AT&T's U-Verse plagued with problems

20 Mbps? Not even MPEG-2 HD requires that speed. There must be more to the story. Frank

Frank, I agree with your comment, but maybe I can shed more light on the bandwidth issue. I believe that MPEG-2 HD would take about 12Mb. This assumes the "perfect" pipe. In order to do all the other things that go on the pipe besides the one HD signal would need to be 12Mb plus. Given that there is no "perfect" pipe, 20 Mb sounds reasonable, especially if you want to support one or more non-HD receiever(s) and one HD reciever on the same pipe. Your mileage may vary.

Average household has three STBs, with 10 to 20% of them, and growing, having HD televisions. Additionally, Internet (15/2 Mbps) and VoIP services (100kbps) require additional bandwidth. Therefore, a household should have at least 20 Mbps, which I believe is not enough. The figure should be closer to around 30-40 Mbps.

To bolster the point further: 20Mbps is not sufficient as clearly outlined by the number of STB in homes in the US (avg is 3), with at least 1 HD, plus recording in the background, 2 SD, more recording. This is not a hypothetical case, its real. 30-40Mbps is the norm for Telcos to compete truly with Cable/Satellite. Touting chat/phone/email/ within the TV experience is nice, but if I cant have HD for my 50 inch LCD, I dont really need to chat with anyone about the low-def games :(

I am surprised that those looking at IPTV delivery do not look more closely at Canada, where SaskTel and MTS have been offering the service longer than most in the U.S. or Europe.

I was hooked up to U-Verse last week. I have 4 STB's with one being a DVR that will record 4 different channels at the same time. My signal is 27.5 megabits/second at the RG and I don't believe that bandwith will be a problem as the installer told me that later this year they will increasing the bandwith using new compression codecs to 40-45 megabits/second. That will add another 1 or 2 HD channels or even more SD channels. I believe that AT&T did a great job in designing and implementing this service and that it will only get better.

This is a great summary of some of the many problems encountered with AT&T U-Verse, starting with the use of the AT&T name which instills skepticism in the eyes of the public. AT&T never had a good reputation in my opinion. However, the lack of DVR capabilities to see recorded video on more than one TV is the biggest sales point downfall. You must record and watch recordings on only one TV. Dish Network allows you to record and watch recordings on several TVs. When I go to bed, I like to watch my recordings and be able to fast forward through commercials using recordings made on the downstairs family room DVR. This is impossible with AT&T U-Verse. I eventually dropped the U-Verse television aspects. Now I only have the Internet portion and numerous email delivery problems recurring frequently. I am an experienced Internet user and should not have these constant frustrations that have caused AT&T to replace my router once and spend a day on installation and about another days worth of time on support calls. This service was not adequately tested prior to promotion.

I've had u-verse for about 4 months and have two very big complaints. 1. Only one channel can carry HD. So even though they tell you, you get 3 HD receivers only one TV can actually get an HD signal. If one receiver is also a recorder "you got it" that counts as a channel. Not sure what they are going to tell customers when all they can send is HD. 2. Consistent problem with sound cutting in and out. This is a sharp, very fast cut off of sound on and off. AT&T told me this was a problem with an HDMI cable and they had no resolution. Pretty sad - offer an HD service and yet they can't support HDMI? THey recommended using a component input. Why bother with their service then?

I have had AT&T u-verse for 3 months now. I have the U200 with internet. I have no priblem with the internet however several with the video. I get occasional picture freeze where I will switch to a station and after several minutes the video freezes. A more frequent problems is static that will last for several minutes on all stations. This is intermittent however it is happening more frequently now. At least several times a week. I don't like cable but I naver had these problems with it.

We've had U-Verse (cable and internet) for about 2 1/2 months now. We just started have issues with the internet freezing a few days ago. We've tried resetting and rebooting everything...nothing. Then last night, the tv signal starts getting pixelated and making loud noises. I heard from a friend that the internet issue was a big complaint - it's fine for the first few months, then the problems start. Seems like it's happened to us. We're just waiting on our refund and then switching back to our old cable company.

