humm. here about it’s typically a 5-20 minute sequence of ‘is thing A set properly? is thing B set properly?’, unless they’ve already had someone else complain about the problem, then it’s ‘is thing a/b/c going wrong? yes? yeah, it’s X’. this is typically followed by ‘we’ve told telecom/telecom’s already made us aware of this.’, because the issue typically is further up the chain than the ISP, though not always, then ‘we’re working on it. should be back up in a couple of hours’ or ‘nothing we can do about it. should be back up in x hours’ or very occasionally x days if it’s a result of a major natural disaster.

My first ISP was a dialup company called LocalNet, based in New York. The first thing I noticed was that I would often get disconnected within a couple minutes of signing on, maybe 3-4 times in a row before I got a stable connection. At the time I was using an internal USR Courier V.Everything modem. The modem diagnostics showed no errors and the reason for the disconnect usually indicated that the modem had receieved invalid data. When I called to ask about this, I was told that many of their users have USR modems and NOBODY else had a problem staying connected. This went on for the entire time I used the service. They suggested things like locking the modem speed at 38.8K instead of 56K, changing all sorts of settings, etc. None of which helped in the slightest. My guess is that some of the modems on the dialup lines didn’t like USR modems and I’d get disconnected until I managed to connect to a good one.

Then, literally overnight, my download speed went from a steady 5-6K/s to a very erratic 1-3K/s. They blamed line noise. The modem diagnostics showed that there were hardly any errors. They still claimed line noise. I had the phone company test the line and they said it was one of the cleanest lines they’d seen in a long time. They then blamed my computer, even though I hadn’t changed anything. I had someone else connect to my account with his Mac. Same crappy results. They blamed general internet congestion, they blamed it on too many people using the phone at once, etc. When I asked why my friend with with a different ISP could download at a steady 5K/s at the exact same time as I was getting 1-2K/s, they simply told me that speeds of 1-3K/s are normal for dialup. In other words, while other companies were starting to deliver 5Mbit+ speeds, they couldn’t max out a 5K connection! They insisted that their systems were working perfectly.

Then there’s my experience with Cablevision (who provide Optimum Online in this area). I had their TV service and several years ago, I started seeing some very noticeable glitches in all the New York stations. These glitches were happening at least once per hour. When I called to complain, I was told that nobody else was experiencing problems and that it must be on my end. They sent a tech out, I showed him a tape of the glitches and he instantly said “That’s not on this end, there’s nothing I can do for that.” He called in and was supposedly told that they were working on it. Two weeks later it’s still happening so I called to complain. Again I got “Nobody else is experiencing problems, it must be on your end. Let’s make an appointment to send a tech out…” This went on for months My friend was seeing the same problems on Comcast, but couldn’t be bothered to complain (because he knew how pointless it was). So I tried to let them know that there was a problem. All they cared about was that I wasn’t one of their subscribers, because their systemes were working perfectly. When Cablevision found out that Comcast had the same problem, they instantly blamed the stations (all of them having the exact same problems?). I contacted someone in New York and verified that the glitches weren’t being seen there. It wasn’t until one of the people I spoke to gave me the direct number of the engineering department that this problem was identified. Seems that there was a problem with one of the transfer links, which supplied the signal to both companies. Apparently when they switched to the backup signal for whatever reason, the glitches happened. Even with the problem identified, it took another 2-3 months of my nagging for them to fix it.

When they switched over to digital boxes, I noticed hourly glitches on all the premium channels that would last for 30-45 seconds. They took at least a couple months to fix this (with the requisite visit from a tech to comfirm that the problem wasn’t on my end). Then I started noticing minor glitches every few minutes in most all the channels watched through the box. Like a frame had been dropped. Nope, no problems on their end, must be my connections, let’s send a tech out. Although they still won’t admit it, that problem seemed to the result of bad firmware because it went away when they gave me an HD box, while the normal boxes continued to show the same glitch. That one was on my end, but was the fault of their equipment, even though they won’t admit it.