Subject: (usr-tc) And you thought you were frustrated with 3COM

From: Scot Desort <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 01 Jun 2000 11:41:33 -0400

Is anyone else here on the Ascend users list?

Whew - there are some VERY angry people on that list. While I have never had
to go to Lucent for support, what these people are describing makes things
at 3COM look bright and sunny. Top-tier engineering support calls being
ignored. Technicians who don't know the products. RMA and warranty claims
not being addressed. It's worse than any complaints I've seen on the 3COM
list.

I *was* considering picking up some Ascend gear to compliment my 3COM stuff,
but I am seriously reconsidering that. So, what's left -  Ci$co? Are they
the only company that provides the kind of support ISP's need? They usually
seem to do most everything right. I don't know -- think I'll stick it out
with 3COM and see if all of the newly found resources available from the
drop of their switches actually *does* go into the ISP/Carrier division.

--
Scot

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From: Jeff Mcadams <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 01 Jun 2000 17:47:31 +0000

Also sprach Scot Desort

>Whew - there are some VERY angry people on that list. While I have
>never had to go to Lucent for support, what these people are describing
>makes things at 3COM look bright and sunny. Top-tier engineering
>support calls being ignored. Technicians who don't know the products.
>RMA and warranty claims not being addressed. It's worse than any
>complaints I've seen on the 3COM list.

>I *was* considering picking up some Ascend gear to compliment my 3COM
>stuff, but I am seriously reconsidering that. So, what's left -  Ci$co?
>Are they the only company that provides the kind of support ISP's need?

Yeah, pretty much...but their modems suck swamp water through a straw.
I've always said I'd love to have 3Com's modems, with Cisco's routing
capabilities.  Ah, what I wouldn't give for a new version of the AS5100.
-- 
Jeff McAdams                            Email: [email-masked]
Head Network Administrator              Voice: (502) 966-3848
IgLou Internet Services                        (800) 436-4456

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From: Jamie Orzechowski <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 01 Jun 2000 17:55:35 +0000

check out the Nortel CVX 1800! ... We are getting rid of our TC Gear (7
Racks - about 40 DSP's) and going to the Nortel CVX 1800 ...

http://www.nortelnetworks.com/promotions/cvxsolutions/index.html

----- Original Message -----
From: "Scot Desort" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Sent: Thursday, June 01, 2000 11:41 AM
Subject: (usr-tc) And you thought you were frustrated with 3COM

> I *was* considering picking up some Ascend gear to compliment my 3COM
stuff,

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From: Richard Lorbieski <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 01 Jun 2000 18:16:16 +0000

Looking to buy 1 DSP card w/NIC. Need ASAP.
Contact me offline or call 1-877-425-7421 ext.10

-- 

Richard Lorbieski - [email-masked]
Chief Technical Officer - Senior System Administrator
Alpha1 Internet  http://www.alpha1.net
409.731.8236  - 877.4.alpha1 (877.425.7421)

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From: Dave Meister <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 01 Jun 2000 18:30:04 +0000

Try calling Terry at Multitech Systems 888-288-5470 x5532 - they are very
responsive and have real people to talk to.

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From: K Mitchell <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 01 Jun 2000 19:25:01 +0000

>capabilities.  Ah, what I wouldn't give for a new version of the AS5100.

I've heard some good things about Patton's boxes, but have no first-hand
experience with them. I don't think they currently have anything to match
TC's modem density, but I believe they have some stuff in the works to
rectify that.

-- 
Kirk Mitchell-General Manager    [email-masked]
Keystone Connect                 Unlock Your World
Altoona, PA  814-941-5000        http://www.keyconn.net

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From: Paul Farber <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 01 Jun 2000 19:59:15 +0000

How can anyone say the Smartnet and 3Com support is worth the money?  I
swear they make a living not off the products but by the support
contracts.