Look out: After I signed the contract, U-verse poached my phone number (without my permission) away from my ISP, Time Warner, before they discovered they couldn’t do an install at my house (older non-grounded electrical plugs). After the first failed attempt to install, during which the tech didn’t discover the problem, my phone service with my old ISP disappeared, rerouted to a non-existent connection. The second install attempt discovered the problem, ATT just said “sorry” and walked away. Now I’m without home telephone for two weeks while Time-Warner drags its feet getting my digital phone hooked up again, at an extra charge and in a more expensive package. Nothing like being gang-raped by a couple of giant corporations. Worthwhile noting that the poor UVerse tech was left on hold by his own company for over 20 minutes. It took me an hour (of cell phone minutes) to get anyone to complain to when I discovered my phone had been disconnected and re-routed into cyberspace. A plague on both their houses. Ramsey

DO NOT GET UVERSE!! Spent 8.5 HOURS on the phone with at&t, they took my number from Road Runner, now I have no phone, and can't get anyone to install from AT&T. They say the quality isn't good enough, while another AT&t says it is. IT IS A JOKE!!! I have NEVER seen such bad service. On hold for 8.5 hours in one week!! (all on my cell phone). Still no phone, and they won't release my number to Road Runner for another 10 days. If I could sue them, I would....

I'm am current on hold with AT&T over a U-Verse billing error. I have been on hold for 2 hours and 40 minutes. The problem is that I canceled my service over 4 months ago because I moved. Though I have asked for return boxes 5 times. I still haven't received any because, according to AT&T, the boxes are on back order and they don't have any to send. This has not kept them from turning me over to collections for not paying for their equipment. Apparently, they simply think I'll give up and pay for equipment I can't use. That will NEVER happen. I am enraged over this. I will never do business with AT&T again, and when anyone asks, I will tell them about this crooked practice.

I had U-verse service in Riverside, CA and loved it while we had it. It took about a week to get it working properly, but after that it was fantastic. However, we moved last month. ATT does not provide service to my new address. I have called 5-6 different times in the last month trying to get them to send boxes to me. Under their terms of service, you have only 21 days before they send you to collections. There is no place where you can physically drop off the boxes. I'm scared they'll attach this to my credit. Had I known it would be such a nightmare to return them, I would have never signed up for their service. I havew given them my new address at least 3 different times now. A simple google search told me that this is a wide spread problem with tons of similar, or worse, horror stories. STAY AWAY FROM U-VERSE. THEY ARE INCOMPETENT!

not only are the CSRs incompetent.. the whole website is. 1) i decided to check myself if service is available. 2) website says YES 3) website cant process order, tells me to call 4)call during business hours, message saying its after hours 5) call the next day, im told its NOT available 6) website now says they are unable to process and I need to call. (does NOT says I cant get the service) so really... its ATT actually trying to get new customers? I put in 500% more effort than the average person and am still unable to sign up. how many millions have they lost because they dont even know how to sign people up? If time warner didnt suck so bad id have given up a long long time ago.

Can anyone tell me how to get my billing problem solved with AT& T U-Verse - I canceled 4 months ago, continue to be billed, talked to customer service 16 times, wrote letters, now have been assigned to a collection agency --- I have (had) perfect credit!!!!!

It took AT&T u-verse FOUR whole days to install at my house and I already had AT&T internet. One day no one showed up at all, and I took off work to wait for them. They took my phone number away from me (gave me a temp. number) but for three days, I had no phone at all. I spent 2 hours on the phone with them trying to get my phone re-connected. 2nd level tech finally got it going. MY internet is horrible now. It takes about 5 min to connect to the internet, 5 more minutes to open my e-mail and about 2 min for each letter to open. I have called them on this, they upgraded my speed to the highest and it has not changed at all. Also, my computer keeps freezing now and i can't even re-boot it without unplugging it. All this has happened since I had U-Verse installed. I am not happy!!!

Don't go with U-VErse , it's all true after four weeks of somewhat working, not but problems. No shows on appointments, dicscounected afer waiting for tech. support for hours, Frigin Nightmare!!!! Call Direct TV I am.

