Have I gone stark raving bonkers? I think AOL is fantastic!
Yes, despite it’s reputation and many quips about being Assholes OnLine, in my experience it’s all I could wish for!
I have been online since Oct 1999. My first ever ISP was Currant Bun which was a pay by the minute. May average ... Read review
Advantages: easy to use, lots of content, several email addresses, cheap! Disadvantages: can't view pictures in emails you have to download them
...stark raving bonkers? I think AOL is fantastic!
Yes, despite it’s reputation and many quips about being Assholes OnLine, in my experience it’s all I could wish for!
I have been online since Oct 1999. My first ever ISP was Currant Bun which was a pay by the minute. May average monthly phone bill? - £180!
I soon changed to Cable and Wireless’s own unmetered service and was paying £35 a month but I wasn’t happy with them ... ...and at £15.99 a month AOL was looking attractive.
I must admit I was wary about it, so I emailed Trampus for her opinion and also read some ops on Ciao. Some that were all for AOL and some against to get a balanced view.
On the whole it seemed to me AOL worked ok for some but for others it caused problems, mainly crashing their computer.
I decided to go for it. I signed up online for the free trial and downloaded the ... more
Have I gone stark raving bonkers? I think AOL is fantastic! Yes, despite it’s reputation and many quips about being Assholes OnLine, in my experience it’s all I could wish for!
I have been online since Oct 1999. My first ever ISP was Currant Bun which was a pay by the minute. May average monthly phone bill? - £180! I soon changed to Cable and Wireless’s own unmetered service and was paying £35 a month but I wasn’t happy with them so I came across the BT Surftime Anytime package at £20 a month and my new ISP was Flexnet. In addition to paying BT £20 monthly, I also had to pay £10 to Flexnet and £6 to Affinity each month.
I was happy with what I got. Fast, reliable connection, a very friendly customer service – it was a small company and at one point I spent an hour talking to the manager who answered most of the calls himself, talking about anything and everything! I was the first in my group of peers to have a fast, unmetered connection and recommended them to anyone who stopped long enough to listen.
So why have I suddenly reverted to AOL? My phone bill came a few weeks ago and at £120 it was all internet charges for a quarter and that didn’t include the £16 a month going out of my bank account by direct debit to Flexnet and Affinity. Coupled with the fact that BT had just increased the Surftime to £25 a month. I was fed up with it. Seeing as I’m hardly rich either, that money could be spent on something more useful (no, not a few new lippies!). So my 2yr relationship with Flexnet had come to an end.
Although every ISP has it’s pro’s and cons, I didn’t want to go to a less well-known ISP. It also had to be unmetered access and at £15.99 a month AOL was looking attractive.
I must admit I was wary about it, so I emailed Trampus for her opinion and also read some ops on Ciao. Some that were all for AOL and some against to get a balanced view. On the whole it seemed to me AOL worked ok for some but for others it caused problems, mainly crashing their computer. I decided to go for it. I signed up online for the free trial and downloaded the software, which took ages (1 1/2hrs). For years I had been sent AOL Cd’s at the rate of two a month but when you want one, you can’t get one!
Installation was a piece of cake but when I tried to connect nothing happened! I tried everything I could think of but no luck and I had to ring AOL. I was wary of this, as I’ve heard they can be rude and patronising. I was impressed. The woman I spoke to was kind and they certainly know their stuff! My modem driver wouldn’t work with this version of AOL (version 7) and with WIN XP but all I had to do was download the latest driver and I was up and running.
I’m not about to launch into what AOL is/has because unless you’re an alien, you’re bound to know! But here’s my impression of the service.
I’ve connected every time and set up several email addresses. I’m impressed with all the content they provide, never having had this before with an ISP. What I’m most impressed about is being able to set up a screen name (which is also your email address) for my young son and restrict what he does online.
The layout for the under 12’s is bright and colourful with plenty to see and do. Games, stories, chat, message boards and loads more. The homework button will come in handy in a few years! As my son who is nearly 7 is just getting into the internet, AOL is ideal for him.
I’ve only been on AOL for a very short time and still learning about all the different features. There is one con for me and that email that has been in your inbox for 20 days gets deleted but you have a personal filing cabinet to make new folders to keep your emails, so in a way it makes me organised and I make sure I keep or delete emails as soon as I’ve read them whereas before I my inbox would be filled with tons of rubbish for months!
As I have several email addresses now or screen names, I thought I would have to log off, then log on again with a different name to check my email but all I have to do is press switch screen name and a box will come up showing all the screen names and whether any of them have email waiting so I can see before I decide to switch.
Paying by credit card each month isn’t great as I’d prefer to pay by direct debit or with my debit card but it isn’t a huge inconvenience as I do most of my banking online and can transfer money from my bank account to my credit card when I want.
I am concerned about virus checking emails and can’t find any help on this yet but I do like the huge amount of help available including the facility of talking to a ‘techie’, which I’ve done already and you talk in private in a chatroom.
I’m am bemused at the way if someone has included a file in an email such as a photo you can’t just view it in the email but you have to download it onto your computer and then open it. It’s more long-winded that way.
