26 September 2007

Grapevine - what is going on!?

| taiyaki
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No email for grapevine users since Sunday, but patchy and incorrect information from grapevine all the way through.

Despite the proclamation on the grapevine website yesterday that as of 2pm yesterday that the email outage is resolved, and then again last night at 10.30pm that email issues are resolved, I – and I’m guessing most grapevine custromers – still have no access to email. We rang this morning, and after waiting ages to get through, were told that the complete non-access problem we have (we can’t even log on) was across the system. But there is no notice about it, and no recorded message about it. The information on their website still claims the system is up an operating. I’m glad I don’t have a small business or rely on my grapevine account for work, because this is just not good enough.

If there is a problem with the network, they should be upfront about it and not have posted incorrect information on their website. The heading “Total Email Outage – Resolved” and “Email Issues – Resolved” when they are clearly not, is irritating and frustrating for customers in the extreme. I hope they offer us all a refund or reduced access fee this month.

Anyone else affected by this or been told it’s fixed when it isn’t?

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We had our Transact service disconnected as we were moving interstate, hence there was no email available through Grapevine as there was no line and upon attempting to login 2 Grapevine on a friends computer, the Grapevine Homepage promply advised us that our previous user name was now unknown, and the bastards then tried 2 stick us with a bill for three months service of email. I had to explain to them why they couldnt bill me for a service they were no longer providing. Im not so sure that my new intertstate ISP is any better yet but atleast I got net. Good luck with Grapevine guys! Quid

Give Internode a look too. iiNet’s not bad, but not great either. I was with iiNet and switched when I moved house and had to disconnect the old adsl. No regrets, I didn’t like the changes to iiNet’s usenet service.

el ......VNBerlinaV89:32 pm 27 Sep 07

Just another word on iinet – 24 hour phone helpdesk if there are connectivity problems, and *useful* phone operators.

I’ve tried a few different ISPs, I’m with iinet at the mo on an ADSL2+ plan and it’s the happiest I’ve ever been with an ISP.

Was with bigpond, but their plans were way overpriced compared to their competitors, and their service was terrible (generally true with any Telstra products in my experience). Although very reliable.

Tried TPG, terrible service and don’t offer ADSL2+ in my area.

I’m with Grapevine as well… They are the most useless F^*&*s I have ever come across. Network status link on the site was down the entire time email was down. I sent them some hate mail (from a hotmail account) but that bounced! Can’t even keep their own email up! Pathetic service constantly. I’m getting straight on the next train to velocity and warning everyone about their lack of… well.. everything. Werrrst ISP.. everrrr.

I’d tend to agree that grapevine lacks something as far as reliable service, but their early plans (pre 2007) were pretty good for the money. I’m on a $38 10GB plan with true unlimited offpeak download (according to my original T&C). The new plans have that “acceptable off-peak download limits” which I think are complete shit. They keep calling me to ask me about bundling my services, and seem completely ignorant when I explain to them that their new plans aren’t as good.

Anyway – if I had to buy now I wouldn’t go with grapevine but so long as they stick to my original contract I’ll stay put.

Well an update – my email is finally fixed. Have to say after this incident I’ll be costing other ISP’s. I understand problems happen, but I do think customers should be kept up to date, and the support line should still be open to people who seem to have a different problem to the main one.

I’m still on an old Grapevine shaped plan, but I notice that their new plans all have an “overrun range” between the cap and the shaping point – for example their $39.95 a month plan where you will get charged $550 in overrun fees before hitting the shaping (!!!!!). Ridiculous, the only reason I’m still with them is the amount it saves me on my electricity usage charges.

I’m on Velocity direct and even they have had intermittent connectivity issues lately, once in a while is fair enough but the last week was bad including two hours off on Monday evening AFTER the Monday morning maintenance. Since then it’s been fine however and I’d recommend them in general.

I got onto a Dodo all you can eat ADSL plan for $50/month a while ago, and no matter how persuasive the indian call centre monkey, nobody has yet offered me a replacement all you can eat plan for that value.