AT&T UVerse is the worst! We switched over to get one of their "bundled" internet/tv/phone packages. After we discovered that during a power failure we wont have phone service, we decided to switch JUST the phone service BACK to POTS (regular landline) phone service. What a nightmare! An appointment to have telco come out and switch phone lines was missed by them - they never called to tell us they werent coming out. - THEN, they disconnected one of our lines (we had 1 res & 1 business line) which was for my business. After hours on the phone for the last three days with "service representatives" who had no idea why the line was dropped, they finally discovered someone inadvertantly decided to cancel the 1 business line because we were supposed to have it changed back to POTS, but didnt wait for the techs to come out to hook it back up to landline service. Without my business line, I am LOSING BUSINESS - people call up to reach my business and the line ends up somewhere in cyberspace but never rings here. Last Monday, the landline techs came in, hooked up one res line, and they told me they would come out this Friday to hook up the business line, but just got a call from another service rep who said they just put the order in today for the 1nd line so they cant come till next week to hook it up! I WAS TOLD BY THEIR OWN TECH AT&T UVERSE pushed this service far too soon before they were ready to service their customers. - nothing but problems with them - i am beyond livid and could never imagine a 100 year old phone company cant get their customers phone service back when it is their fault. AT&T, - your headache - DElIVERED.

They are not really a 100 year old company anymore. Companies like AT&T have morphed so many times it has lost sight of its roots thanks to a revolving door of soulless shortsighted executive management zombies. They wander from company to company wreaking incompetent havoc wherever they go. Sad really. No responsibility, no worries. I just installed Uverse recently and not impressed with the TV portion of the package. I still have DirectTV and now looking for a way to scale back the Uverse TV and keep DirectTV. The Uverse compression scheme degrades HD. DirectTV HD definitely looks visibly superior. I only wish this Uverse mess didn't come as a bundle and I could have internet only. The internet portion finally got me the speed I was supposed to get with DSL and it's been steady and consistent.

My biggest problem with uverse is the CONSTANT interupption during your favorite shows. It NEVER fails...while I'm in the middle of watching one of my favorite shows, suddenly --- it just stops! I change the channel, and that channel is fine, but the minute I try to go back to my channel, it freezes again. Now Im stuck between 2 channels, and then by the time it unfreezes, I've missed the best part of the show. Does anyone else have this problem?

yes tracey i am having similar problems i really don't think we're the only ones tho.. it really angers me as i'm sure it does you as well.. i have looked everywhere online for what might be causing this problem and have found nothing to try to rectify the situation.. i have called customer service numerous times to try to figure out whats going on and they just tell me to unplug the stb for 2 minutes and plug it back in and wait for it to reset.. and thats bull cause after i do that it just freezes again... and my internet connection always drops.. and is nowhere near the speeds at which i should be getting.. its just a hassle to even try to talk to them about any of it.. i think i might just put some type of device to amplify the signal from the line to the stb maybe that'll help but then again i think its illegal to have any kind of amplification device on a line.. i don't care i'll do it anyways

Joe and Tracy, you need to call them and have a techie come out... seems you are having issues with your line coming from the outside to the router...

I am extremely angry with ATT Uverse. I live in Northern CA in an area that Uverse has been expanding for the last 8 mos. We were Comcast tv/net customers for years, but the dvrs we had didn't record reliably. We had them changed out twice last year with the problem worsening each time. Trying to request new DVRs (2)each time with no response to my calls to supervisors, I decided to try tv/net ATT Uverse which was recommended by 3 different neighbors. So, at the end of January, I got an appointment for the first week in March. The tech was very helpful and knowledgeable; he checked & improved most wall connections which were installed by the builder in 2004. Being able to rely on a dvr which recorded up to 4 programs at once was a luxury. However, 2 weeks later, Uverse turned off our landline and my neighbor's newly installed Digital phone. When we realized our phone didn't work at one o'clock in the AM on a Thursday, I called ATT who discovered Uverse disconnected it. I was then transferred to UVerse and a very helpful woman asked me to stay on the line so she could do some tests. I waited for a moment,but then my cell phone died. Due to an extremely busy schedule Thursday, I finally called Uverse back waiting about 25 minutes to talk to a human. I explained our situation and was informed that yes they did turn off our phone which would mean we had to apply for the same number we've had for 27 years and wait (8 more days) until today, 3-27-09, for the line to be reconnected again. Having talked to 2 ATT installation techs on-our-street last week and having left messages with 2 managers and a supervisor without so much as a by-your-leave, we waited out the week visualizing personal business contacts when they called to hear our phone was "disconnected". Last Monday, I sent the CEO of ATT an overnight letter asking his assistance. At this moment it is the end of "INSTALLATION" DAY WITH NO PHONE, and NO way to talk to Uverse since they closed before the tech was scheduled to arrive.

