[BBP Guru]

Pacific Poker is a division of 888 Gaming, and one of the fastest growing poker sites on the web. As an avid online player, I regularly frequent some of Pacific Poker’s competitors, so I was anxious to try this site, which my friends were constantly recommending to me. Is the site that good or were they just excited about collecting my referral fees? Here are my impressions.

Read full review at http://www.blindbetpoker.com/sites/p...er-review.html

[xBlurr]

A lot of my friends play at pacific poker. They have a lot of big tournies with large prize pools. One of my friends actually won a little over 5.9k last week playing in a $20000 gaurenteed prize pool. Another won $800 yesterday. Though my friends play there, I have never really liked it that much.

[1rainbow]

i've heard a lot about pacific but never played there yet, thinking about downloading it to try

[mildseven]

I often play at pacific it´s a good site and I think it offers the best Multi-table tourneys. I had a problem with them on my first deposit but it proved they have quality in their security. They froze my account because I logged in from another country than the one I was registered. but it did take them too long to re activate it that´s what I didn´t like. Anyway it´s a very fastplay at pacific and they have quality playes.

[Slayre]

I started out on Pacific... but, didn't like it all that much... I never figured out how to change the password they gave me and I can never remember it, so, everytime, I have to look it up.... just too busy at other sites, I guess..

[GrimJack]

I just started playing on this site a little while back. My experience so far is with Party, Noble, Full Tilt, UB and Pokerstars.

Maybe it will grow on me, but right now, I am a little jaded. The one positive is they seem to have a lot of players. Certainly more than Noble (but I like Noble) and so they have a lot of MTTs, but unlike Noble's MTT they aren't all Rebuy Tourneys (I think, but for lack of info I can't tell if they are Rebuys or not).

Here are my comments.

1) Site Generated Passwords: As above. If I cant't change it, I can't remember it.

2) No Remember Me Function: If I can't remember it, at least they could remember it for me.

3) No Instant Hand History: I really like this feature because I have bad cards, don't remember them and just get curious. Why don't they have it? Seems pretty standard everywhere else.

4) Awkward Chat: It opens in a new window. Seems to be no way to default it to "on" so every time the switch you tables, ex MTTs, you lose your chat altogether and need to go through the steps to re-open it.

5) Awkward Lobby: They have a ton of games. If I sort MTTs by Buy-In amount, I need to go into the game to see the payout structure...fair enough. But when I go back it has resorted to default, so I need to take the extra step of clicking on the header again to re-sort. Not only that, but whenever you resort, there is a 2-3 second lag time (I guess while it reloads from the web). This is very simply put, very annoying.

6) No Automatic Updating Payout Schedule: Unlike Noble Poker which updates the payout schedules with each sign-up. They default to the lowest common demoninators saying..."We'll tell you when Registration ends" Well OK, but I want to know the payout structure first, and how much I stand to win.

7) No Multi-tabling tourneys: If you register for two and are doing well in the first, you get booted out of the second. (At least they say they refund your buy-in)

8) Lack of Basic Info: The site's homepage is certainly dim of information about the site. I can't find out how to do the things that are basic on other sites. How do you request hand history? Can you get Hand hoistory. Are these tourneys freezeouts or re-buys?

9) Slow Dealing: Lots of lag. Needs to have higher production values and become a lot smoother. And then you only have a split second to see the results before it removes the winning hand from the screen. With no instant hand history a lot of the time I was left saying "Well I guess I won" I have the chips.

10) No Flip Over on All Ins: As above they only show the players cards for about 2.3 seconds. Even a seasoned blackjack dealer couldn't digest the combinations in multi-way pots that quickly. Before I look at all the people's cards they are gone. I'm left asking myself "Wha' 'Appened" (PS I get really annoyedit when playing with a fast BJ dealer that adds the cards in their heads and removes them and my bet from in front of me before telling me what I had, or letting me add them up myself and see that I lost...and I am a fast adder. It feels the same here)

11) Incomplete Dealer Chat: The dealer tells you who wins and what they had, but not their cards, or what hand the loser was holding. This just adds to the "Wha Appened" factor.

12) Lots of Disconnects: Everytime I tried to visit BlindBetPoker.com in a browser behind the Pacific UI, the Pacific UI crashed...What is that all about? The way I knew I was disconnected was I would look at the table, I would time out, but there would be no action buttons for me to fold/check/raise etc. (Someone else mentioned this above) The good part is that once I was disconnected/crashed, the site would log me back on and take me to my table in a split second. With Noble, when it crashes, I need to close the program, go through their lengthy update process and then wait to get to the table. Noble frequently tells me I am already logged on and doens't let me log back on. Noble gives me frequent 15-20 minute disconnects. Major time when in tourney play. So props go to Pacific for figuring out how to handle disconects better than anywhere else, but fix your problem with IE running in the background!

13) Multi-table SNGs. I really like these. They have a lot of them going all the time. One of my peeves is their short payout schedule. They have these 35/40 person SNGs, great But they only pay the top 3. I like Pokerstars where they would pay the top 7 or something like that. I would like this place a lot more if they had some options that paid a little deeper. Especially among Fish, (er ah novices) who play the 35 person $1 SNG. Give them an opportunity so they will feel good and stick around a little longer.

I could go on, but I just got here and I probably will have some other germain comments as I build on my experience and maybe even find I am wrong about a few of the above.

The graphics are about average. But I could care less about them. They show cards around a table. About all you need in my opinion. The problem is with incomplete dealer chat, too quick showdowns, and no instant hand history. This makes the UI feel incomplete and leaves the player wondering what is going on.

But after all of this, I am still playing here. So it must be OK. The currently offer a 25% bonus up to $100 and you have to make bets in excess of 20x your deposit to cash it out. A little steep I guess, but not so bad in my opinion.

Good Luck except against my

[nxtyear]

good post there Grim

yeah i agree with ya. and that's probably why Pacific Poker is known to have THE worst software. all for the reasons you explained.
worst part is the getting disconnected one. i've never been disconnected as much as there in my life.

despite that Pacific still remains as one of the big names in poker. Reason? the beginners.
beginnners firstly SUCK at poker , second, they do'nt distinguish between good program and bad program. it doesn't matter for them the payout structure, they only think as far as the prize pool.
instant hand history? they don't see it, so there's no need

annoying is the all in thing like you said, now THAT is really annoying...
and the chat too....

well despiate al that people play, just because there's lots of bad players in pacific, that's why you hear so many bad beat stories from Pacific (along with Party and Pokerstars, which are so big that there's tons of bad beats)

ok
it seems like my post is just a repetition of yours so i should get banned. but oh well nice post once again Grim, it's good guide to many players i think

[pookyman]

Pacific Poker is my favorite place to play. I like the sit and go tourneys and I especially like to play in the 20 man $33 sit and go. First place pays $300, and it pays the top 5 finishers.
I know the software is not up to speed, but it is not the worst that is outthere. Never play NL in a ring game, if you make a big bet, even if no one calls they cut the bet. Totaly unfair, but they refuse to fix it.
I like the multi-table tournaments too. I play in the $30k gauranteed as often as possible, It is held nightly.
I won the 6K gauranteed once, for a sweet reward of $1800.

[GrimJack]

Thanks for the advice nxtyear. After I wrote this comment, I got so frustrated, I logged off and never logged back on. If there are a lot of beginners then I will try it again.

Any recommended games where the beginners congregate?

I'll be playing there some this weekend.