CABLEVISION service reliability

[Oren]

For the last TWO HOURS plus, I've had no INTERNET and no PHONE.

PC is dead, and when you pick up the phone there's a click, and no dial tone.

Over the last few weeks I've been on the PC A LOT. The cable modem reboots (all lights go off, then it comes back to life) MANY times during the day.. when it happens, you lose your Internet and phone(s).

I've been through this before. "Typical Customer Service", we'll send someone out, and he replaces the modem.

Same deal happening again now. TV is OK when it happens, Internet and phone are dead (usually for 10 minutes 5-6 times per day) and tonight for hours.

OR you're on the phone on hold (with anyone) forever, waiting 20 or so mins...and all of a sudden the line goes dead (Saturday). (And then I see the modem is "rebooting" again)

It's the service. You can unplug/reboot the modem, and it boots back to the same lame state that it was in before you rebooted it (4 lights lit). When the service finally comes back, all 7-8 lights go on.

I think I'm going to Verizon. I tried to call Cablevision to cancel after this 2+ hour deal tonight, and have them take their crap outta here, but it seems only the "disconnect" line is closed... it's not normal business hours.

 

[blueneon36]

I feel your pain. Everytime the wind blows more than 15 mph and we get more than an inch of rain, Comcast goes out.

I have the same problem as you when it goes out. I pick up the phone, its dead, the modem has 2 lights out of 10 flashing.

Last time the Comcast guy came out, he found that the cable behind the wall plate in our bedroom went bad. Since the modem was connected to that wall outlet, the internet, phones, and TV in the bedroom all went out. My HDTV in the living room was unaffected, however.

I can't wait for FiOS to get to my section of Pittsburgh. As far as I am concerned, it cant get here fast enough.

:hw:

 

[limegrass69]

Just to give you some perspective, I have Cablevision at home (triple play) and at the office (video). I also use Lightpath (their business class fiber service for voice and data) at the office.

I don't think your experience is typical of what you should expect from any service provider. For me, their service has been solid. Maybe a little echo on the phone here or there, but never a dropped signal (other than when the power is out for a long period of time).

It sounds like your signal levels are bad. Have you spoken to your neighbors? Do they have the same problems? If not, you probably have a wiring problem. That could be anywhere from the tap to the modem, and can be caused by water ingress to the cable, a bad crimp, an old (or too many) splitters, unterminated fitting/cable runs, a kink or nick in the wiring, long cable run, etc.

Tell me a little about your setup and I'll try to help you out.

I'm surprised they have not been able to track the problem down. The CV techs (not contractors) are usually pretty good at hunting down and fixing these problems. You should never let them out of your house until you are completely satisfied.

 

[Oren]

Just to give you some perspective, I have Cablevision at home (triple play) and at the office (video). I also use Lightpath (their business class fiber service for voice and data) at the office.

I don't think your experience is typical of what you should expect from any service provider. For me, their service has been solid. Maybe a little echo on the phone here or there, but never a dropped signal (other than when the power is out for a long period of time).

It sounds like your signal levels are bad. Have you spoken to your neighbors? Do they have the same problems? If not, you probably have a wiring problem. That could be anywhere from the tap to the modem, and can be caused by water ingress to the cable, a bad crimp, an old (or too many) splitters, unterminated fitting/cable runs, a kink or nick in the wiring, long cable run, etc.

Tell me a little about your setup and I'll try to help you out.

I'm surprised they have not been able to track the problem down. The CV techs (not contractors) are usually pretty good at hunting down and fixing these problems. You should never let them out of your house until you are completely satisfied.

But it's not the signal levels. EVERY time that I've called (many times since I got the "triple play"), that's one of the FIRST things the rep checks, and it's always fine. This has always been an infrequent problem, so once they tell you they found something, and everything is fine (like it usually is), they go and the SAME EXACT SH!T goes on!!

And (for the person that PMed me), thanks so much. But I was furious about it last night, I didn't call today, but I think I'm over it for the time being.

Here's the problem...

The people that I speak with at CABLEVISION DON'T KNOW. They follow a "standard procedure" (an SOP) and inevitably they send a tech out. You have to be home... the hours can be basically anything, etc.

THEN the tech gets here, they test the apartment building, the wiring, etc... and they swap out hardware (because they TOO don't know). This "routine" is sickening.

I've been in hardware and software forever. The problem here is connectivity fails, and it has ZERO to do with hardware. Zero to do with wiring. It's the service. And people that you talk with at CABLEVISION don't know.

I've been dealing with it, and dealing with it, over and over again. I think the real issues is that most people aren't noticing the outages. (or they are reporting them, but CABLEVISION goes thorough the exact same routine with them). There are CABLEVISION trucks out here all the time.

Consumer Reports did a recent survey/study on providers. I wasn't shocked to learn that as far as RELIABILITY scores Verizon got an "A" (Excellent), CABLEVISION got a "C" (Satisfactory).

