down to a basic frame, while the Dell laptop
is two screws.) If you are buying an Apple laptop, get the biggest hard drive you can afford when selecting a model.
- Apple
memory is expensive. When you buy an Apple laptop, no need to load up
on memory. Buy compatible memory at a much cheaper price (www.kingston.com).
Note if you are buying an Apple iMac or mini, buy as much memory
pre-installed as you can afford. Both of these platforms are hard to
install more memory in. Especially the mini!!!! I do not recommend that
you buy a mini!!!
- Apple replacement parts are
expensive. If the wireless card fails, you cannot buy a Linksys USB
wireless adapter to replace it.you have to buy the expensive Apple replacement card from Apple. You have many cost effective options
with the Windows platform.
- Apple operating system will not
support some printers connected to a network. HTHC prints to a printer
connected to a Windows desktop from an Apple Laptop across a wireless
network. We have seen some problems connecting to wireless printers
from Apple laptops. Check the website of the printer manufacturer to
determine if this is going to be a problem or send HTHC an email
(carlthorne@hthcatlanta.com) and we will tell you if your configuration
will work.
- Support with the Apple platform can be a problem.
Have a problem with your Comcast High Speed Internet Connection?
Comcast will probably hang up on you when you tell them you have an
Apple laptop.
- Support with the Apple platform can be a dream!
Apple online support, built-in help and live support are excellent. Try
talking to someone from Microsoft sometime.
- Your iPod will
need to be erased and re-formatted to work with the Apple operating
system. Your iTunes library will need to be moved/converted to the
Apple operating system format. This can be a big pain and very time
consuming. HTHC can do this task for you. We have vast experience in
this area.
- Apple operating system is more stable and does
not freeze or crash. Be prepared to know how to remove the Win Tel
battery to reboot a frozen Windows machine.
- Apple operating
system, so far, has not been infected with a major virus (knock wood).
You better be up to date and running scans for viruses and malware on a
weekly basis on the Windows platform or bad things will happen.
- Apple
laptop can be configured to run both the Apple and Windows operating
systems. A Windows platform cannot. I like some versions of programs
better on Windows. My laptop can dual boot to take advantage of both
operating systems.
- Apple operating system is very different
from Windows. So what!!!! You struggled to learn Vista and Windows 7 is
coming out soon and you will have to struggle to learn that operating
system. You can learn to use an Apple pretty easy. Books are available
(like the Dummies series), or you can schedule one on one training with
High Tech House Calls.
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