NCATS 2005 Survey Response

We would like to thank everyone who took part in this year’s survey. We have been very fortunate to have the customer base that we have. Your feedback and suggestions have proved invaluable to improving our service over the years. We have grown to depend on this feedback for our current projects and future plans. The following response will cover the most popular topics as taken from user comments. Finally, we will display the results of the main survey for your viewing. Thank you for your time and your participation. If you have any questions, please feel free to e-mail support@ncats.net

Anti-SPAM Control
By far the most concerning of issues is the proliferation of Spam. Over the years Spam has made its way to the foreground of services we must continually monitor and improve in an effort to keep up with the mechanisms responsible for sending it.

Many states have adopted tighter anti-spam legislation in an attempt to reduce the annoyance, but thus far we have yet to see the fruits of these efforts. NCATS, like many other ISP’s, has adopted Spam filtering services for our customers. Our latest upgrade to this service came in the form of our new Spam Blocker located via link on our home website. It will be a continuing effort to improve the filtering techniques and adopt new techniques to aid in the detection of Spam. Through this filtering we have offered our users the ability to greatly reduce the amount of Spam they are receiving. Many of the modifications we make to our Spam filters occur behind the face of our Spam Blocker and we have already laid out plans for future tools, options, and services to be available relatively soon to aid and improve the current Spam Blocker. We here at NCATS use the same mail system we provide to our customers so we are very aware of issues as they occur. New testing is already underway as we prepare our next line of filters to be added to the Spam Blocker.

Faster Dialup
Dial-up Internet access continues to be the primary means of accessing the Internet. It is both affordable and widely available. Unfortunately not every phone line and modem is made equal. This topic comes up often when considering customer concerns and we wish to simply address four aspects of a good dial-up connection with today’s technology. Our first two concerns have not changed since day one of our dial-up service, both of which deal with line quality. There are two line quality concerns when planning a dial-up connection: the quality of line inside your home and the quality of line outside your home.

The most common cause of line noise comes from within your home, where your phone line is run from the DMARC (the phone box on the outside of your house) to your phone. Often times this cable is old, warn, too thin, or poorly insulted… especially in older homes. This alone can cause slower less stable dial-up connection. Keep in mind that the phone company is not responsible for the condition of your phone line inside your home.

The other cause of line noise may occure depending on your location, the condition of phone lines in your area, and by the quality and age equipment used at your phone companies local central office. Typically this is only an issue with locations farther than three miles away from the central office, areas in old developments, or rural areas where the phone lines have needed repair. The phone company can fix some issues if there is audible noise during regular phone conversations, however have little support for improving modem access. Keep in mind that moisture can also effect quality on this section of the line.

Another current issue is adware/spyware. These are programs that can install themselves onto your computer often without your knowledge and send data to the Internet while consuming processor power on your computer. We recommend that you keep your computer scanned and cleaned of adware. Please see our Free Services section below for programs capable of removing this type of software.

Lastly, modems have taken a substatial step forward in recent years with the availability of v.92 and v.44. v.92 is the next generation of modem technology above that of v.90. It supports new features such as 50% faster handshake/connect times, almost double the upload speed, and the ability to use call waiting with your Internet connection. Most importantly, v.44 is a new compression standard that allows your modem to transmit up to four times faster than previous modems. We have successfully tested v.44 modems here at NCATS with very surprising results. We have seen and documented connections greater than 56k with these new modems, which have come close to ISDN speeds. NCATS supports v.44 on all our dial-in numbers and we have already received much praise from customers now surfing the web at increased speed. We do not currently have suggestions for makes or models of v.92/v.44 modems; however these two standards should be printed on the box if you are considering a purchase.

800 Number and Florida Access
Many have requested that NCATS provide a toll free numbers for users outside of the county. I’m afraid we will be unable to provide such a service, as we are simply a local Internet provider. Customers may continue to access their NCATS services from anywhere they can gain Internet access.

Extended Work Hours/Weekend Support
This question was also addressed in our last Survey Response for 2002. NCATS will be unable to provide live technical assistance outside of our regular work hours, which are Monday through Friday 8:00am to 7:00pm. It is our goal to maintain 24/7 services, however live support will only be available during our posted work hours.

DSL Alternatives/Wireless Coverage/Grant Broadband
NCATS currently maintains five radio sites for use with our broadband service. These locations are the Hesperia Blue Lake tower, the Newaygo water tower, the White Cloud sheriff building tower, the Fremont Coop, and the NCRESA/NCISD cell tower located by our office. Location and height are extremely important when considering these locations as well as the number of customers each site can support. We had considered locating on a cell tower in Bailey by customer request; however costs and terrain limitations have forced us to put such a project on hold. Many have requested that we locate service in Grant. There were two locations in Grant which we initially surveyed, but the limitations of these locations are severe and we have also been forced to put a hold on this project as well until we are assured reliable service can be had.

