I'm feeling charitable and giving them a higher star rating than the other reviewers seem inclined to give. Not much of a higher star rating though. I'm old enough to remember when TV was 13 channels, and you needed an antenna hooked up on your rooftop for reception. When I moved to where I live now, way back when, "cable" was going to be necessary, and I was going to have to pay for it. I was a bit conflicted about that, but I ultimately thought, "Well, there will be many more channels available, no commercials, and they won't cut movies up and censor them on the off chance that a child might be watching. It might actually be worth paying for." Decades later... Is it worth paying for? Hardly. I now pay a king's ransom for basic cable, and I get...stultifying "reality" shows that pander to every corrosive stereotype you can imagine as well as to the absolutely worst aspects of the human character, movies that are stocked with more inane, abrasive commercials than you ever saw back in the 13-channel days (a 2 or 3 hour movie can run for something like 6 hours with all the commercials; I love The Godfather, but why would I watch it on cable and suffer through the unending commercials when I can just pop in a Blu-Ray and watch it again in its unadulterated form? TCM is a notable exception to this, but it's a lone island in a sea of maddening inanity), an unrelenting line of TV preachers trying to hustle you out of your money in the name of God (at least in the old days, Jimmy Swaggart and Robert Tilton gave you an entertaining show for your money), nonstop "infomercials" (I have yet to figure out the sales strategy of running the same infomercial every single day...and I do mean every single day; do they think at some point of clicking quickly past that particular channel(s) I'll relent and say to myself, "Ah, let me pay attention to what they're selling; maybe I'll be interested!"), sitcoms of varying degrees of quality (MASH vs. "Saved By the Bell") that I used to be able to watch for free, "news" programs more designed to spread propaganda and sell things than to actually inform the populace, and sports, and more sports...which I have as much interest in watching as I do infomercials. (Any bright spots at all? Yeah. A few. I saw "Breaking Bad," "Mad Men," and a few other worthwhile, intelligently rendered series on basic cable. My closest friend and my birth mother have both told me "Yellowstone" is engaging, although I haven't watched it yet. And I think "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" is consistently laugh out loud funny, and who doesn't need a laugh these days?) Back in the day, my cable co. was Cablevision of Raritan Valley. If you called their "help desk," they'd invariably tell you to "reboot" the system, and, if that didn't work, their guess was as good as yours. When I bought a DVD player back then, I asked 1 of their techs to come install it for me (I'm not lazy...although I've been accused of that...but I'm "simple" when it comes to modern technology...or any technology at all). He did, and when I offered him a "gratuity," he declined it, saying, "It was embarrassingly easy, and I'd feel like a schmuck accepting that money." Didn't make me feel good about myself, but I respected the guy. A few years later? Optimum has taken over the helm, and nothing has changed, except what I pay monthly. Paying "vig" to a ruthless loanshark like the late, unlamented "Gyp" DeCarlo would probably be less burdensome. I don't know that even DeCarlo would have been quite so avaricious as Optimum is, now that I think about it (although, in fairness, Optimum won't break my legs if I don't pay. At least I don't think they will). A few years ago, my friends/co-workers bought me a large screen TV to replace the ancient small-screen TV I had been using. I don't know if it was pity or pure altruism or what that motivated them, but it's 1 of the nicest things that anyone I'm not related to has done for me. I called an Optimum tech to set it up. He arrived on time, looked at the unopened box, and said, "I can help you take it out of the box, but I can't set it up, because if it cracks or breaks, we're liable." Flabbergasted, I said, "I didn't have you come out here to take it out of the box! I can take it out of the box!" I had to slip him some money, and he finally set up my TV. That Cablevision tech who wouldn't take a tip for setting up my DVD player is obviously long, long gone. Recently, my cable box died, and I made an appointment for a tech to come and replace it (after a maddening half hour with the robotic help desk that kept telling me, "We're rebooting now; this should take a few minutes," even when my box had absolutely no power with which to reboot anything). The tech arrived during the 3 hour time window I had been given, he was polite and efficient, and within a few minutes, I was back in service. My cable TV has been restored to working order. I'm not actually sure that that's a good thing. read more

We just had our wifi hooked up in our new apartment by a tech named William. We were given a time slot of 8am-11am and William showed up right at 8:00 on the dot. At first, he thought we'd need access to our buildings attic, which I would need to have the landlord come out and open for us. Instead of making us reschedule, William went above and beyond, outside in the unusually hot morning sun, to relocate the hookup from one pole to another, so we could get it done today. I offered William cold water and snacks, but he kindly refused and kept on working until the installation was successful. He was also very kind and patient through the process and made sure all of our devices could connect before he left. If I could leave more than 5 stars for this man, I absolutely would. read more

Pathetic service. No internet for 6 days and no acknowledgement of their outage, despite numerous phone calls, troubleshooting attempts, tech support visit, escalation to Supervisors; and multiple long chats on Optimum website with their tech support - who have no clue what's going on until long into the chat - and then they can't do anything about it. Will be switching to FiOS. read more

Pathetic service. No stable internet connectivity for 6 days and despite numerous phone calls, troubleshooting attempts, tech support visit, escalation to Supervisors; and multiple long chats on Optimum website with their tech support - who have no clue what's going even after confirmation from last technician that issue is with the main distribution box it needs to be replaced.. speed variation between 0Mbps to 670Mbps subscribed for 1GB plan.. read more