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[#] Mon Sep 22 2014 15:09:38 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

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Some high-ranking direct sales dude at the cable company has, for some reason, taken a specific interest in switching my household over from FiOS, or as he put it, "winning back this address" (since they had the tenants as customers back when it was a rental property).

I told him he'd have to match Verizon's price, bury (not fly) the cable, supply a DVR for every screen, and guarantee that I don't need to use "their" router. He said yes all over the place, and it seemed like a good idea at the time. I haven't signed up, though, and now that I'm thinking more about it, it's still crappy cable company service.

It's hard to think of a giant like Verizon as the underdog, but in wireline broadband they really are, and they've still got the top rated service. So maybe I'll pass.

Anyone here have experience with both Verizon and Optimumum?

[#] Mon Sep 22 2014 16:13:02 EDT from LoanShark

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Optimum gives the usual crappy service but it's been mostly reliable. It may be a little like... wait for it... pulling teeth... to get them to replace a modem that needs replacing. I have no experience with Verizon.

[#] Mon Sep 22 2014 23:34:53 EDT from ax25

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Oof.  The pain of it all :-)



[#] Tue Sep 23 2014 22:16:02 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

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Yeah, dunno what I was thinking, crappy cable is crappy cable. A scan of various broadband boards shows mostly people preferring FiOS by a long shot.
There was one person who was very pro-CableVision but she also claimed that Verizon promises fiber but often delivers copper instead. Riiiiiight.

Eventually I came across this chart: [ http://tinyurl.com/pgwphta ]

It seems I've already got the best and I'm going to stick with it. I'm going over what I was thinking at the time and it seems that the big appeal was not having to use their router to tie the set top boxes in to my LAN. I think when I get some time I'm going to try out the Ethernet port on the set top box and see if it works. It didn't on the old Motorola but maybe it will on the new Cisco.

[#] Tue Sep 23 2014 22:24:30 EDT from wizard of aahz

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The Charter part of that chart is a load of hooey. Charter's advertised vs. real speeds were not even close.

[#] Wed Sep 24 2014 14:08:53 EDT from vince-q <vince-q@ns1.netk2ne.net>

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It seems I've already got the best and I'm going to stick with it.
I'm going over what I was thinking at the time and it seems that the
big appeal was not having to use their router to tie the set top boxes

in to my LAN. I think when I get some time I'm going to try out the

You can always buy a "dumb" cable modem and install your own router.

A friend of mine in a neighboring town is a customer of Wave Broadband for TV and internet. His modem needed to be replaced. He was going to call the cable company until I beat him over the head about it and told him to go to Best Buy and just get a "stupid DOCSIS modem" and a good router/WAP. He did that, and called the cable company to report the modem change so they could properly log it into their system.

The result? His internet speed increased by roughly 50% just by getting rid of their GarbageModem. Of course, a *real* router helped as well.

[#] Wed Sep 24 2014 15:19:09 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

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The router for FiOS has a coaxial cable connection to feed data to your set top boxes. It can also receive the public Internet connection from the ONT over a different channel, so they don't have to run Ethernet from the ONT to the router. Naturally I don't do that; in both houses it's been a good Ethernet connection.

I can run a different router and put their thing behind it, but then you lose some TV features such as on-screen Caller ID and remote DVR programming.
This may be an acceptable tradeoff.

[#] Wed Sep 24 2014 20:36:28 EDT from vince-q <vince-q@ns1.netk2ne.net>

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1. you really really really don't need on-screen CID. That is *the* height of geeksloth. <evil grin>

2. unless you do a lot of overnight travelling you don't need remote DVR either. More geeksloth. <evil grin>

[#] Thu Sep 25 2014 10:53:30 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

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True, but I'm not the only one in the household. If I were, I wouldn't have TV service at all.

[#] Thu Sep 25 2014 13:37:05 EDT from vince-q <vince-q@ns1.netk2ne.net>

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Sep 25 2014 7:53am from IGnatius T Foobar @uncnsrd (Uncensored) in I Want
Broadband Everything>
True, but I'm not the only one in the household. If I were, I wouldn't

have TV service at all.



Use 1950s Italian Household Rule #1:


This is my house and as long as you are living here..." [fill in your own variable item here]

<very evil grin>

[#] Thu Sep 25 2014 17:54:46 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

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Yeah, well, the person who has the other name on the mortgage is the biggest TV addict of all.

[#] Thu Sep 25 2014 19:20:49 EDT from vince-q <vince-q@ns1.netk2ne.net>

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Sep 25 2014 2:54pm from IGnatius T Foobar @uncnsrd (Uncensored) in I Want
Broadband Everything>
Yeah, well, the person who has the other name on the mortgage is the
biggest TV addict of all.



"I'm-a gonna make-a you an offer you no canna refuse..."
There.
*That* should do it for you!!

[#] Fri Sep 26 2014 17:44:37 EDT from zooer

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True, but I'm not the only one in the household. If I were, I wouldn't
have TV service at all.

Last night someone asked me if I saw something on TV, I told them I had watched about zero hours of TV this
month.

[#] Fri Oct 02 2015 17:43:44 EDT from IGnatius T Foobar

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So here's something interesting. If you have Verizon FiOS you can get two different phone services.

There's regular FiOS voice, which lets you plug your analog phones into the ONT.

Then there's FiOS Digial Voice, which lets you plug your analog phones into the ONT.

The "digital voice" product is cheaper, and I finally figured out why. It's incredible that they get away with this. The "regular" voice service runs over ATM to the ONT, and is tariffed like a regular phone line. The "digital voice" service runs ove IP to the ONT, and even though it doesn't use your Internet connection, it's tariffed like other VoIP services, about $7/month cheaper.

Fine with me ... less of my money going to the governmonsters.

[#] Wed Nov 16 2016 15:54:46 EST from IGnatius T Foobar

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The cable guy paid us a visit last weekend. He wanted to try to get us to switch from Verizon to "Optimum" (Cablevision).

I respectfully told him that we are a very satisfied Verizon customer and he would be wasting his time talking to us.

He left quickly ... but that might have been because I was holding a chainsaw in my hand at the time. He was visibly nervous.

[#] Wed Nov 16 2016 16:11:01 EST from zooer

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That and you were naked except for wearing a Trump hat, but that is how you usually do yard work.



[#] Wed Nov 16 2016 23:22:10 EST from IGnatius T Foobar

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I don't have a Trump hat, actually ... but I do wear my John Deere hat when I do yard work.

[#] Thu Nov 17 2016 14:07:27 EST from zooer

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You covered the logo with duct tape, wrote "Trump" on it with a Sharpie®, and you do the yard work naked.



[#] Thu Nov 17 2016 22:05:44 EST from wizard of aahz

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Actually he just does that with the chainsaw when he's giving himselff a haircut.

[#] Fri Nov 18 2016 05:20:51 EST from the_mgt

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Nah, that is stupid, nobody gives himself a haircut while wearing a hat.



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