So yesterday, after weeks of waiting, was finally the day on which Verizon showed up to connect my super-fast FiOS Internet.
The tech arrived around 9 AM and was optimistic that it wouldn't take long or much work.
That immediately made me suspicious.
He soon regretted saying it.
The previous owner had only had FiOS Internet, not Internet and TV, and having both requires that there be a cable jack in the same room as the Ethernet jack.
I picked the room that had the Ethernet jack as my office (for other reasons besides that), but naturally that ensured that it was the only bedroom without a cable jack.
So he had to take the time to install a new dual jack that had Ethernet and cable outlets, which meant drilling some holes so that he could run a cable to the attic and down into the closet in the office, and also run a cable from the cable box to the phone/network box.
So that took a while, and even after it was done, the router – I have to use a Verizon-specific wireless router in order for the connection to work – wasn’t getting a signal lock.
So he had to totally replace the network box.
Eventually, 3+ hours later, he had it up and running and it was amazing. I downloaded a 1.5 GB file in about 10 minutes.
He then got to setting up my TV and DVR service, which went off mostly without a hitch, except that for some reason they’d neglected to include all of the non-premium HD channels in my packet. He told me that they probably wouldn’t be turned on until the next day, but I wasn’t terribly concerned, as I was at least getting all of the networks’ HD channels.
So he left and everything was cool.
Until I went back up to the office and decided I would set up a wireless network with the new router.
I went to the router’s config page and tried to log in with the default information.
No luck, so, per the instructions on Verizon’s FiOS site, I held in the “reset” button for ten seconds to restore it to factory default.
When it came back up the Internet light wouldn’t come back on and I no longer had connectivity.
I called tech support, who concluded that the router must have fried when I reset it, so they would dispatch someone in the morning with a replacement.
*Sigh* So after waiting for weeks and finally getting super-fast Internet, I killed it within an hour.
This morning the tech showed up, hooked up a new router, and it was the same deal.
Eventually he was able to determine that the problem was that the previous tech had hooked it up so that the networking was entirely via coax rather than coax and Ethernet.
The router needs to be connected to the coax, as the DVR uses the router to download the program guide, on demand programming, and the information for the widgets (little on-screen graphics that tell you the weather and traffic conditions and etc.), and the first tech apparently thought it was easiest to just have the whole thing running on coax. In fact, on the new network box he’d installed, he didn’t even connect the Ethernet to the house.
Long story short, the second tech simply plugged in the Ethernet to the house and got the router to connect that way.
So now I have Internet.
I’d gotten up early yesterday to be sure to be ready when the Verizon tech arrived, and I had to get up early again this morning to be ready when the second tech arrived, and also to bring my car into the shop.
Some time ago the car started making a noise and had a slight shudder. Noise and shudder eventually got worse, so I brought it in to get checked out.
Turns out the problem was from worn out tires and a bent rim. So I have to get new tires and a new rim. Not sure how this didn’t get noticed when I had my safety inspection done, as I doubt that the wear and the bending happened in under a month, and the last time I had the tires replaced it was determined that it needed to be done as a result of my safety inspection.
Oh well.
In any case, I’m going to post this while I have a working connection, and I’m going to leave said connection alone for a while before I try setting up the wireless network.
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