Adventures in Time Warner World

Let me just state up front that I drank the Time Warner Kool-aid a long time ago. That's who provides us cable, high-speed Internet and telephones. So if TW doesn't deliver we are essentially bereft, cut off from the world. And by-and-large they have delivered; there have been very few hiccups. But let me tell you a story.

Sunday night we turned on the TV to watch an NBA playoff game. After just a few seconds, the cable box re-booted. We tried again and it rebooted again. After a few attempts it seemed to settle down and we watched the program.

Monday night I turned the TV on and reboot, reboot, reboot! I called the tech support number and after a long wait got cut off (I guess that would be a phone reboot). I tried again, finally got through to Ahmad at tech support, explained the problem and after he told me all the things to try for problems other than rebooting, he finally decided the cable box was bad and I should take it by for a replacement.

Tuesday, after swapping the box, I had to call tech support again, because the only thing the TV would show me after installing the new box was a message that said "Please Call Customer Support." Raoul struggled with that for a while, but we did get it going. Tuesday night we turned the TV on to watch some BB and were greeted with a very poor picture. Serious quality issues here.

Wednesday afternoon (and here I tell you the secret to calling TW tech support; call in the daytime when nobody is watching TV) I got Jethro on the line, explained the problem and he immediately told me that there were issues with the cable coming into the house.
    "Uh, there was nothing wrong with the cable on Sunday. Why now?"
    "Maybe it's the wind. Is it windy at your house?"
    "No. No more than usual."
    "Well, maybe your neighbor did something to the cable."
    "I don't think so. I don't think she can climb up the telephone pole to reach my cable!"
    "I'm sure it's the cable coming into the house."
     "Uh, let's see. What has changed here - the cable itself or the cable box?"
     "Huh? Well, I'll set up an appointment for a technician to come to your house."

Oh, great. Now I have to wait weeks for Larry the Cable Guy to come between 8AM and 10PM. Please don't leave the house and lock up all your pets.

But Roger the Cable Guy was able to come the same afternoon! I explained the deal to him, he took one look at the TV and said, "The settings are wrong. Didn't the customer rep guy asked you about the settings to allow it to show 1080P instead of this 480P that you are looking at?"
    "No. I asked him why it only said 480P on the front of the box. He said it was because the signal was weak."

So Roger the Cable guy flipped through a few settings, changed the set to show the high-def 1080P signal and WOW! Look at that great picture!.He did say that it was probably a good thing that I went ahead and swapped out the cable box. He said that a software change on the old box caused it to reboot, and reboot, and reboot - but only if you turned to TNTHD - the channel the NBA playoffs are on.

Now I'm waiting for TW to call with their customer satisfaction survey. I have something to say to them about Ahmad, Raoul and Jethro. And about Roger, my new BFF.