Topic 'Wow broke my house...' in forum 'W.O.W.' - dslreports.com

Re: Wow broke my house...

Sun, 09 Sep 2012 14:17:51 EDT

Cthen posted :

said by Metal:

said by Big Jimmy :

Is it the WOW guy's fault if your TV breaks too? Or if by disconnecting the Comcast line into your house to hook up the WOW line you lose Comcast internet service? Maybe he should be responsible for your microwave too? Point is that he installed the service you requested, and you dropped the ball by not understanding that it didn't have a particular feature that you relied on. Like I said, it sucks, but it's not his fault that you were daisy-chaining your hardware together. Yeah, he should've given you a heads up, but pitching a fit about it won't change anything, because WOW doesn't run ethernet drops, not to mention that you never paid them to install ethernet. At this point about all you can do is call WOW and have them come out and hook up the Cat5 from your internet devices to the otherwise disconnected U-Verse boxes, unless you want to jump ship back to U-Verse.

When I ordered I specifically indicated I wanted Apples to Apples service. I suppose I should have known Apples to apples service is well our equipment isn't exactly as good and we don't have as many channels (no west coast feed) and we charge more per box per TV but yea... apples to apples. Just don't use all your stuff... (I should pay my bill in apples)
I'm going back to Uverse and reclaiming my living room.

Did you mention to the phone rep all the details of what your current service was providing you with?

Are you aware that by law, at anytime during the first 30days (or is it 60?), you are free to cancel the service without having any extra fees or charges for doing so?

You are going back to Uverse to reclaim your living room and later you post that you have rewired your house for ethernet over power. So this means that the Uverse equipment is not even in your home? Where did it go? If it was in your home then it would be as simple as connecting it all back together and calling AT&T to be put back on the same package as you had been before. Hhmm interesting...
--
"I like to refer to myself as an Adult Film Efficienato." - Stuart Bondek

Re: Wow broke my house...

Sun, 09 Sep 2012 13:51:26 EDT

Cthen posted :

said by Metal:

:mad:
none of my boys can play video games in their rooms

How so? Last I checked game consoles aren't biased as to where a TV is to have them connected. How did unplugging a network cable just make all the game consoles just stop working? How does that make a blu-ray player stop from working? And you say all of them just went dead from network cables getting unplugged?

Besides that, was there a reason for him to unplug network cables? Your not telling the full story here as to what really happened, until you do, there won't be a whole lot of sympathy from other posters.
--
"I like to refer to myself as an Adult Film Efficienato." - Stuart Bondek

Re: Wow broke my house...

Sun, 09 Sep 2012 13:03:26 EDT

anon posted : It doesn't matter if they're disabled or not in your case, since they're not for distributing internet. They're there so that you can use Cat5 as a connection between the media players and base station, so even if they WERE active, you'd still be up a creek because you'd need an existing network to connect them to.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Sun, 09 Sep 2012 12:15:32 EDT

Metal posted : PS
All of you see to know WOW equipment so good... they do have ethernet jacks in them, they're disabled.
I"ve rewired my house with ethernet over powerline connectos for the time being.
We may as well close this thread.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Sat, 08 Sep 2012 13:23:39 EDT

adam1991 posted :

said by Metal:

Dude the stuff was hooked up, he disconnected the Uverse boxes and unplugged my stuff.

Why did you let him? This is about the only valid part of the complaint I can think of. He should have run his wiring and his equipment, which is completely separate from AT&T's equipment. The only unhooking anyone might have to do is unhooking AT&T's cables from the TV and then hooking up WOW's cables to the TV.

But all that would do is delay your sense of entitlement for a little while. When you realized the WOW boxes didn't have ethernet jacks in the back, you would be right back to where you are now--throwing a tantrum that "I'm entitled to WOW's equipment behaving exactly like AT&T's, because that's what I want and serves my needs".

It all comes back to you not taking ownership of your life.

You try wiring a quad level house.

Irrelevant. You're not OWED anyone else making your networking happen. So man up and take ownership of it.

I'll man up to the point of thinking that guy should have told ME I'm breaking virtually every piece of equipment in every room of your house sans the actual TV's.

How would he know that? He knows nothing about AT&T's equipment. He knows only his own. And he doesn't know your specific setup. How would he know that--by osmosis? Your sense of entitlement has you expecting that the world hands you whatever you end up needing on a silver platter, even if you didn't know you needed it. On top of that, you didn't even ASK anyone if the WOW equipment behaves like the AT&T equipment. Apparently, the world is just supposed to KNOW what you want AND THEN provide it, while you sit there like Jabba.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Sat, 08 Sep 2012 13:16:21 EDT

adam1991 posted :

said by Metal:

Thanks this is the first truly useful post in this thread.
And to any of you who think it's ok for the installer guy to just unplug all my stuff and not say a word that's pretty damn pretentious.