Installed uverse March 25, and every night around 9-10 pm tv freezes off and on for about a hour then works fine.Techs have been here 5 out of the 7 days we have had it installed they have changed everything but the coax lines that were used by direct tv. Matter of face tech is coming out today,this time customer sevice said he could fix problem , and that is to move modem or my desktop to another room because my monitor is causing inerference. Any Help?

We had u-verse phone and internet installed. Tge phone has white noise and static. They have tried to reset the system 3 times and have been to the house. The problem still is there. The tecnition said this is the way it is some times. My bigest complaint is with billing. We signed up at an att store and were told there was no installation charge. When the bill came it had this charge. We went to the store and talked to the manager. He said again we should not be charged. He made many calls but could not get the charge removed. The billing departmernt was rude to him and to us. He gave up and turned the problem over to us. I do not turst att. This is not service.

I really don't hate U-Verse, but they have some problems. I notice that the video and the sound lose sync, a lot. Don't have any local access channels, Canadian Chnl 9 or a true Weather Chnl, with local updates. We had a strong electrical storm, the first week, after our U-Verse was installed. Three days and lots of finger pointing between the U-Verse techs and the AT&T lineman, and they found the problem in the control box, down the street. Appears their problem solving needs help. I had no problems with the Internet connection. Did not have phone service. I now have WOW cable/internet and I am happy, again.

Have u-verse triple bundle worked great for 5-6 months now when ever I turn tv on I cant change channels or anything. Thought it was the remote have tried 4 different remotes same problem they work fine on other boxes but not mine. I press any button on the remote the remote lights up but the cable box dosnt pick it up,it takes around 45mins-1hour before it will start working. Have had 3 different at&t techs look at it and nobody can figure it out. Tried movig box to different location,covered up sensor on tv no change. I did have one of the techs say it may be the brightness set to high witch it wasnt, they had it set higher than I did after they came out the third time to look at it. Does anybody else have this problem. Also have the freezing at times as well.

Since installing U verse on 5-2-09 I have had chronic DD5.1 surround sound drops. Many many hours,techs,trys later it is now 6-20-09 and ATT has no solution. They don't have their technology working yet and should not be allowed to sell this as a true dolby system. Is there a law against this practice?

Solution for some of you!!!! Some of u have said your tv freezes at 10 pm or so... Mine in the bedroom did too at night. I JUST figured it out!! I turned the tv off in the living room (the only DVR as u know) and my wife immediately said the tv is freezing. I thought, well let's turn the living room tv back on and then the tv in the bedroom magically wentback to normal. I did it ten times just to prove it to myself and that is in fact the problem. As stupid as it sounds... I figured it out. Try that u guys who r having problems. Let me know if it works .... Borninmissouri@yahoo.com

I have had Uverse for 2 years with constant problems no one could figure out. finally after hours on top of hours of calling and reexplaining and nunmerous prim techs coming out, they ran cat 5e wire directly from the video box to my Gateway and installed a new Gateway i have no problems.