Beats any limits hands down. Heck, I’m online at home now *ahem* downloading legally avaliable software via bittorrent *ahem*

**Disclaimer**
There are many large files that you can download via the Bittorrent client, all freely avaliable. An example is OpenSuse 10.2 (3.6 GB) at http://software.opensuse.org/ I do not prescribe to software piracy and have taken remedial action to legalise ownership of software in my possession in the past.

Canberra ISPs are a ripoff, if you can get off the transact cable and onto ADSL2 I would be doing that quick smart. I just checked the velocity site (because the link is handy) and their ADSL8000-40000 plan at $140 doesn’t even come close to my IINET plan with 60GB peak + 60GB off peak for $140, another $40 and i have added my home phone and voip. pPlus i am normally connecting at about 18000kb/sec which is more than double the speed

ADSL2! Damn it. It would coast me $129 to get ADSL2 with Bigpond. That’s it, I’m swapping to a local ISP!

el ......VNBerlinaV82:42 pm 26 Sep 07

DO NOT go on any plan which has excess usage charges when there are shaped plans available. A mistake by my Dad cost us $500+ extra in one month.

Damn, that’s a lotta porn!

Back on topic – I’ve been very happy with ADSL2 through iinet myself, and have only ever heard good things about Internode too.

Quite right. Last time I priced them against other local ISPs and even Bigpond, I wouldn’t be saving anything.

While on the subject of ISPs. Just as Federal Labour has been saying, the more people who use wirless internet (such as nextG), the slower it goes. My internet speeds have dropped from 1400kb/s to just 500kb/s in just four months. And the Liberals think that wirless internet and nextG is going to give the bush “world class” high speed internet. What a croc.

Oh yeah, a bit on topic.

Grapevine is notorious for being a cheaply-run ISP by TransACT for a bit of extra revenue. Unfortunately these savings are not passed onto the customer. If there is anyway that you can break out of your contract I would reccommend that you do and change to either Velocity or Netspeed.

I also recommend Velocity if you’re on transACT for whatever reason.

We’re on a shaped plan and Speed-scheduled our downloads in the off-peak times, managed to get 110+gigs last month without getting capped. I think from the T&C we could go to 120gig a month without receiving any notice from them to slow down.

DO NOT go on any plan which has excess usage charges when there are shaped plans available. A mistake by my Dad cost us $500+ extra in one month.

I use Internode and have for 3 and a bit years. not 1 outage has effected me.. best ISP out there IMO

I’m with Bigpond and in four years, it has only been down for 4 hours total between 9am and 12 midnight. Usually their out for an hour every few weeks at 3am in the morning. Very reliable, but their prices are murder for large download plans (20GB). I’d love the change but with the outages I hear about from local providers, especially on Whirlpool, I feel like I’m dammed either way I go.

check out the Whirlpool.net forum on grapevine mailserver etc.

(BTW, for everyone else, whirlpool is a great site for info on all ISPs and quick answers on issues like this as many ISP staff are on there)

As for “I’m glad I don’t have a small business or rely on my grapevine account for work, because this is just not good enough”: this is the reason some ISP’s offer ‘business’ ADSL plans which cost more than residential… see whirlpool above!

Growling Ferret1:20 pm 26 Sep 07

Boney – that’s why you use gmail or yahoo mail or hotmail….. It doesn’t matter who your ISP is then

boneymaloney1:19 pm 26 Sep 07

[muses] if you could easily transfer your email address to another provider like you can with your mobile number, perhaps service would improve…

Solution = http://www.velocitynet.com.au

Grapevine is the most hopeless ISP I have seen…. and I say that even after working for Bigpond at one stage…

That sucks, Get a better ISP. Outages once every so often are understandable, but certainly no emails for days is a bit much. I left a Canberra ISP a few months back to switch to internode. Best decision I’ve made in a long time.

you could always use velocity. just follow the link to the right of this comment [end freebie plug]

seriously though I’m with grapevine & havent been overly impressed with the outages of late. I did notice the email issues last night but of course their tech support line wasnt open.

No problems with mine… I just received all my new emails about 30 seconds ago

Gungahlin Al12:26 pm 26 Sep 07

This was subject of an article in CT today. Something about an upgraded server wouldn’t reboot on Sunday. Emails are getting through but very slowly, and they are putting another server in pronto but still don’t know what the problem is….

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