For you to sit there like a lump and expect any cable installer to research your custom network setup without any specific instructions or work order from you, and then to accommodate it again without any instructions or work order from you, is AWFULLY pretentious--not to mention the whining of a self-absorbed, entitled brat.

You have responsibility for how your life goes. If you want someone else to take on that responsibility, (a) you must pay him for that, and (b) you must explain exactly what you want him to do for that pay.

But you just sat there and expected him to take on extra work AND read your mind.

I'm floored by your sense of entitlement.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Sat, 08 Sep 2012 13:12:44 EDT

adam1991 posted :

said by alan92rttt:

Do you honestly expect the WOW installers to understand that the OP was using an unsupported feature of a competing system and tell him that their was going to be a problem?

Its the OP's responsibility to know how his home network works, know that he's doing something unsupported and find his own solution. That may sound harsh but this is not WOW's fault or their problem to fix.

+1.

100% agreed.

The OP bought a system that did A, but never understood that. OP wanted B, and assumed the world would seamlessly and invisibly accommodate that without his saying a word or doing anything else. So he sits there like Jabba the Hutt, then complains when things don't unroll his way.

OP has a problem with entitlement. He thinks he's entitled to the world just automatically going his way no matter what.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Fri, 07 Sep 2012 11:17:34 EDT

pparks1 posted : I'm going to agree with the original poster that the installer should have at least mentioned this issue.

A simple "Hey, I noticed that you plug all of these devices into the ethernet port on the back of the U-verse box, but our boxes don't have an ethernet jack, so you are going to have to figure out a way to hook all of them back up".

It's not WOW's responsibility to engineer a solution to this, or even understand what the OP was doing, but to simply leave everything unplugged and then jet out doesn't seem right. Obviously this isn't going to leave the customer happy or satisfied.

I had no idea you could hook up u-verse in this fashion. Wireless could be a solution, but unsure on your distances, walls, etc. I don't use wireless for my gaming consoles or anything else because it's less than 100% reliable. Another option you could consider is a power line network adapter, unsure if they great because I've never personally had a need to try them as my house is very easy to physically run wire in.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Fri, 07 Sep 2012 10:32:47 EDT

sparkydm posted : It seems logical they would say something but, I make a point of telling them what I have when making the appointment and BEFORE the friendly tech ever touches anything! Then he can't be shocked when I tell him to put it back or fix it. I like the car wheel/tire comparison! I've been fortunate with the installers/techs I've had out, all have been thorough and informative. Keeping my fingers crossed!

Re: Wow broke my house...

Fri, 07 Sep 2012 09:26:50 EDT

battleop posted : "Do you honestly expect the WOW installers to understand that the OP was using an unsupported feature of a competing system and tell him that their was going to be a problem?"

Well you are posting this on DSLR and everyone here knows that all employees from the janitor to the CEO are expected to have at a minimum 30 years of senior level administration experience.
--
I do not, have not, and will not work for AT&T/Comcast/Verizon/Charter or similar sized company.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Thu, 06 Sep 2012 09:51:40 EDT

anon posted : You need to go back to Uverse then and use their internet connection from thier dvr as i did for awhile. All other cable companys are like WOW.
You need to run cat5 or go wireless with them for internet. Maybe down the road WOW will update our media players to do the same.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Thu, 06 Sep 2012 08:56:02 EDT

anon posted : The only problem with that train of thought is that its not apples to apples. Its a totally different system. That didnt send a flag up to you? Your just one of those people that blames everyone else and never takes responsibility for anything. Have fun with uverse!!

Re: Wow broke my house...

Thu, 06 Sep 2012 02:05:40 EDT

Metal posted :

said by Big Jimmy :

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 21:49:00 EDT

anon posted : Is it the WOW guy's fault if your TV breaks too? Or if by disconnecting the Comcast line into your house to hook up the WOW line you lose Comcast internet service? Maybe he should be responsible for your microwave too? Point is that he installed the service you requested, and you dropped the ball by not understanding that it didn't have a particular feature that you relied on. Like I said, it sucks, but it's not his fault that you were daisy-chaining your hardware together. Yeah, he should've given you a heads up, but pitching a fit about it won't change anything, because WOW doesn't run ethernet drops, not to mention that you never paid them to install ethernet. At this point about all you can do is call WOW and have them come out and hook up the Cat5 from your internet devices to the otherwise disconnected U-Verse boxes, unless you want to jump ship back to U-Verse.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 20:50:03 EDT

mix posted : Isn't this why they invented wireless routers and network cards 10+ years ago?