DO NOT, DO NOT subscribe to AT&T U-verse. I have had them since May 21, 2009 and their service is beyond believe. The right hand does not know what the left hand is doing. Due to a billing error on AT&T's part, I have lost my Phone, Internet and cable due to they disconnected me. They so called sent me an e-bill that I never received or subscribed to or told about. So they say I was a month behind. After calling them, 2 days later I received an e-bill and a hard copy saying that I owed them $354.00. My monthly contract was for $146.00 a month. That should be $292.00. The bill showed I had until Aug. 23 to pay my bill. After talking to billing, they so called, fixed my bill. Never happened. I payed by Bill Pay. They received payment of $284.00 which was agreed to on Aug. 18 with the payment going to my old account with AT&T. Same company. They disconnected my service on Aug. 18, 09. Now I am with out service or phone, cable and internet. My bank is working with AT&T to get the money to the right account due to AT&T does not know how to transfer money between their own accounts. I have spent unheard of hours on the phone with Billing and Support since May 21, 09, due to the hundreds of problem that come with AT&T U-verse. By reading the blogs, this has been a problem for years and still going on. If you have it and are happy, good luck. If you don't have it, don't get it. Too many problem and incompetent people that will BS you or pawn you off to somebody else. Bad investment.

for all of the previous posts above and since i am an iptv technician, here you go your sound and picture drop sync, and freeze because of your coax in your house. wild guess is that you have rg-59 and not rg-6. alreay not looking good for your picture, and your coax couplers on your wallplates and anywhere where you have one that wasn't changed when you had the system installed will cause your system to freeze and pixelate. your coax fittings have to be perfect for this system to work, and the STB's that ATT uses don't have the hardware in them to buffer the errors in transmission. Also if they fed your RG with coax that could also be the weakest link in your system, with bad fittings screwing the entire system up as well, The HPNA system works great in newer homes with RG-6 it doesn't have to be quad shield, just straight six and under 75ft. and if any of you jackasses think you can just put splitters anywhere in your house to make your tv work it doesn't. this is a new age technology, and through IPTV systems we have now reached the physical limit of old house wire or "IW" both coax and UTP even if you phone line feed these RGs they have to be at least at a bare minimum CAT-3 and a home run line and not daisy chained or split throughout your house. I apologize I had to vent

This article and many others describe problems with U-verse in 2007. And yet comments are appearing in 2009 of the same or similar complaints. My experience coming from TimeWarner digital, RoadRunner Cable internet, and a TIVO HD DVR, and At&t phone. Now with U-verse 11 days in to my 30 day trial. Regardless of the kind of wiring in my house, previous DirectTV, Comcast, and TimeWarner cable have been able to provide stable service. I am trying U-verse for the cost savings and the bells/whistles. The tech was on time and efficient, hooked up two tv and one pc (wired ethernet) and one phone jack over 4 hours. My order was for a single phone number xxx-xxx3, they provisioned two phone numbers xxx-xxx9 and xxx-xyy7. I had to call back on a different day to convince them to remove the second number from my account. I like the on-screen call log, and adding a wireless pc to the network was a breeze. TV-DVR issues: TV/remote lag, picture skips, sound drops, not being able to play "recorded" shows from DVR when the connection is down, much more menu next/previous than using my TIVO, 2 day program information vs 14 day with tivo (hard to search/set to record). Also, some programs I could record using Tivo on TimeWarner, I cannot record on U-verse DVR. The remote and menu system are more like salad bar programming, than based on user goals and a design process. Internet issues: ok, I knew it would be slower. It does seem to be more consistent, even at longer distances, using dsl reports tests, than RR was. BUT, speed is not an issue when the connection is dropped so frequently. Not suitable for work-from-home over VPN, large downloads (like MS updates), or online gaming. I tend to lose connection 2 or 3 times between 6pm and 10pm. Each drop takes about 3 to 5 minutes for the router to fully reset (solid green lights). I reviewed the event log on the router, and for one day I saw 33 disconnects of a minute or more. On a Sunday and a Tuesday I had outages (no tv, no internet, no phone) lasting over 6 waking hours each. (outages when Im asleep or not home I can forgive, even though in theory I would be missing scheduled recordings, but weekend day time and weekday prime time, no). Email: This is pretty minor, but Yahoo (basic) Email? Really? Why do I get a pop-up and ad filled, spam encouraging email account with a service I pay > 100 USD for a month? Fallback: They did cover or remove all my cable co hookups, so even if U-verse install was free, I am sure going back to old provider install will be costly, sigh. Summary: When the quality of service, reliability, and user interface improve significantly, I may reconsider U-verse as an option. But I 30 days will be plenty at this time.

