I AM CURSED..........RANDOM GRIPING....NEED TO FIND A TV

[Bretsky]

I come home Wednesday night and my wife indicates that the dam cable is out. Logic dictates me to ask her what Charter said, and she lets me know she hasn't called yet.

So I can them at about 8:30; their support staff nothing less than moronic IMO. They tell me to shut off the cable box; I tell them I already did. They ask me to do it again and leave it powered off for 15 minutes.

At that point I think they are just trying to get me off the phone.

It doesn't work.

I call them back at around 9:30; they ask me if I powered off the dam cable box. They tell me they are sending a signal. I call them back at 10; it hasn't worked yet. They tell me it often takes an hour and assured me it'd be working in the morning. I tell them I think the cable box is bad and want it fixed; they assure me it's fine.

I get up and race off to work; come home Thursday night to watch TV. Frickin cable still not working. Called the clowns again; they asked me to do what we did Wednesday. Then indicated they'd have to schedule a service technician.

I was afraid to ask, but in a slightly angered mode, I said "HOW SOON"

They said Tuesday.

No access to the Tube on Saturday to watch the Badge
No home access to the Tube on Sunday to watch the NFL

I'm pissed.

I see myself having the shakes Sunday morning as I am thinking about pre-games and the NFL Sunday............................................ ..........................................as I'm cussing out the Charter.

I hate the Charter.

[MJZiggy]

The good news is that it's a bye week and you won't be missing the Pack...and you can watch the pregame stuff on the web. I assume you've tried disconnecting and reconnecting the cables and stuff...I'd invite you over to my place to watch, but well, you know.

[retailguy]

Re: I AM CURSED..........RANDOM GRIPING....NEED TO FIND A TV

I hate the Charter.

I have a solution.... Directv.


You're welcome.

[Zool]

Im going to assume you bypassed the cable box and plugged the co-ax directly into the tv? You wont get all the channels obviously, but some is better than none right?

[KYPack]

Re: I AM CURSED..........RANDOM GRIPING....NEED TO FIND A TV

I hate the Charter.

I have a solution.... Directv.


You're welcome.

Yeah.

Then he'll lose the reception during thunder storms.

[pittstang5]

Re: I AM CURSED..........RANDOM GRIPING....NEED TO FIND A TV

I hate the Charter.

I have a solution.... Directv.


You're welcome.

Yeah.

Then he'll lose the reception during thunder storms.

LOL....Nice to know that I'm not the only one. I'm almost to the point where I may go back to cable, but I don't think the cable provider around here offers the NFL ticket. The ticket is my only way to see the Pack.

[Fosco33]

Re: I AM CURSED..........RANDOM GRIPING....NEED TO FIND A TV

I hate the Charter.

I have a solution.... Directv.


You're welcome.

Yeah.

Then he'll lose the reception during thunder storms.

Another solution - move to a place that doesn't have thunder storms

I've had DirecTV for years w/o a single interruption.

When I had Charter at UW, we were consistently screwed over - to the point where I'd take their stupid High Speed Internet Modem to their office and laugh as they tried to make it work at their site - it was the quickest way to get new equipment and bypass their 'tech service' BS.

[Bretsky]

Im going to assume you bypassed the cable box and plugged the co-ax directly into the tv? You wont get all the channels obviously, but some is better than none right?

I'm an idiot; no I have not tried that yet. That'll be my task for today.

B

[Bretsky]

Wait, can somebody explain to me how this Cable TV works ?

I have five televisions in our house. The Big Screen is hooked up to the cable box and the rest are not. None are working.

Is the cable box the central station that gives off signal to all the other tv's ?

I'm assuming that if I unplug the box and put the coax directly into the TV the best case is I get the local stations, correct ?

[retailguy]

Wait, can somebody explain to me how this Cable TV works ?

I have five televisions in our house. The Big Screen is hooked up to the cable box and the rest are not. None are working.

Is the cable box the central station that gives off signal to all the other tv's ?

I'm assuming that if I unplug the box and put the coax directly into the TV the best case is I get the local stations, correct ?

You should go to the point where the cable comes into the house. Hook a portable TV into the connection coming into the house. If you have TV, then the line is fine coming into the house, and the problem is most likely the block that apportions out the lines into the house. If TV does not work, that indicates that the problem is between the pole and house.

Good luck. If you have "friendly" neighbors, you could buy 150' of coax and "piggyback" off the neighbors house until Charter gets there, just connect the coax to your incoming line and you'll have cable throughout the house.

[Badgepack]

Cable theft is a crime, don't you watch the commercials?

[retailguy]

Cable theft is a crime, don't you watch the commercials?

It is not a crime if you already have it. Right now he is paying for something that he is not receiving.

I'm 90% positive the problem is the cable from the street to the house. Someone has probably dug a hole and hit the cable. Moisture gets into the cable, and over time corrodes the connection.

[Partial]

Re: I AM CURSED..........RANDOM GRIPING....NEED TO FIND A TV

I hate the Charter.

I have a solution.... Directv.


You're welcome.

Yeah.

Then he'll lose the reception during thunder storms.

Another solution - move to a place that doesn't have thunder storms

I've had DirecTV for years w/o a single interruption.

When I had Charter at UW, we were consistently screwed over - to the point where I'd take their stupid High Speed Internet Modem to their office and laugh as they tried to make it work at their site - it was the quickest way to get new equipment and bypass their 'tech service' BS.

I was gonna say this exact same thing. I have heard AWFUL things about them in madtown. Their is a massive facebook group called Charter communications blows goats!

[Fosco33]

Not my info... but this may be another thing to try.




The first experiment was to connect the RF connector of the cable directly to the TV (this connection was to the Cable box earlier). To my surprise, I got video and audio in the TV and I could watch a non-premium TV channel. Perhaps this was not suprising -- afterall, there was signal in the cable (that is how the COMCAST technician was able to do a remote "reset") and not all channels are scrambled, though this is something I didn't know before. This also confirmed that there was no problem with the TV's RF reception circuitry (I knew that rest of the TV worked fine, for I could get the video and audio signals from both the VCR and the DVD Player).

Though this trick got me a functioning TV, it did little to solve my immediate problem, for Zee is a premium channel and its signals are scrambled.

While inspecting the Cable box, I noticed that it also has output ports for normal Video Audio 3 wire cable. This gave me an idea. Why not connect the cable to the cable box and use a Video Audio connector to connect the cable box with the TV. Afterall, there was some possibility that the problem was with the RF output of the cable box, and not with the de-scrambling circuitry. So I tried that.

[Partial]

Cable theft is a crime, don't you watch the commercials?

It is not a crime if you already have it. Right now he is paying for something that he is not receiving.

I'm 90% positive the problem is the cable from the street to the house. Someone has probably dug a hole and hit the cable. Moisture gets into the cable, and over time corrodes the connection.

I'd bet charter is right and its a box error. He is getting internet musn't we forget.