Wireless Install Fee
One of the prime concerns for many potential NCATS broadband subscribers is the initial investment for equipment. The standard install for our broadband service is $350. This initially covers a $150 radio capable of transmitting Ethernet packets. The remaining $200 covers a high frequency direction dish antenna, the necessary extremely low loss coax, the grounding and/or lighting protection, as well as any mounting hardware or brackets needed for your home or tower. The equipment and location costs alone account for an expensive service to maintain even before considering labor and partial wages. As such, our broadband service is a very good community service for those needing the upload speeds we can provide or for those users unable to get traditional broadband service, but unfortunately it is not a service that is capable of subsidizing client installations. NCATS is considering a payment plan as opposed to a lump sum payment for installation. Though the details of this are not set, it could be monthly fees billable for one year after install in addition the normal monthly service fee.

Webmail Stored Email
Webmail has become a very popular means to send and receive email. NCATS has maintained a webmail site for many years now and we have seen its usefulness and popularity grow. Many customers have wondered why they can view their email from their mail client (outlook express for example), but cannot view their mail from the web after using outlook express. By default, the majority of mail clients will download the mail located on our server, storing it on your home computer, then removes those messages from our server. At this point the message will only reside on your own computer and will no longer be accessible from our webmail. The only means to ensure mail is always viewable on the webmail site will be to either stop using a mail client or to configure your mail client to leave a copy of the message on the server. Alternatively, a mail client can be configured for IMAP instead of POP3. For continued help with configuring your mail client as opposed to just using webmail, please contact technical support.

Free Protection Services
Many customers have noticed large ISP’s offering things like free virus protection, free popup blocker, and free Spam protection. Luckily we can provide you with these same services or point you in the right direction to get these services for free as an Internet user. To address Spam and Virus filtering, NCATS offers our SPAM Blocker to any ncats.net customer via our home website. By default we scan all incoming mail to safeguard against virus threats being sent to you via email.

Free popup blockers are widely available on the Internet, but for XP users, we recommend upgrading to service pack 2 as soon as possible. Microsoft provides these service packs for free and service pack 2 now includes a nice firewall and popup blocker, which are very important security features for your computer.

Spyware and Adware are becoming an increasing problem and is often responsible for slow computer performance and Internet speed on dial-up connections. We currently recommend the use of Spybot Search and Destroy, which I will provide a link for below. This is a free application with free updates that will search and remove adware and spyware from your computer. Microsoft is currently developing an antispyware utility that shows great promise. This utility is available for free on Microsoft’s site, available only to XP users, and still in beta. Once released, we will likely be recommending it to all our Windows XP customers.

Spybot Search and Destroy

Though NCATS provides free email virus scanning, our scanner does not protect your computer from applications you may download with your web browser or other applications. There are many commercially available products available such as Norton or Mcafee, but here is a very functional and effective antivirus application that is available for free to any home internet user:

AVG Free Antivirus for home users


NCATS 2005 Customer Survey Results
From a poll of 583 users.

How did you hear about NCATS?
How long have you been an NCATS customer?
Have long have you been using the Internet?
How often do you use the Internet though NCATS?
Why do you use the Internet?(Check all that apply)
Which of the following would you say is most important for you when choosing an Internet Service Provider?
What operating system do you use?
Were you aware that NCATS provides broadband radio based Internet in Fremont, Newaygo, White Cloud, and Hesperia?
Do you use a 56k modem?
If yes, do you connect over 33600bps or 33.6kbps?
What type of modem do you have?
Does you modem support v.44 compression?
If yes, how much faster would you say v.44 is over previous modems?
Do you currently use a dialup accelerator with NCATS?
Would you like to see NCATS distribute a dialup accelerator?
Would you pay $1 per month for a dialup accelerator?
How would you rate NCATS ease of use?
How would you rate NCATS pricing?
How would you rate NCATS quality & reliability?
How would you rate your overall Internet service with NCATS?
Would you recommend NCATS to a friend or family member?
Overall, how does NCATS total performance in the last four months compare to other Internet Service Providers you may have used in the past?
Have you ever needed to call NCATS technical support?
Have you ever needed to bring your computer to NCATS for repair?
How would you rate NCATS overall technical support?
How would you rate NCATS support hours (8am-7pm)?
How would you rate NCATS technical Support quality & reliability?
How would you rate NCATS website support?
Do you read the NCATS website for news and information regarding NCATS?
Is our NCATS website the first site you see when you load your web browser?
Do you use NCATS web-based email located at http://mail.ncats.net?
How would you rate the web-based e-mail services you are offered?
Are you aware that NCATS provides free optional SPAM Blocking for ncats email?
How would you rate our SPAM Blockers ease of use?
How would you rate the automated SPAM filtering NCATS offers?
Are you aware that NCATS provides free virus protection for ncats email?
How would you rate the e-mail virus protection NCATS now offers?
Would you prefer that NCATS send email notification when viruses are removed from your email?
What telephone exchange do you connect from (the location your computer dials from)?
Gender:
How old are you?