So things are coming along pretty well, albeit a bit slower then I’d like. After nearly 3 weeks of working with Speakeasy/Covad/AT&T on my DSL, it turns out that I’m too far away from the CO to get a decent connection so I’m moving over to Comcast. The Comcast service is indeed *VERY* fast (I saw ~30Mbps down and 3Mbps up last night!) and about 40% cheaper then Speakeasy, but not having a static IP and being able to run a full range of services on my server is a big negative. I’m in luck though- I’ve found a place I can host my server for free, so it’s all going to work out.

We’ve also learned why it’s good to have an insurance policy on all the appliances when you buy a home. Both the oven and dishwasher are having problems, but the parts & labor is only going to cost us $45.

Comcast came out last week to install a new drop for our TV in the living room. I guess I was hoping for too much for a “professional install” when they’re only charging $14. But after some creative thinking and getting lucky on how the old wires were run, we came up with a solution which doesn’t suck.

Now it’s mostly just a matter of getting our old townhouse on the market and hoping it sells quickly… Now that Congress has passed the bailout bill maybe that has a chance of happening.

So yes, we finally moved to our new home. Anyways, I figured I’d give a quick score card for all the companies we’ve had to deal with so far, in no particular order:

• Comcast: C-. For some reason thought that changing our billing address meant we wanted them to disconnect our service two weeks early, so our plan of having Tivo tape all our shows while we were on vacation didn’t work. When we got back, Comcast said it was just a service outtage in our area, but after 2 days we called again and they admitted the confusion. Of course, by then it would take them 2 more days to turn it on, by which time we’d actually moved out. Got a C- instead of a D because the technician who came out was so nice.
• PG&E: A-. Easy to work with, but long lead time on getting the gas turned back on in our place meant we were without a working stovetop/hot water for almost a week. When they went to turn on the gas, the first guy broke the pipe, but PG&E sent two more trucks & 3 more people the same day to fix it. Would of gotten an A+ if we could of gotten them to schedule things quicker.
• Speakeasy: B+. I want to give Speakeasy a higher grade, because frankly I know how big of a disaster things would of been if my ISP was someone else. But, looking at the bigger picture, things took longer then I would of liked and my DSL is more like “Damned Slow Link” (less then 1Mbps down, compared to the 6Mbps I ordered) then high-speed internet. Hopefully AT&T and Covad will figure things out and I won’t have to dump Speakeasy, switch to cable and host my server elsewhere.
• AT&T: B. Ordering was easy, but their unwillingness to send a tech out to turn our line up and verify everything was in proper working order meant of course our phone didn’t work. Once they sent a tech, it was pretty painless and he was able to quickly diagnose the problem and fix it.