ATT U verse has not notified any customers about channel changing issues. As a result I had to have 3 services calls, 3 boxes and four contollers which never fix the problem. One tech (Roger) walked in an out and told me my new flat screen was bad. Worked fine with Cox box and an earlier version of ATT. How is direct TV?

Directv is fine and a pretty good satellite tv service but they are in litigation about that $480 dollar early termination fee they are charging customers and going directly into their bank accounts and taking it without customers consent or knowledge. Other than this dilemma - I am 100 percent satisfied with my service. P.S. I PLAN ON COMPLETING MY TWO YEAR AGREEMENT WITH THEM...

AND EVERYONE RUNS TO THIS COMPANY AND BIG RED EVERY DAY. IT SOUNDS LIKE THE OLD AT&T IS DEFINATELY NOT THE NEW AT&T. WHEN IT COMES TO CONTRACT TALKS BETWEEN THESE TWO - THE PAGES ON THE BLOGS COMMENT SECTION ARE ENDLESS. THE END RESULT AGAIN - EVERY ONE RUNS TO THESE TWO. WHEN WILL CONSUMERS LEARN???????????????????????????

THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU BALLOON TO 89 MILLION CUSTOMERS AND 81 MILLION CUSTOMERS AND YOU TRY TO COMPETE WITH ONE ANOTHER AND TRY TO OUTDO EACH OTHER. PROBLEMS, PROBLEMS AND MORE PROBLEMS!!! AT&T CAN BARELY HANDLE THE 30 MILLION PHONE LINES IT OWNS. I GUESS THOSE OF YOU U-VERSE CUSTOMERS WHO FEEL VIOLATED BY THIS COMPANY MUST BE LOST IN THE NUMBERS. IT'S JUST SAD........

I've had U-Verse for a few months now and starting next week, I'm switching to cable. The guy who initially sold me the service was very helpful and gave me his name and number and told me to call him if I ever had a problem. The technician who installed it was also very helpful and went through everything with me. Since then, I've experienced the freeze that everyone is talking about, I ordered a PPV fight and missed some of it because it froze up, the HD quality is horrible, especially for sports, and whenever I tried to call the guy who sold it to me, I got an answering service. Whenever I watch a basketball game, it reminds me of an old atari game, obviously exaggerating a little. But needless to say, until AT&T improves the HD quality and fixes its technical issues, I would not recommend U-Verse.

We have U-verse also for around 6 months. The internet Wireless access is actually very good. We did not get the IP phone even though it was part of the deal.... I heard of way too many problems with the Internet phone to even go there, much less the power outage = No phone issue. NOW for the TV issues.... ;) Changing channels... yes a bit, not bad, Jumping channels... I push the last button, when I have 2 channels in HD range selected (1000) funny.... sometimes it goes to channel 8...????? WHY? But the worst is when pressing almost any button once in a while, The DVR gets muted, with NO way to fix that except, REBOOT the DVR! Nice waiting 5 minutes for that to happen. I was trying to watch a TV show, not the dang DVR reboot. And just had the Tech out again today, replaced the DVR again and the remote. I'm just hoping it fixes the "mute" problem this time. But not holding my breath. And I've worked on several jobs for the past 15 years where I dealt with AT&T..... I always thought they were lying to me when they explained ANY problem.

Had U-Verse installed about 6 months ago. Everything was going pretty well until about 3 weeks ago when calls started being dropped and other unknown people would start talking on the line. AT&T tech came out a couple of days ago and installed a new modem. Since that time, the problem has become worse. Cannot receive a call without it being dropped or interference or someone else on the line. The tech said that we could go back to our former AT&T account.

At&t service is the worst-- we have had u-verse and all that happens is our picture freezes up phone goes dead and internet freezes. And i get this for 138.00 a month--- It has happend Six times today. I have had five techs. out to my house-- and still the same problem, all they do is blame each other for what they do. They have lowered our bill to 47.00 dollars. When it goes back up-- they can come and take this Rotten stuff out of our house. Beware!

we have u verse and is the worst thing i have ever seen according to goverment this digital tv is suppose to be so great lol i never had this much trouble with regular cable or analog i think its a load of bull just to get more money out of us as for att they r a joke companys like this is what is making us a laughing stock of the modern technology