[Linux-Anyway] Re: Feel like messing things up
- From: Horror Vacui <horrorvacui@xxxxxxx>
- To: Linux-Anyway@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 31 Jul 2002 14:06:15 +0200
Scott Robbins wrote:
>On Wed, Jul 31, 2002 at 11:56:26AM +0200, Godwin Stewart wrote:
>
>
>>
>>Isn't cable available either? Over here in Europe we get the (perhaps false)
>>impression that everyone in the US has access to some form of broadband.
>>
>>
>
>
>Only in certain parts of the country. Here in NYC, things become
>available more quickly than elsewhere.
>
>However, Verizon has gotten very aggressive with their somewhat poor
>DSL--when they call me, in the hopes that "the call is being monitored
>for customer satisfaction" I tell them that firstly, as they drove all
>the other suppliers out of business (because everyone had to, in the
>end, rely upon Verizon for line access, and Verizon was usually
>unhelpful) morally I have my doubts about subscribing with them.
>Secondly, I've had various friends ask me to help them set it up--in
>almost every case, I had to call their tech support (which I didn't have
>to do with either of my DSL providers) because something was a bit
>borked with the software, thirdly, as they use pppOe and the awful
>winPoet, their service is far less good than the other DSL providers
>I've used, and lastly, as they don't support Linux at all, their 24/7
>support, which usually involves quite a lot of hold time is pretty
>useless to me. :)
>
A friend I convinced to get internet got it from the post/telecom/ISP
monopoly, and bought the modem they offered. It turned out that the
modem supplied by that company conflicted with his phone, supplied by
the same company, and he had to unplug the phone to surf faster than
9600 baud. He went to the post office where he bought it, and was told
he needs to go to the telecommunications office. There he was told they
can't do anything, he needs to call the support line. After spending
about three hours a day on hold for about five days, he came through and
was told he needs to return the modem where he bought it. He demanded a
supervisor and told him what happened the last time he tried it, but was
told the same. He wanted to talk with the supervisor's supervisor and
was told to call later. I felt a bit responsible because it was me who
convinced him to get into it, and I tried to find out myself who was
responsible, where to return the modem, or to get a different phone
model. We jointly waded through various hierarchies and were always
refered to somebody else. He still has to unplug the phone to surf,
because there appears to be no procedure to return the modem at all, and
if there is, nobody knows how. It would be possible to get another
phone, but only for a high fee he's not prepared to pay. He could buy
another modem, but the one he has is quite expensive (much more then my
US Robotics, which works fine), and he doesn't want to own two of them.
As I got ADSL, I didn't want to buy the "install-CD", and called the
support center. The lady told me there's absolutely no possibility to
use ADSL without the install-CD, I said it's perfectly possible if you
know the settings - we quarelled over that for a while and didn't get
any further, I hung up and decided to find it out elsewhere. I found the
step-by-step instructions in their monthly customers magazine, probably
published thanks to a glitch, because to-date there are no instructions
on the webpage, and the support can't tell you anything, except "buy the
CD". Now imagine asking something about Linux. Kafka.
Cheers
Horror Vacui
To unsubcribe send e-mail with the word unsubscribe in the body to:
Linux-Anyway-Request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx?body=unsubscribe
Other related posts:
