What's the best cable company/ISP in NYC?

I've had good experiences with Time Warner. I've also had bad experiences with Time Warner. I do think their customer service has improed over the years, but they started from a pretty awful state. Honestly I don't think any cable company is going to drive you to ecstasy: customer service is expensive and they're essentially selling a commodity.

I've had a lot of positive experience (as well as friends) with Optimum Online and their iO TV service. Brooklyn resident here, FYI.

It really depends on what part of NYC you're apartment is in. Manhattan: dominated by Time Warner but Verizon is making inroads into the more expensive parts of the island (UES, UWS). RCN has a very limited presence in Manhattan. Brooklyn: Mostly Time-Warner but as you move outwards towards Queens, Cablevision has a presnce (Flatbush, East New York, Brownsville). Verizon is starting to get some foothold-again in the tonier parts of the borough. Queens: Time Warner and RCN. Not sure of Verizon's presence. Bronx: Time Warner mostly. Staten Island: This is not part of NYC. It probably should succeed and become its own state. So there's no real solid answer. You're going to have to call each company and give them your address (there are some online tools you can use also) to see if service is offered at your apartment. As far as quality goes: they're all pretty bad, but Verizon FIOS is the best of bad when it comes to cable (particularly HD) quality. Service is universally bad. Cablevision really likes to pull bullshit billing tricks. They all charge way too much for service--even basic cable. Verizon has the best broadband. Time Warner tends to be oversold in many parts of the city and the shared nature of cable broadband really degrades the broadband speeds.

Secede, not succeed. Apologies for the pedantics.

For the record: I've had a decent time with both Cablevision and Verizon. Verizon does have the best picture quality, thought not as good as satellite. Then again, it works during heavy rain. :) I just switched to VZ (on price point), and one benefit is that their cable modem includes a wireless router, so you don't need to buy your own. The big downside to Verizon is their customer service. The sale and install will be a breeze. If you find that there's something incorrect on your bill, you're in for a world of suck getting it straightened out.

In my experience, Verizon's broadband tends to be horribly slow at times (we've just come off of three days of spotty service on our home network where my connection kept consistently dropping and overall slowness abound) while Optimum (Cablevision) has usually had steady rates and minimal downtime. Customer service was always helpful. Essentially, cable is full of YMMV.

I'm in Brooklyn, near Prospect Park. Back in the day when we had rabbit ears on our tv, we used Verizon for the internet - problem was it seriously lagged at times. We eventually switched over to a Cablevision package deal, which lead to more reliable internet speeds and we finally got cable tv! Downside to Cablevision - they do NOT have BBC America! LAME. They have BBC World News but that's not what I'm interested in. That is the only gripe I have about them - that and once their package deal was over with (6 months to a year after signing on with them) the price of basic cable + HBO became outrageous.

I used to like Optimum Online (when I lived in BK & the BX) because I got VHI Soul. Now I'm in Queens and get weird community access channels on Time Warner. Really I think all cable providers suck. They'll just rob you any which way so go with the one that is cheapest.

I've had no problems with Time Warner over the past few years, although I don't use any of their On Demand or HD channel offerings. The first year introductory rate is good, but expect the bill to climb month by month once that is done.