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 20:38:47 EDT

Metal posted : Dude the stuff was hooked up, he disconnected the Uverse boxes and unplugged my stuff.
You try wiring a quad level house. Since half of it is on a slab getting wiring upstairs is going to be a PITA,
I'm glad my kids figured out those Uverse boxes coax connections were live or they wouldn't have the stuff up there and they'd be in my living room (where they are again)
I'll man up to the point of thinking that guy should have told ME I'm breaking virtually every piece of equipment in every room of your house sans the actual TV's.
Like Belle Tire saying I installed those rims you wanted but damn your old tires didn't fit so your car's out back with the tires in the trunk.
cya

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 20:11:46 EDT

anon posted : Well like others have said it really is not WOWs responsibility. Most installers dont know how the UVerse equipment works and I'm sure he didnt know what it was for. Yes maybe he could have asked but you need to take the responsibility of your home network. Do a little research before jumping in when you know that you have all these devices trying to connect. Instead of putting the blame on WOW man up and realize that your in the wrong for not opening up your mouth and asking. You had plenty of time to ask, when you called to get service and when the tech showed up. Be a little more pro active and stop passing the buck.

I think you should just man up and setup a network like a NORMAL household would. And no WOW doesnt run network cables for residential.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 20:03:31 EDT

25139889 posted : he said he was switching and yes you have to return the boxes to AT&T or be billed for them.

The OP should have known that WOW would NOT support his setup. The Installer does NOT have to install anything and they only have to make sure THEIR equipment is working and one computer can get on to the internet (if you purchase) or you have dial-tone (digital phone) that is IT.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 19:40:40 EDT

ajwees41 posted : were the uverse boxes still hooked up? if you were switching wouldn't you have to turn them in?

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 18:42:03 EDT

Metal posted :

said by mackey:

Get a MoCA bridge.

It'll complicate the wiring a bit, but you could repurpose a bunch of MI424WR's which can be found on ebay for about $15 ea.

/M

Thanks this is the first truly useful post in this thread.
And to any of you who think it's ok for the installer guy to just unplug all my stuff and not say a word that's pretty damn pretentious.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 14:03:14 EDT

comp posted : I agree. I would never expect my cable company to support or know about my network.. Just there devices.. If i choose to use there devices to bridge network gaps, that is on me, not them

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 13:40:35 EDT

NuclearXP posted :

said by OSUGoose:

Wrong, it is the WOW's installer to do a walk through top ensure everything is correct on the order. At that point in time it would of been discovered that the OP had that configuration and the WOW installer could of, 1) If possible offered a WOW solution, which may of involved extra charges, 2) Notified the customer that those devices will not be able to hooked up in a similar fashion and allowed the customer to decide if he still wanted services.

It sounds like the OP got a contractor that just came in and threw WOWs stuff in without any regard to the fallout.

Correction: it is the WOW instalelr's responsability to do a walk through of the installed WOW services. They have no responsability for peoples complicated one-off home network setups.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 13:31:13 EDT

KrK posted : Install a good router and you're golden.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 11:39:51 EDT

alan92rttt posted : Do you honestly expect the WOW installers to understand that the OP was using an unsupported feature of a competing system and tell him that their was going to be a problem?

Its the OP's responsibility to know how his home network works, know that he's doing something unsupported and find his own solution. That may sound harsh but this is not WOW's fault or their problem to fix.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 10:48:29 EDT

OSUGoose posted : Wrong, it is the WOW's installer to do a walk through top ensure everything is correct on the order. At that point in time it would of been discovered that the OP had that configuration and the WOW installer could of, 1) If possible offered a WOW solution, which may of involved extra charges, 2) Notified the customer that those devices will not be able to hooked up in a similar fashion and allowed the customer to decide if he still wanted services.

It sounds like the OP got a contractor that just came in and threw WOWs stuff in without any regard to the fallout.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 09:06:06 EDT

NuclearXP posted : It isn't the WOW installer's responsibility to maintain your home network. Their job role is to install and configure the WOW cable/phone/internet package you requested. Nowhere on their pricing & packaging page: »sales.wowway.com/OnlineStore/Pri···ing.aspx does it outline home network installation or configuration.

You either need to go wireless like most people, go MocA if you don't want to re-wire, or use the wall plug ethernet adapters wherever you have equipment. You could also re-purpose old wireless routers with dd-wrt into bridges and run short wires within a given room.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 00:31:48 EDT

mackey posted : Get a MoCA bridge.

