Surprise subject line, huh? Seriously, I can't seem to win an ongoing battle with Comcast but I can't place the blame entirely upon them. Here's the problem I'm having with my cable TV service:

In the warm months, my signal is too strong coming into the house to the extent that my distribution amp overdrives the signal for the digital receivers. This results in "freeze frames", etc. Comcast's solution was to remove the distribution amp and replace it with an 8-way splitter.

This fixes the problem with the digital receiver, but the remaining TVs with basic cable have a crappy picture. I've just learned to live with that part.

Now that it has gotten cold, Comcast has gone around padding the line extenders in the area to compensate for the temperature change. This means that my signal is too low now and I have to put the distribution amp back in.

They claim that until the budget allows for auto-compensating LEs to be installed, I'm just going to have to live with this. Truth be known, it really isn't a big deal for me to move eight cables from a splitter to an amp, but that's because I know what I'm doing. I can't imagine a typical customer being capable (or willing) to do this.

I do know that Es Comcastico has a truck in my tiny neighborhood once a week at different neighbors' houses. I don't even waste my time calling them anymore because I'm tired of the double talk, plus I'm not very good at speaking Spanish. That is assuming of course that I'm able to get them to actually send someone. Most calls usually result in "unplug all of jour TB sets and count to tirty......"

I usually hang up before my head explodes. Does anyone know of any buzz words I can use with them to make them come up with a real solution?

Yep....Direct TV...lol

They speak Spanish in India?

As you know, many of the states utility commissions do little if any control or regulation of cable companies. This is left to the local community with their "franchise agreements". These agreements offer little in the way of consumer protection and communities really don't bother with or fund an office to investigate complaints. As long as "the check" clears each month along with local access for the school district and community is always available, everything is O.K.! So, what can you do? Talk to your local elected officals, letters to editor, in other words organize! The Music Man above all else was a story about a flim-flam man, remember?

I'm with Anthony. I had Cablevision for years until they pissed me off one time too often and I went to Dish Network.

I never regretted it. I stayed with Dish until this year when I went to FIOS. There was nothing wrong with Dish (except for losing signal a couple of times a year in really bad weather). I liked their equipment, I liked their programming, I liked their pricing and I really liked their customer service. FIOS however, was a much better deal and their picture quality is awesome.

If you have a choice to change to and you continue to let these people annoy you, you're just being masochistic.

I know they shouldn't have the right to be so obnoxious, I know they have a "public trust" and a responsibility to deliver good service and all that, but if they really tick you off just vote with your feet and leave. You have other choices - why let the b*stards aggravate you? Send them a biblical quotation - my favorite is "be fruitful and multiply with yourselves", and then go somewhere else for service.

Does this sound like the Bell System in the '70s and Interconnect? We're all in business because Bell ticked off enough people with their arrogance and bad service and, and, and...

Just leave and don't let them bother you again.


Sam

I have the misfortune of having Comcast also, get the same story about hot and cold weather. The cable plant in this area is so old they cant give me HD and Im too wooded for a dish and no FIOS.They bought out Adelphia when they went belly up here and say theres no money for upgrades but I still pay the market price. Theres a VP Rick Germano I always complained to which always got a quick response from the local people.
Heres the address https://www.comcast.com/Corporate/Customers/RickGCustCare.html
I really dont blame the local people, not much they can do with an outdated cable plant and a corporate thats not willing to spend some of the millions theyre making to serve their customers. You only need to Google "Comcast complaints" to get a lifetime of reading

around here i had a similar issue with videotron, in the summer i would lose digital cable between noon and 4 pm every day, my analog signal would get full of static as well. Anyways, videotron would send one of thier sub contractors here either in the morning or evening, never when the problem was present. I gave up and spoke to a collegue whos brother is a supervisor at videotron, we put a booster on the line and all problems have disapeared. Videotron still insists there was no problem on the line, and everytime i call, insist i should switch to them for phone...

I've had a lot less problems since Time Warner bought Adelphia. It's still not great but is getting better. From what I read over on the Cabletechs forum, Comcast sucks, both as a customer and to work for.

Gelehu, I agree that things went downhill when Comcast bought Adelphia's market. I used to be on a first-name basis with Adelphia's local service manager, in fact I had his cell phone number because of my chronic problems. He's gone now, so I'm back to being a regular customer with them.

I had Direct TV for several years, but it is just too windy here to get even a well-mounted dish to receive a reliable signal. Quite frankly, I got tired of going up on my 12/12 roof to tinker with it several times per year. Besides, they didn't offer local channels at the time.

I need to have Comcast for their high speed Internet service. I'm too far out from the CO for DSL and I'm not willing to risk satellite cost and reliability.

So as it sits, I'm going to have to complain to the county's CATV commission. I've done this before, but they are just a bunch of part-time "good old boys" who really don't care, nor are they willing to do anything. Yep, as long as the county's facilities are receiving service, they don't seem to care much about anything else. Since my issue is temperature-related, they rarely find anything wrong when they send out a technician several days later!

