Hardware, Software, Provider??? Who Knows?

My brain is melting with " answers " that may have nothing to do with reality. Here's what I mean: lately I have noticed that almost any tech call to a computer company, or a service provider, a cell phone company, or even a doctor; it seems to me that generally speaking whomever I am speaking with they will never say: " beats me ",
" I have no idea what is wrong ", or something along those lines. No, instead everyone is a genius and has an answer. The answer may have nothing to do with the reality of the problem but they will tell you something.

So here I am with TV, phone and internet service provided by Time Warner who just merged with Charter. They say, or better yet they said during the first week or so that TWC customers will not see much of a change in service. This has not been my experience.

The problems that I have been having are several and they effect all services with the phone being the worst problem. This post can become a rival to War and Peace if I tried explaining everything. I'm thinking that I would like to start by mentioning one and admitting that I am not sure if this is a hardware or a software issue and that is not because I don't know the difference in what each is responsible for. But one of these answers that I mentioned earlier clouds the issue and the person who spoke with me is at least 3 levels up from the first person one get's when they call in with problems.

After 2 hours on the phone with this guy i started getting angry but did my best to not drop and F bombs or insult the mans mother ( I remember those days and I know that it doesn't pay off to do that ) but here is the issue. My " campaign" ended on 8 August. TWC has used that term ever since I've been a customer. Now that they merged with Charter I was informed that they will now be call " packages " or " bundles " The person assigned to me to negotiate my " package " made a few adjustments before I gave her my finale decision on what I want to step down to. The one thing I did not want to step down was the internet speed which is 2nd from the best or 200 Mbps ( hardwired and ' not guaranteed ' ) but I'm getting very close to that speed wired or wirelessly. My speed is so good that when a filed tech was here and say the results of my speed test he and the other supervisor he was here with both admitted that it was the fastest wireless speed they had ever seen.
I have several screen shots that I can post if anyone want to see the test and the speeds. But before I agreed to the new package I did a test to see if things were the same. The were down by 2/3rds! It attempting to explain what was happening I started to hear the mumbo jumbo that lead me to in fact not know if he was trying to tell me that there was a problem with my modem/router, my computer, the software in one of the devices but I can say that it sure sounded like they were not taking ANY responsibility.

That said here is the rest of the pitch: Well 69 is fast enough for streaming and 200 isn't going to make a noticeable. difference My response was: " I'm paying for 200 speed so I want what I am paying for. And as close to an explanation that MAY have had something to do with reality were these numbers that come from my modem router. I asked why they changed and could they be changed back. He didn't know. The tech who came to the house didn't know and the only thing they didn't do was change out the hardware.

So I apologize for not knowing if the problem is hardware or software and I apologize for all of the words trying to explain how I got here.

My laptop that was getting these awesome speed is a Toshiba with Windows 10 64 bit with a210 GHZ i3 processor with 6 gig ram and Intel(R) Dual Band Wireless-AC 3160

BTW TWC claims that my computer may have slowed down because I have an Amazon Fire Stick hooked up to the network. Does that make any sense at all? I disconnected it and nothing changed.

 

There was a post a while back that said Comcast had terrific internet but lousy service. It now seems both are screwed up.

I have TWC also and have NEVER had the internet speeds you have. I have Starter Cable, Standard Internet and Home wi-fi. My rate went up $12.18 this month and I'm not getting anything additional. I'm seriously considering DirectTV.

 

Better late than never; as the saying goes. Thanks for saying something and sharing your thoughts and experience.

TWC is at some point with what is called a " merger "; at least it is called that by some. For me not only do the problems continue in many ways they've gotten worse. Everyone has an experience of some kind with a provider. If it's not a subject of interest then no one will write about it. But without hearing about our thoughts and experiences then what we get has no comparison. It makes sense why companies don't want people to know what their neighbors pay for similar service because too much difference in the same or similar service might cause complaints that might make it to an investigation or an expose'.
If you are sitting in a middle seat on a crowded flight to a destination and just happen to talk to the people around you and find out that it's not like the old days when a person road a bus and everyone paid exactly the same price no matter how far you rode the bus or whether there was no one on the bus or if it was so crowded that you had to stand-up. On a plane trip there are so many variables that the two larger than the seat people on either side of you taking up part of the seat that you paid $300.00 dollars for only paid $99.00 for theirs. Even if there was a place to complain about the lack of fairness in your paying more for one horrible seat than the two people on either side of you the company and their complaint handlers will manage to give you a reason no matter how absurd as it may sound. That is their story and they will stick to it.
Have you caught any of the news article about passenger air rage? Not that it is right but it is understandable when it's fueled by some very over priced alcohol.
The details tell the story. But when your story is limited to 140 characters all of the niceties and formalities of a " proper letter " are dropped and very quickly become " blurbs " and are the accepted form of communication. The new acceptance allows the abuse of our rights and makes " fairness " an obsolete term. It's not hard to imagine a large number of readers here wondering: " what the H... is this dude talking about?"

I'm sorry that I can't find 140 character to explain the twilight zone of Time Warner or whatever it is or is called now.

 

I have fibre-optic broadband and land line, and one mobile phone contract, with Virgin Media UK which is part of the multinational giant 'Liberty Global'.
The service on both is pretty good, but the customer service when something doesn't quite go right is pretty atrocious. They expect you to do everything online and phone calls can involve ridiculous wait times.
The same applies to my other property and other ISP/phone provider there which is supposedly a 'good' division of BT. Not when you need to actually speak to someone, unless it's sales!