Question for World of Warcraft players (or those familiar)

[vois2]

Finally after some years of waiting, I've decided to bite the WOW bullet. In the past I have always found folks here at Subsim to be able to accurately offer info on gaming, any gaming.

So I have the original game, the new Burning Crusades expansion, and a 60-day card coming by mail soon.

One thing I wondered about is servers. I've never been much of an online gamer, so I have some questions. In the more thorough reviews of WOW from players, I read alot of comments about server lag. A LOT of server lag. These reviews were mainly from early to mid 2006. Do you know if such lag still exists, or have the problems been fixed now?

Also, am I limited to using Blizzard's servers? Or are there other sets of independent servers out there that I can choose to link up with when playing WOW.

Thanks for any advice, info or opinions!