Freeserve was not the first free ISP. Freeserve was the first free ISP to make it big, it opened the flood gates that held the British public back from the Internet and for that we should thank it. Freeserve had two big advantages at the start;
1) The free Freeserve CD being handed out with every computer bought at a wide range of established computer retailers around the country.
2) The support and backing of a big company that eliminated the need for annoying adverts to crowd your screen whenever you logged in.
Despite the backing from the parent company, Freeserve operates on a razor edge of a budget. It operates there very well but you can tell when things are starting to get scary. Freeserve was swamped due to its initial success. It simply did not have the capacity to cope with all the users. Quickly enough (But too slow for some) it rallied and installed larger modem racks.
Freeserve is still prone to these overflows of capacity. When a number of set-rate phonebill ISPs in the North of England worked out they had bitten off more than they could chew in August of 2000 they closed down. The people who had signed with them all returned to Freeserve en mass. Freeserve was log jammed again. Okay, I doubt there is a single ISP out there who could not be jammed up in this way. Freeserve, though, is one of the most vulnerable.
This, though, is a positive review of Freeserve. Their service works. Should you dial up to discover the lines are busy you can try again later; you do not crash. Freeserve does not kick you off-line at the end of every hour (the scary fact is that some ISPs still do this).
Money wise? … and I know this is the important bit to many. Freeserve’s ISP facilities are free but you are left with the phone bill. If, like me, you’re an internet addict, then that can be a killer. Freeserve continues to make attempts to deal with this. Freeserve has deals with BT to get their users money off (providing, of course, you’ve signed up to the right deals) but, as far as I am aware, it only has deals with BT.
The Freeserve Portal site is alright. It is busy but worthwhile. I like the fact that you do not have to keep it has your Homepage. The ISP I am with at the minute has software that wails and kicks up a storm if you try and change these settings.
The Freeserve E-mail is nicely done and a pain at the same time. You own a mini-domain. @.freeserve.co.uk So, you can have as many names as you like. This is good because you can create lots of aliases for yourself. Manx@ or CiaoReviewer@ or RateThisReview@. The downside is that these are just aliases. You really only have one email box. If you have to share a computer at home you will need to sort out a cunning filter system to put different family members incoming e-mails into the right folders.
How helpful would this review be to a person making a buying decision? Rating guidelines
Sep 5th, 2000
very helpful by (60%):
helpful by (40%):
