Are they still okay for internet? That's what my roommate and I were gonna go with in October when our Cricket account expires.
I have them for broadband only in Chicago--they've been fine so far. Back in SF when I had them for broadband and cable, our cable modem died twice (in just over 3 years) but hassle-free replacements fixed the problems quickly.
Even if it's mounted to a wooden 4x4? If so, put an actual lightning rod kinda near it and ground that really good. Lightning should go for that instead. I bought a Linksys myself, I had read the default ComCast ones were pretty much crap.
Totally agree with how much it sucks, I had to go for a replacement modem because the one we "lease" for $1.50mo. died and Now they are removing cartoon network and moving it to the digital only package requiring home uses to get boxes for all the extra old analog TV. They provide two "free" but I am sure there will be a hidden cost some were down the road. Come next year, they will place all uses in my area on digital for all the good station (ch. 15-78) and only broadcast analog signals for (ch. 2-14) So basically your stuck going to digital. & Dish TV; our dish network provider alternative has been forced out of the area due to service problems.
We've grounded everything at my house six ways from Sunday; we've had multiple professionals look into it. Nothing helps. They keep telling us it's the underground river, but maybe we're on a junction of two magnetic ley lines or something (hell, as good an explanation as any at this point ).
The only things I'm really mad at Comcast for is not having MSNBCHD and not offering an "HD only" package, or at least offering an option to cut the SD versions of HD channels you already have. If I have an HDTV, why can't I get rid of the SD doppelgangers?
Well that just sucks. I would've thought that if the dish was the only thing not grounded it would be OK. But I'm no expert.
I hope they do. But, as another poster pointed out, as long as people will put up with their crap and pay their ridiculous prices they ain't going anywhere. My breaking point came 2 1/2 years ago when they moved the NFL Network from the package I had to a trash sports tier that was going to cost me an extra $5 or $6 a month. I wasn't about to pay that in order to see the eight critical late season games the NFL shows on that channel, nor was I going to miss those games. I'd been an early adopter of cable, and later the HD service. I signed up in the late 70's when they first wired my neighborhood. I told them I was canceling if they didn't give me that channel back. The best offer they'd make was to give me the tier free for 30 days. Nearly 30 years of loyal patronage meant nothing to them. Bye, bye Comcast! I signed up with DirecTV, and have never looked back. I've got a similar program package, that actually has a few more channels for 75% to 80% of what I had been paying Comcast. Since I was a new customer and signed up for more than a basic programming package they waived all of the installation and equipment lease fees Much better equipment, too. The only downside is that if we have a heavy snow storm, I have to clean the snow off the dish. And there is an occasional very brief outage if there's a heavy thunderstorm moving through the area.
^ Was it actually Comcast back then? Or even a company bought by a company bought by Comcast? (This could go on for a while) We had Cox cable (I think) around 1980-1981 and I have no idea how many times the name changed in all those years, or how many other companies got rolled into this fat fucking monopoly, but at least there's still at least 2 satellite companies to create some competition. XM & Sirius merging will probably mean a lot of screw-job for satellite radio listeners, of which I used to be one (dropped before the merger became known, I just got fed up with Sirius' crap Indian customer service).
I think the name of the original company was Warner Cable. My experience was the same as yours though. Two or three name changes until Comcast absorbed the local operation. I'd been less than happy with them for a while. Moving the NFL Network was the last straw. The fact that I'd been a charter subscriber, and that loyalty is a two way street was was completely lost on them. Somehow they thought it was better to lose my almost $100 monthly subscription fee than give me the $5 sports tier that would have kept me on board. Go figure. Never did the satellite radio thing, but I take your point. No competition means no service.
Has anybody of used FIOS by any chance? As a Cdn working for a Telco (Telus) we've been pushing IPTV like mad. Personally I think our TV service sucks but I'm just amazed that a cableco would have such shitty service compared to a telco.
That's the problem with all large companies, they don't give a rats ass about loyalty, they just want your money. If you can find somewhere else to go, they got a million others willing to pay. Even companies with a lot of competition, like Geico for example. They've been pissing me off long enough now, I'm looking to go with someone else. Again, piss-poor customer service.