Do you LIKE to pay over and over for the same buggy code?
Do you LIKE having NO support whatsoever if you don't pay for it?
Do you LIKE being held hostage to crappy hardware warrany's?  CISCO has a
90 day warrany.. that 's it.  Is thier gear that crappy that they will
only stand behind it for 90 days before you have to pay for it?  3Com has
5 year on DSP's.... but it take two weeks to get it back?

Face it... there are better companies out there.... 3Com and CISCO may
have the name recognition that the CTO/CEO likes... but tell them the
TOTAL cost for a 3 year lifespan and see if they don't want to look for
alternatives.

Paul Farber
Farber Technology
[email-masked]
Ph  570-628-5303
Fax 570-628-5545

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From: Paul Farber <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 01 Jun 2000 20:07:44 +0000

Rigt now they have 96 port 1U rackmounts.  I have some of their 2800's (24
DSP's 1 PRI/T1) and it works well.  Support is not 24/7 but they do
respond to e-mail/calls.

I have 3 in service and they seem to work as well as 3Com.  One good thing
is that they have KFlex support with the v.90.  Most low end PC's have
kFLEX/v.90 modems... so you have 2x the chance of getting a connection
(v.90->kFLEX) rather then just v.90 then v.34 as on the TC.

They are priced right.... $1200 or so less than a DSP.

Paul Farber
Farber Technology
[email-masked]
Ph  570-628-5303
Fax 570-628-5545

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From: Aaron Nabil <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 01 Jun 2000 20:16:54 +0000

> http://www.nortelnetworks.com/promotions/cvxsolutions/index.html

Nortel is too "Jabba the Hutt" like to deal with, you are going to be 
too small to even be a blip on their radar.  3com at least has
_distributors_ you can get pricing and information from.  Does Nortel have
a "totalservice" web site where you can find documentation and software,
release notes, all that stuff?  Nope.  When you start having problems with
the CVX1800, is there a newsgroups a mailing list you can turn to?  Try
calling Nortel's main number and try to talk to someone _right
now_.  You'll only be able to get someone to call you back.  And when you
ask the operator when that will be (hmm, sometime later today?), "oh,
we try to respond to all inquiries WITHIN 7 DAYS".

Here's an illustration of what you will be up against at Nortel.  A few
months ago, we got a "cold email" from one of their sales staff about
their DSL gear.  Since we were in the process of evaluating DSL solutions
for a coming multi-million dollar investment in provisioning gear and
DSLAMs, here is the reply I sent him...

 From [email-masked] Thu Feb 10 15:55:07 2000 -0800
 Date: Thu, 10 Feb 2000 15:55:02 -0800 (PST)
 From: Aaron Nabil <[email-masked]>
 To: Daniel Foreman <[email-masked]>
 Subject: Re: Nortel Solutions
 In-Reply-To: <[email-masked]>

 We are in the process of evaluating a DSL provisioning solution.  If
 you'd like Nortel to be considered along with Redback, Cisco and Lucent,
 send us every piece of printed information you have about the
 Shasta line.  Manuals, provisioning information, NTP's, everything.  And
 _pricing_, of course.  Not just pricing on a particular configuartion,
 pricing on all the configurations, support and maintainainance, and
 training.

 Here's our address....

You know what I got back?  Exactly the same glossies you might find in a
Nortel booth at a trade show, all packaged in a nice Nortel folder.  I'm
expecting 80lbs, I get 8oz! Unless you are GST or Earthlink or
US WEST, you are nothing to them.  A million dollar sale is NOTHING to
them. NOTHING.

I noticed the above URL you gave at the Nortel web site, it suggest that
there is some kind of "promotion".  I challange you to find that
information on their web site.  In fact, try and find any information
(beyond a picture of the outside of the box) on the CVX on their web
site. 

I'm sure Nortel is great if you are worth $500 million.  If you are worth
$5 million, forget it.

Keep us posted tho, eh?

--
Aaron Nabil

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From: Carl Litt <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 01 Jun 2000 22:18:43 +0000

We just bought our 6th CVX, and I have to say I like them better than
Total Control.  We started complementing our USR stuff about a year
ago, and we're pleased with the results (more pleased they we would
have been with the PM4 we were comparing with).

