Why do cable companies always completely suck forever?

[Trexller]

yeah but nowadays we can get AI generated celebrity nudes that are indistinguishable from real life

So that has to be worth the sacrifice of privacy, reliability and any customer service

Right?

[magnetaress]

My new modem had been more reliable butt for the first 3 months it was kinda terrible.

Isps are historically known to drop the ball and totally screw 1 out of every 100,000 customers due to shear ineptitude.

Ya 1 in 100,000 odds for most things these days. Not great odds to bet on for a surgery.

[Ciderpress]

I just simply do not understand why you ever need to get a new cable modem for any reason. Isn't there like a huge underwater cable that connects the internet between america and europe or something? Do they have to update that with the latest firmware too?

It's electrons traveling across wires. It's not, as they say, rocket science.

Here's my new favorite horrible thing about this piece of shit modem: The online and power lights have led's illuminating them, but they are really dim for some reason. The "voice" light which powers my terrible internet phone "land line" is very bright. There is absolutely nothing in any of the documentation they sent me that explains why the lights can dim, or what the lights dimming might mean, or why this modem is in any way better than the old one I just replaced, which worked perfectly always for like 12 years.

This is basic diagnostic shit from the 80s that they are utterly failing at.

[Ciderpress]

Oh and one more thing: I hate coax cables. It's the most imprecise interface ever. Is it plugged in or not? Who the fuck knows.

[Swish]

We're in the "buy cheap, buy twice" era... that new box probably isn't designed to go for more than 2 years.

[Pulgasari]

Originally Posted by Ciderpress [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Oh and one more thing: I hate coax cables. It's the most imprecise interface ever. Is it plugged in or not? Who the fuck knows.

Coax is why you have to get a new modem. They're backfitting the data into the existing cable tv infrastructure. Packets and docsis.

@loramin is any of that right? 🥲

[Pulgasari]

Anyway if you think about the speed lights are like how they inverted rested xp on wow, you'll get it quick.

[caveslug]

Some years ago my internet stopped working, after getting the guy out.
He tells me he's been working for this company for over 5 years, and has never seen my modem used by his company.
Was with this company for a 3ish years by this point.

[Trexller]

Originally Posted by Swish [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

We're in the "buy cheap, buy twice" era... that new box probably isn't designed to go for more than 2 years.

No tech company has figured out how to make any money without a subscription model

[Danth]

Originally Posted by Ciderpress [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Also what the hell does "boost your signal" mean? What?? Isn't it just a signal that is either on or off?

Signal strength is very much variable. It'll be measured in decibel-millivolts, plus for a strong signal, negative for a weak one. Both incoming and outgoing signals will automatically adjust themselves, within the limits of the devices, according to the needs. For example, if you live in an area with a lot of line noise, your modem diagnostic might show a transmit volume in the high +++ range with a receive volume in the --- range, indicating your transmitter is screaming but it can hardly hear the incoming signals. This is *really* common in rural areas or on high-traffic nodes.

Could be your ISP noticed weak incoming signals from your address and sent you a modem that can yell louder--albeit, this is unusual and most the time the ISP will wait for a modem to fail. Optionally the old modem might've been incompatible with some network or software upgrades, or it's just plain old no longer supported. 10 years is a long time for a cable modem.