No utopia, but better than the cable company.
Written: Feb 20 '08 (Updated Mar 01 '08)
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Dealing with utility monopolies is often a case of choosing the lesser of two evils. I'd been with my local cable company's broadband service, Optimum Online, for nearly nine years when I finally had enough.
There were often interruptions, necessitating lengthy periods on-hold after working through their labyrinthine menu system that seemed designed to discourage people from trying to reach a representative. In the last-straw experience, I found that I was getting 6 mbps download speed, not the promised 15. After driving to their service center and replacing the modem, at their request, speed dropped to 4mbps. A rep first and then a supervisor basically shrugged and said I was above the 0.2mbps speed considered their minimum so they didn't really need to do anything. That's when I called Verizon.
The FiOS rep said that it would be a two-step process: first a team would come out to prep my house for fiber (which seemed to be a matter of ensuring a line reached the pole closest to me), then the actual installation would occur.
The appointment day came, the installer looked things over, and stated that the prep team basically hadn't done any work. Fortunately, rather than leave, he started that work himself—which meant that it was about four hours before he started on the actual installation.
Once the actual home installation began, he installed a honking-big network interface on the front wall of my home, near the front door. This thing looks basically like a smaller version of the diaper changing stations you see in public restrooms--rather an eyesore, and something I wish he'd installed a tad more discretely.
As installation dragged, I assisted in order to speed things along, routing the Ethernet cable from the outside interface through an attic crawlspace and down between the walls to a hole I'd carved, and we were done... six hours after he arrived. Or, perhaps, not quite done. The rep tested things on his laptop, they looked good, and my computer was hooked up. And there was no connection.
This started to turn into a PC-Mac thing, with the insinuation by him that if I only had a different sort of computer....
After quite a bit of time, where he had to call service centers literally around the country, it was sorted out: for some reason, the Verizon router had locked itself to the MAC address of his laptop, and the modem had to be reset. Done, and done; total install time, about seven and a half hours. Not how I planned to spend my day, but there you go.
Download speed was a gratifying 10mbps—at two-thirds the cost of what I had been paying cable. Phone service was also converted to fiber—it's mandatory when either TV or online services are installed—but that did not otherwise change for me. I didn't go for FiOS TV because I was told that converters would be mandatory for all TVs, and I didn't want to lose essential functionality of my PVRs.
the good
• Speed, for the most part, has been on-target. Sometimes upload speeds vary, but infrequently; I don't run a server or any such thing, so it's not a big problem, but Verizon couldn't explain why this might change.
• Optimum Online was subject to periodic outages; I'd lose my connection at least a few times a year (early on, it was literally out as much as on) for varying periods. So far, in a year and a half of FiOS service, I haven't lost the connection for a second.
• the Actiontec router they've given me, while rather surprisingly big (actually more the twice the size of the cable modem) has quite a bit more configurable setting than the completely non-configurable device Cablevision had provided. I had to reboot the Optimum Online cable modem every week or so to restore connectivity, but not the Actiontec (but see below).
the bad
• their customer service web site ignores the existence of Macs. They've implemented Windows-only services in it (not sure if it's MSIE-only, or will work with FireFox-Windows). If you attempt to get their contact information... nothing happens. Specifically,the problem is that, as you go through menus and buttons for contact information, the support page tries to open an interactive troubleshooting session—using Windows-specific code. Working through to their contact information via another route yields a link to "Get Support by Phone." Sounds promising, but clicking on it yields a page stating "Checking if Quick Support is installed...." That's another WIndows-only service that checks your system for issues; all you've asked is for a phone number, but it won't provide that. I have the contact information written down, but I had to get it via Google.
• it's still a utility monopoly.
• Usenet service just as mediocre as most ISP's
• required switching phone service to fiber optic and installation of a battery backup. I'm in hurricane territory; years past, we've lost power for days at a time, but the phones almost always still worked. That seems to no longer seems to be a given.
• for some reason, I've had periodic burps with my LAN connection, where transfer speeds between computers slows to a crawl. Rebooting all of it (often just the router, sometimes router and some or all of the computers) fixes it. That never happened before the Actiontec router.
Ater the initial 1 year offer ended, the cost skyrocketed 60%, from $29.99 to $49.99. I cut that back down to $34.99 by agreeing to a phone/Internet contract, which also upgraded by connection speed to 20mbps down/5mbps/up. But then the confusion started: no one seemed to be quite sure what I ought to be charged. I called back 3 times, and each rep thought my bill ought to be something different. In the end, they decided things in my favor, which the really needn't have done, so I'm certainly satisfied.
Update: the power adapter for the Verizon router died unexpectedly. I spoke with a Verizon rep who seemed to have difficulty grasping the situation, finally saying they'd mail me new adapter. Not wanting to be without a connection for a week (that was the anticipated shipping time, and the installed network cable couldn't reach the computer) I asked if there was a place I could go to get it replaced).
The Verizon rep said he'd locate a Verizon store for me; it was taking a while, and he told me to go online to verizon.com and look it up--to which I replied that would help if only I could go online. Finally, he got me an address, one I recognized.
Me: "isn't that a Verizon Wireless store? Do they have FIOS supplies?"
Him: "yes, they'll have it."
I called back and spoke to another rep, who told me no, they definitely do not have stores where you can pick up supplies. With Cablevision, at least, I could run out to replace a dead box; with Verizon, the only choice is to get a service appointment or wait for a replacement by mail.
Except, of course, if I took the rep's other suggestion: go to Radio Shack and see if I could buy a replacement power supply. More annoying, though, was the discovery that the router they provide has a 1-year warranty; anything goes wrong with it after that year, you're on your own (a new Actiontec is $140). Not sure why they'll send me a new power supply for free but not the router itself.
I am dropping my rating by a star due to the updated info.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
Scott_A_R
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Location: Massapequa, NY
Reviews written: 45
Trusted by: 11 members
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