The configuration is confusing at times, but once you get them going,
you don't need to touch them for months at a time.  Also, you don't
need no damn Windows client to manage it remotely... everything can
be done through telnet.

Another thing to consider is that the CVX is more than a RAS.  There
is also code for VOIP (which will be unified with the RAS code this
year), as well as other telco-specific applications (eg. T3 > T1 demux).

Carl Litt
Network Administrator
Execulink Internet Services

Other comments:

> release notes, all that stuff?  Nope.  When you start having problems with

Yup.  Performance Online.  They have software, documentation, bulletins,
etc.  (We have a support contract, so I can't speak for those who don't)
I do have one thing to say about software... there is so much development
that it's sometimes hard to find a sitting target to upgrade to.  But
their patch levels are more stable than USR's general releases.  Don't get
me wrong... they have their problems, but nothing you can't work around.

> now_.  You'll only be able to get someone to call you back.  And when you

Non-emergency tech support is always available during normal business
hours (9-5).  After-hours emergency support is on call, and will call
you back usually within 30 minutes.  However, often when I call in with
questions about configuration, etc., they have to research it and call
back.  At least when they call you back, they have answers better
than "Umm, reseat the card and try again".  And I've never had to
teach a technician things about the box they should already know.

> US WEST, you are nothing to them.  A million dollar sale is NOTHING to

Wrong.  We are a small telco/ISP, and we get great support from them.
We were interested in the Shasta, and they sent sales people down to
meet with us.  When we the CVX's were delivered, they sent 2 engineers
for a couple days to help us set them up.  You don't have to be a large
service provider to get their attention.  Maybe for a large sale, you
need to get a human contact, to show you're serious.  Call them up
and see what happens.  It would probably also help to be specific.

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From: Mike Andrews <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 01 Jun 2000 22:22:33 +0000

> capabilities.  Ah, what I wouldn't give for a new version of the AS5100.

That would be really slick.  Gimme the ability to put modems running Quad
code (or maybe very very recent DSP code) in our Cisco 7206VXR.  Mmmmm.  
:)

I've not heard much good about Cisco's v.90 code.  I've got some Rockwell
SoftK56 modems at home (for testing) that won't even connect *at all* to
some local Cisco numbers.  They'll talk to 3Com and Ascend most of the
time.

Ascend's probably a very close second to 3Com in v.90 reliability, or
maybe slightly ahead now (they work better with Motorola SM56 modems
relative to TCS 3.6, that's about all I know)...  but managing an Ascend
is an absolute nightmare...  not just those awful menus, but they have
some, uh, "unique" ideas about how SNMP and Radius should work that just
blew my mind last time I had the misfortune of working with one...

I personally don't really need tech support from the vendor... I've got
this mailing list, and I've got the knowhow to tear into it and figure it
out (or reverse engineer it) myself.  I'm not afraid to read a few RFC's
here and there.  As long as I can get hardware fixed, and get updated
software easily I'm good to go.  (Something 3Com is a bit lacking on --
like Jeff, I can't download TCS 4.0 even though I was in the beta!  
Fortunately the released code seems to be the same as the last release
candidate...  but it's not like Cisco where I can just jump on CCO and get
the latest bugfix when I run into a problem.)

Mike Andrews (MA12) * [email-masked] * http://www.bit0.com/
VP, sysadmin, & network guy, Digital Crescent Inc, Frankfort KY
Internet services for Frankfort, Lawrenceburg, Owenton, Shelbyville
www.fark.com: If it's not news, it's Fark.  (Or something like that.)

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From: David DenHollander <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 19 Jun 2000 18:26:55 +0000

We have brand new Hiper DSP's NIC/NAC set available for $3750 a card set
(24 modems) or $7250 for 48 modems.  

>Contact me offline or call 1-877-425-7421 ext.10

David DenHollander 

(403)254-1100 Main 
(403)201-2815 Fax

List your equipment for free
http://www.adoptable.com/

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