see episode 1
see episode 2
This is getting totally ridiculous. Remember from my previous posts that I've been having issues with my freebox (my ISP's modem / set top box) for a couple of weeks now. After their online help, their online chat, emailing in, posting on this blog, still no response to my problem. On the chat, one tech guy said I had to change my filter. why not, maybe my computer as well ?
free.fr are of course, known for their innovation, but also for the lousiest customer care around. Anyways, let's give it a try. On their page, I finally found a contact us section with a phone number. Costs 0,34eur/min, and my 2 calls today must have added up to 45 min ? Of course, I got the usual greeting message, select this option or that option, please hold the line, one moment please, etc.
Yep, there went about 15 euros today just in trying to solve my problem, AND IT'S STILL NOT SOLVED.
To be fair, they picked the line both times in about 1 min, so that's pretty neat. After extensive background checking (my phone number, my cell phone number, my email address, my name), I got to explain twice the problem.
call 1: the guy was testing my modem from his side, and indeed after a while, he detects that my Ethernet is not hooked in, although it's in. He doesn't trust me on this, I swear that I haven't touched anything. Well if this box is replying to his probes, then it must be alright. I myself suspect that there's a component on the Ethernet interface that is not working too good. I've had this box for a couple of years, and they do wear down right ?
The guy convinces me that now, the problem is INDEED either with the freebox, or WITH THE CABLE ? as if a cable that works perfectly well can go loose. He asks me to hook up another cable (lucky me, I have plenty of them) and ANOTHER computer (which of course every one has...), and test again. Since I'm paying big time here, I tell him I'll call back if the problem arises again, which I was sure of, and of course did. And I test with another computer, and another cable.
Connection, web surfing, connection dead.
call 2: another guy, another security check, more blah blah to explain the whole thing again. Yep at least 5 minutes have gone by. Oh he says by the way, are you using a cable that came with the box ? duh... no. I don't even know what it looks like. I have a whole mess of cables on my desk, but it was working for about 3 years, and up until a couple of weeks ago. My cable, and another cable are used regularly for data transfers. And again, there are no active elements in a cable...
so how can that go wrong ?
"sorry sir, we can't decide whether the cable is faulty or the box, so we want you to test with a free.fr cable. We'll send you one as soon as it's processed". Right. The guy thinks I'm an idiot: I ask for a supervisor, no way. I tell him I'm a network engineer, 5 years of study, 10 years in the Internet business: I know when a cable is faulty and that mine is not, and that it won't make a difference. The guy laughs, seems to agree with me, and goes back to the standard script:
not a corporate cable, we'll send you one, call us back if it doesn't work. More laughs on his side. Right.
I have a free.fr cable in the office, will bring it tomorrow, and give them hell over the phone again.
The bad news is I don't have a proper internet connection anymore, I know the box is faulty, and that free.fr takes forever to ship a new box. I ordered an upgraded version 3 weeks ago, it still hasn't shipped. Expect me to connect with my 3G phone for a while still...
Technology is great when it works. The rest of the time it sucks.
And for the record, my line quality is beautiful, 20dB, almost a perfect line...