How about terminating the sets that need the amplification on their own splitter, and the sets that do not on their own splitter? Then put an "A-B" switch that enables/disables an in-line amplifier when it's needed/not needed?

That is pretty much what I've resorted to doing, Arthur. I was generalizing when I said I was literally taking the splitter out and replacing it with the amp or vice-versa.

Again, I really don't have a problem with this myself. My issue is that I have an advantage over a typical customer who lacks the technical know-how to overcome this problem.

On a similar note: I just had my Verizon land line service reconnected today and they sent it to the drop feeding my shed. I went ballistic when a fax answered my main number until I realized that the fax was my own. Now granted, I can easily throw some jumpers around to put the lines where they belong, but why should I? They charged me $42.00 to reconnect my service, so I would expect that I'd be getting what I paid for. Again, I can fix it, but I'm not the typical customer. Either their cable records are wrong or they have a doof in the central office. Either way, that isn't the customer's problem (well, at least it shouldn't be).

I already know how much you like that subject! :p

Update: Well, they just got the lines put back in their proper places, but now the caller ID is gone. 1-800-VER-I......Para Espanol, marqe...... Ugh.....

Ed, just a few words. Ask to speak to the supervisor's supervisor! And/Or someone whose primary language is ENGLISH! (Primero Englisa ?) That's what gets me decent help/repair from TWC.

Comcast can afford to make an offer on NBC, but can't afford to put money into their plant?

Justin

Ed:
Got this email from one of the guys at cabletechs.org
"Its hard to overdrive analog outlets. Split off however many outlets with boxes plus one splitter port for a second splitter. So if he has
two cable boxes use a three way, then feed the dist amp from the first splitter, then a splitter for analog only outlets. Simple really, cheers and happy new year from cabletechs.org"

Thanks, Jeff. I'm not having a problem overdriving the analog outlets; it is the digital receiver that is getting a signal that is too strong when using the amp.

Again, I'm fully capable of addressing these issues when the seasons change with a myriad of switches, pads and splitters. I've been doing it for years but then again, I'm not the typical customer. No customer should have to go to these extremes to overcome issues with the incoming signal levels.

Ed -

I'm shocked! Shocked, I say, to discover that a Public Utility might deliver crummy service with no recourse for consumers.


Sam

I know we're beating a dead horse here, but
this link offers some good reading on the subject!

ed, I agree with letting Verizon fix it. If they dont have the customer records straight, then fixing problems later is just a pita, and like you said, they charged you $42 to enable a line in the switch. At least they could enable the correct circuit id with the correct features. looks like they swapped the circuit, but not the features. ha. left hand doesn't know what right hand is doing.

Why not just put a couple of attenuators in line with the digital sets.. Radio shack used to carry them, I'm not sure if they do anymore..

The "old" cable TV company used to stock attenuators in various impedance values that were in a male-female F-connector form factor. The technician (remember them?) would select the appropriate value and insert it for perfect service.

I've been watching this thread but haven't chimed in because this whole thing sounds like an exercise in futility.

Ed, I'll assume you had some numbers to go on from the cable tech. Even if you do, signal levels change so I'll repeat my mantra- unless you have test equipment, know how to use it and know how cable works anything you do is a shot in the dark.

That said, they do make switchable attenuators, amps with gain controls and amps with AGC that could be useful here. But unless you know what you are doing and can see what you need to do, none of that is going to do you any good and may even knock out service to the neighborhood.

-Hal

Hal, I thought you'd never get here. Where have you been?

But seriously, I agree that there are plenty of fixes that I, the consumer can provide at my own expense, but why should I? The varying signal levels are due to shortcomings in Comcast's plant. I know this can be resolved and I know what needs to be done, but doing so would be comparable to my providing a buck/boost transformer to compensate for the power company's voltage being too low.

Their "technicians" have rattled off plenty of "over and under" signal levels to me, but each time they arrive, I hear something different. Sure, signals vary but I honestly believe that they just don't know how to read their equipment.

So on that note, I'll reiterate: I'm not a typical Comcast customer, so I can fix this issue. The continuing gripe that I have here is what if I didn't know what to to? I hate to think of the thousands of customers out there who are just taking their word for it and living with the poor signal quality.

What's ironic about that is that it would probably be enough to get their attention and get some real techs working on the problem, but then they would probably charge Ed for causing the problem.

Justin

But seriously, I agree that there are plenty of fixes that I, the consumer can provide at my own expense, but why should I?

Oh, I absolutely agree. Those fixes would really just be a band-aid anyway. The fix needs to come from them in their OSp.

What's ironic about that is that it would probably be enough to get their attention and get some real techs working on the problem, but then they would probably charge Ed for causing the problem.

Nahh, they'll just disco Ed and send another tech over like all the other times to put everything back the way it was.

-Hal