I've tried to cancel CABLEVISION once before, and you end up with a person "negotiating" with you. I ended up accepting $20 off of my bill each month for a year.

I'm gonna ditch them. We've had FiOS (Verizon) here for well over a year now, people are happy with it, and I'm gonna make the change.

I'll miss HTV, but I can't deal with house phones and Internet that are sometimes dead. It's not typical for me... these services must be up 100% of the time.

Just a week or so ago (I was at home, I heard a very loud crack and a crash), and this HUGE tree falls across a major roadway here (there's been LOTS of rain here over the last few months). The top of the tree is about 5 feet from where people are parking... there is NO WAY to get past it. The road here is 100% blocked.

I live in an apartment complex. So I had to call the Super.

I pick up the phone, and it's Click, click, click... NO dial tone. And it stayed that way until people were out there moving it!

Late last night, 2 hours with no phone or Internet... then the signal finally comes through and the modem responds accordingly.

 

[DAB]

I guess I've been truly pleased here with Suddenlink. The cable and internet has only been out one time since 2000 that I can recall and that was when Hurricane Gustave came through our area and brought down power, cable and telephone lines. We were without service about 3 days and were then back up. My internet didn't work very well after that, come to find out the ground on my utility pole was broken and my freaking power was being grounded through the ground on my Suddenlink cable. Once the power company fixed the ground and installed me a new ground from my outdoor meter pan I've not had any further problems.

One might wonder why I would say since 2000 but that is because I remember in April of 2000 back then it was Cox Cable opened a beta program to test out their new high speed service I was one of the first in my area to get it. Its the only service I've had for High Speed ever since. I have had problems with HD and not having enough signal, which it took them three visit to finally replace the amplifier on the pole, this never impacted my internet though.

 

[Oren]

I guess I've been truly pleased here with Suddenlink. The cable and internet has only been out one time since 2000 that I can recall and that was when Hurricane Gustave came through our area and brought down power, cable and telephone lines. We were without service about 3 days and were then back up. My internet didn't work very well after that, come to find out the ground on my utility pole was broken and my freaking power was being grounded through the ground on my Suddenlink cable. Once the power company fixed the ground and installed me a new ground from my outdoor meter pan I've not had any further problems.

One might wonder why I would say since 2000 but that is because I remember in April of 2000 back then it was Cox Cable opened a beta program to test out their new high speed service I was one of the first in my area to get it. Its the only service I've had for High Speed ever since. I have had problems with HD and not having enough signal, which it took them three visit to finally replace the amplifier on the pole, this never impacted my internet though.

DAB, for me though, I don't think it's any of that.

It would be a very difficult thing for me to prove. After all this time and going back and forth with CABLEVISION, I've been dealing with a very intermittent thing. Going by what I've seen lately (and it just went down for 5 mins or so about 1.5 hours or so ago), this has always been something that most people might not notice here.

I have to say though, after what you guys said, it might be affecting only this building. I'm in a Garden Apartment complex. It's big though. Like a little town.

There's over 200 apartments here, in many separate buildings (that are all the same). Each building has about 10 apartments in it. It could be our building, I don't know, but it's unacceptable to me. God forbid we'd have some type of emergency situation and the phones and Internet are dead. At that point, scrambling, you're wasting time. (I'm NOT worried about that, but I'm saying... phones and Internet should be available 100% of the time, period.)

That concern has been conveyed by ME several times with CABLEVISION... YET they always follow the exact same process..

They test the signal strength remotely, they find no problem so they send a tech out (inconvenient), the tech checks the lines in the apartment and the building; they go into the basement and check the "box" outside (there is no problem at the moment while they do so) and everything is FINE! SO they REPLACE THE MODEM!

And the NEW modem does the EXACT SAME THING!! It's RIDICULOUS!

The problem is they DON'T KNOW how to diagnose this problem, AND, if it happens while they're here (very unlikely) I STILL think that they would have ZERO clue. None.

They'd replace the cable modem. (That's EXACTLY what they'd do.)

 

[limegrass69]

Oren...Check your PM

 

[DAB]

Apartment complexes are the worse and they seem to never be able to troubleshoot the problems. My son lived in one a while back and they had nothing but problems. The cable company said the complex needed to be totally rewired, but of course the complex didn't want to spend the money. Getting HD there was impossible! He eventually bought a Condo so now he has DirecTV.

 

[magicjellybeans]

Cablevision

Cablevision is the best I have ZERO issues with signal after I homeran all my wires using Quad-sheilded RG-6U BELDEN coax cable and one splitter.I f you dont think its a signal issue,you dont know what you are saying.I did have dropouts but never anymore.
Your signal is LOW,period.They have the best customer service but if you do have a tech out make sure its not a subcontactor ,they all SUCK!(any company)
I would never go back to sattelite which craps out every time it rains(unless you go with a bigger dish and thats not an option here)

Clifton,NJ here OAKLAND CABLEVSION ,where REAL people that live in America answer the phone!



Take it from an electronics technician/ham radio operator/hobbyist