Overall, I’m very pleased with my change to AOL and I think I’ll be with them for a very long time. My AOL trial comes to an end the middle of Aug but I won’t be cancelling. That just leaves me to cancel my BT Surftime, Flexnet and Affinity. Cancel the direct debits, inform everyone of my email change including all the websites I’m registered to. Shame AOL can’t do this for me, as it seems to do everything else!
That just leaves me to say to those considering a change to AOL. Ignore the reputation, keep an open mind, read other ops on Ciao, install the software and just try it for yourself, you just may be pleasantly surprised!
Advantages: Quality connection, good Helpdesk, good news/information content Disadvantages: Price, connection/browser software
...the best aspects of the AOL service - it's free, reasonably fast, and the staff are friendly and competent.
The other thing that's nice is the little news snippets that you get when you log on. The current affairs, the 'seasonal' news (like the Halloween special on Britain's top 10 haunted houses), and the free competitions are all nice touches (although I haven't won anything yet!)
The connection is reasonably fast and stable, and it's only failed ... ...I only use it for AOL exclusive material (which is broad-ranging and generally quite good).
They were also really nice - after the first free month, when I wasn't quite satisfied with the speed, and wanted to disconnect, they gave me another month free, some faster dial-up numbers, and asked me to try a little more. By the time the second month lapsed, I was happier with the speed, I was enjoying the content, and I'd heard of other ISPs that had ...
DDRS 25.11.2001
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of AOL
Advantages: Easy to use interface, many features Disadvantages: Bad tech support, cyber idiots and occasionally bad Customer Services
...can guess I am no AOL virgin, in fact I had over 4 years of AOL under my belt before I left, working my way through such great versions as 2.5, 3.0, 4.0US, 4.0UK, 5.0, 6.0 and lastly 7.0). Why did I leave I hear you say? Well, a few reasons… I was hosting at the time on their shopping channel (Yes I was the official shopping host on AOL – UKHostSale although I am guessing you haven’t heard of me ) and due to differences I’d had enough, I wasn’t ... ...in 1997 when I joined AOL it was the best there is. The people were so friendly on there, hardly any cyber freaks (Dodgy people who don’t take no or any other profanity for an answer and just want you to have type written sex – yawns) and life was good. The facilities on there were fantastic and everyone loved Hosts and Guides and respected COS (Conditions of Service, if you do have AOL and are unsure of them, please see Keyword : COS – god some ...
Miss_BooBookitty 02.01.2003
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of AOL
Advantages: easy to use, affordable, friendly, safe and secure Disadvantages: you do have to pay a monthly fee
I've been using AOL since 1998, I wanted an affordable and reliable ISP that would give me integrated email facilities. I tried many other ISP's that were around at the time but came to the conclusion that AOL was the best one for me. I've used all versions from 3 up to 6.0 and am now using version 7.0 wich looks even better than before and is faster and easier to use. Of course all ISP's have problems from time to time and I'm not saying I've never ... ...available for me when required. AOL certainly wasn't the most affordable ISP two and a half years ago, but when they introduced the Flat rate £14.99 a month plan this changed things completely. You can now stay online 24 hours a day and only ever pay £14.99 a month, now that must sound good to everyone. I would strongly recommend it to everyone, the integrated instant message and email facilities mean you can do everything from one page without having ...
jameylidd 06.02.2002 (07.02.2002)
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of AOL
Advantages: Unlimited access for £14.99, feature packed. Disadvantages: Occaisional difficulties.
...I have been with AOL for about 18 months now, and generally I am more than satisfied. It is very simple to use with it's baby blue colour scheme and cute little icons. Now and again the browser will not support certain sites such as Cadburys, so I use Internet Explorer instead.
Connection and Access Numbers.. Unlike other ISPs I have used there is more than one connection number, usually four. For 99% of the time I can connect first time at the ... ...your screen name with @ aol added onto it. This can be a problem if you want to use your own name as it is quite likely to be in use already and you will have to add some numbers onto the end to personalise it. Also take care if setting this up for your children, I wouldn't recommend using their full names.
E-mail.... This is very simple to use, you can block unwanted e-mail, attachments, hyperlinks etc, which is very useful for a childs account. ...
DaisyDuck 15.10.2001
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of AOL
Advantages: Reliable, quick and easy to use Disadvantages: A bit expensive if your going to be picky!
AOL is the biggest ISP in the world, but is their status justified? Well, after several disaster stories with other ISP’s that won’t remain nameless if you carry on reading, I simply wanted a good quality ISP with free 24/7 access for one monthly fee. Now, the choice at the moment for 24/7 ISPs is pretty large – AOL, Freeserve, BT, NTL, and many more, far too many to mention here. So why did I choose AOL. Well to be quite honest, I don’t know if ... ...and at £14.99 a month, AOL is one of the most expensive of the non-Broadband ISPs, though its not much more expensive than the like of BT and Freeserve. But of course, there are no bills to worry about after your monthly fee, and to be honest even if I don’t get my moneys worth from the service, I happy knowing that I’m unrestricted when I surf the internet.
Unrestricted? That’s right! AOL is very relaxed in how long you stay connected to the service. ...
aljones 11.01.2002
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of AOL
