I have recently bought a laptop, my old desk top PC is six years old and has been giving me problems for some time now.
The laptop is very good except that it has AOL in it. So far I have avoided initiating any of the AOL facilities. The reason I have been wary of AOL is because of the poor reports I have seen in the past.
Can anyone give me the benefit of their experience with AOL?
Donald/Scotland
Donald, avoid AOL at all costs. They are just awful, imho. Lost of popups, advertisements, all kinds of junk. I switched to Mozilla Firefox, got amazing service from them, and have not had a single popup. AOL pays computer companies to offer them as a site. I had them years ago and they were bad then. We subscribed to our local telephone company for the DSL, and used Mozille FIrefox instead of the telephone company offerings. Type mozilla firefox into your search engine and see if it appeals to you.
[This message has been edited by Gardenfish (edited 07 March 2006).]
IMHO, I’ll secound Fire fox…
Oh, one thing, somethings won’t come threw Fire fox that you may want. Then I will use IE, but thats only happened to me one time, maybe more for others. -----------------
Spelling and Grammar not subject to judgement… 
[This message has been edited by Grubb (edited 07 March 2006).]
another vore for firefox. only drawback is you hafta reinstall java, flash ect. but its no big deal. there are a few sites that will not work with it, verizon online billpay being one. but more people are starting to.
aol is way overpriced for less service than you get locally. some people like th built in free virus scanner(included in the monthly cost), but use avg, and it really is free.
if your gonna pay 25/month for aol, your better off th get dsl if you can
roger
princess anne, eastern shore of md.
I have already installed Firefox which I used on my old PC and I do like it.
I have tried to remove AOL from my laptop and I get a warning message that if I do, other programs may not work correctly.
So I have removed the desktop references only. I have also noticed that there is no reference to AOL when I look at programs via the Control Panel - Remove/Install facility.
I think I can survive by ignoring AOL.
Donald/Scotland
Donald,
That message is probably a standard disclaimer that appears with many programs when removed. Ont the other had it does not take up enough resources to worry about.
As for AOL inself, I would reccomend avoiding it. It does enough quirky things that make it potentially problematic.
jed
I would go ahead and remove AOL through the control panel. The message is probably just warning about AIM or some component that loads resident in RAM on boot up (launcher program).
What I have found about AOL is that if you use it and any of their AV, Spam protection, or other protections is that unless you are logged into AOL you are NOT protected. I have seen many machine compromised by this, left on with a high speed connection and then whacked with spyware, virus, and pop ups, just because someone left the machine on and not looged into AOL.
Maxthon is a browser that is IE based…I’ve been happy with it…my wife uses Firefox…the first thing [well almost] I do with a new computer is remove AOL.
Thank you everyone!!!
Nobody had a good word for AOL.
I shall pull that dodgy program and see what happens.
Donald/Scotland
Well! So far so good, AOL got the chop.
Thanks again and TTFN
Donald/Scotland
As a network manager and I think I can speak for a lot of us; I hate AOL. My latest adventure with them has been maddening. After we changed our company’s ISP and set up new external DNS entries to reflect the cahnges, AOL decided to refuse our email. Numerous calls to AOL tech support has resulted in frustration and down right combativeness between myself and AOL technicians. If it weren’t somewhat important to our business to be able to exchange email with AOL I would tell them to take a freaking leap.
Friends don’t let friends use AOL.
The ONLY time AOL was ever good is if you had it in your stock portfolio at the issue price of $12 and through several splits, that $12 became $900. But that was THEN…
I once did use AOL and when I wanted to quit them for Comcast, it was like pulling teeth. Several years later I reinstalled a 90 day free version and it almost took me 90 days to get it off my system. AOL is a bit like sticking pins in your eyes, WHY???
Mark
Kerry,
I too am a network admin and share the exact same opinion. I have never had a client or friend that used AOL for anything other than email that was happy with it.
Your example of AOL refusing your email due to a different DNS is typical. Source IP should have nothing to do with acceptability of email and dns should be refreshed daily. If they are using source ip for email blocking or not updating their dns then they should be spanked and sent off to bed without dinner.
jed
Our church runs an email based prayer chain and event notification system. After I hit the send button I instantly have every AOL address returned. Argghhh. I finally deleted the people on the list with AOL addresses. Since then no more returns. And so far no one with AOL addresses has even mentioned not receiving the updates. I don’t know if that is good or bad.
AOL just suck!! Nothing but a big ole Virus. I delete anything that has todo with with them idiots.
Hey there Reverend,
“good or bad” LOL 
. Kinda makes ya wonder sometimes.
Mark
Go ahead and try to remove it. Nothing will stop working. If you have not started the program chances are you will be able to. Once the program is initiated you may as well forget it; the average user could never completely uninstall AOL.
AOL blocks any email coming from FAOL.
Which means if you are on AOL you can’t receive your password to post on the board unless you contact me. I’ll send it to you.
LadyFisher, Publisher of
FAOL
I have had AOl for 9 years and no have gone to AOl broadband and love it at this time I would not think of changing to another system I do like the faster speed of Broadband but then its everybodys idea as to what they want
Slicfoot
AOL just issued a rate hike to 25.90 a month for their top level service…I am now in search of a better provider in this area…
Anyone in the snyder county area of PA have any suggestions as to who’s the best ISP Available in these parts???
LF,
So I’m wasteing mine and your time entering the monthly drawing I presume…That would suck if I’d actually win something…Never happen… and not get the email telling I got three days to reply… 
[This message has been edited by billknepp (edited 15 March 2006).]