It'll complicate the wiring a bit, but you could repurpose a bunch of MI424WR's which can be found on ebay for about $15 ea.

/M

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 00:20:20 EDT

Xsk8er posted :

said by Metal:

:mad:
I just dumped Uverse for Wow ultra, The installer was here all day running new lines and getting things installed BUT... didn't he notice every blueray player in my house, every bedroom computer, xbox, Playstation or media server was plugged into the Ethernet port on the back of my Uverse box?

I don't see that's wow's problem.. HECK AT&T UVerse does NOT support you using their Ethernet port on the back of their IPTV receivers as an "internet connection" .. In fact they have said multiple times in the UVerse forum in the past that a reboot or update on the Uverse box can cause your Uverse TV to not work properly if connected that way (the Ethernet port on a Uverse box was designed to plug into the Gateway to get the IP connection to the Uverse box instead of via Coax to the gateway) not to provide an extra internet connection.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 00:02:53 EDT

anon posted : How is it WOW's responsibility to bridge the gap of a (really cool that I've never heard of) feature that U-Verse provided? Yeah, it would've been nice of the installer to give you a heads-up that they weren't hooked up, but those guys aren't network engineers, they're cable guys. It does put you in a crappy position, but they're paid to run coax, not CAT5/5e/6, and even though it's someone's problem to fix, it isn't WOW's.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Tue, 04 Sep 2012 22:39:58 EDT

Metal posted : When I got Uverse my kids were young, we had no netflix, a couple regular old DVD players, no HD TV's and a replay DVR in the living room. None of the kids had computers and the only video game system we had was a SEGA Dreamcast. As they grew up the boxes we're the perfect fit to expanding our home network.
My house is a quad level. If Wow wants to wire it for cat5e great but at this point I don't see much choice but going back to uverse.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Tue, 04 Sep 2012 22:09:44 EDT

OSUGoose posted : Frankly, WOW needs to own this. Their technician should of seen that you was using the u-verse boxes as ethernet bridges, and at the minimum asked why they were connected to the u-verse box. Ya know being proactive vs reactive to the customer. I thought part of Ultra's install was getting wireless devices onto the network, since thats part of the fees. He could of very easily gotten the PS and xbox (depending on what versions of each you have) connected via WiFi. At minimum that could of then let you decide if continuing with the install was worth it and what if any solution WOW could offer to replicate what you had. Thats were the pre-install walk through is supposed to find when he first gets there. And I speak to this from a ex-direcTV installer where I was one of the few in my garage to go around and see the setup and make sure my stuff would work before I disassembled it.

Re: Wow broke my house...

Tue, 04 Sep 2012 20:03:57 EDT

mix posted : You're the first person I have ever heard of who has relied on what is essentially a cable box (okay it's a Uverse box) for home lan connectivity for all their gear. What did you do before the advent of Uverse a few years ago? No computers, xbox, netflix enabled tv's and blueray players I take it?

Re: Wow broke my house...

Tue, 04 Sep 2012 17:49:26 EDT

usa2k posted : Is the Media hub in the same place the Uverse was?
There are four ports on Ultra and you can add a switch to expand.

(I've never really seen a Uverse setup BTW, but have Ultra now. My Blurays are wireless.)
He certainly should have discussed the strategy.
--

Jim, VoIP 12/2002, VOIPo 2/2007
FAH-Tool~Pets~Join Artist-247

Re: Wow broke my house...

Tue, 04 Sep 2012 10:46:35 EDT

anon posted : I can understand where your coming from, he should have mentioned this when installing the boxes.

On the other hand you should have maybe researched the ultra system a little more because the ethernet on the media players doesnt give you internet through them. I think this should also have been brought up when you were ordering your service. They have no idea how you have your network set up so by letting them know they could have let YOU know it wouldnt work like that. just sayin.

Wow broke my house...

Tue, 04 Sep 2012 00:07:04 EDT

Metal posted : :mad:
I just dumped Uverse for Wow ultra, The installer was here all day running new lines and getting things installed BUT... didn't he notice every blueray player in my house, every bedroom computer, xbox, Playstation or media server was plugged into the Ethernet port on the back of my Uverse box?
Now, none of our TV's have netflix, none of my boys can play video games in their rooms and I'm pretty pissed off since the guy obviously just unplugged all the Ethernet cables left them hanging behind our devices and didn't say a word that oh by that way hope your kids don't like like playing games and you didn't use those blueray players or media center PC for anything and left.
Now what?