Verizon FIoS Triple Play--Should I or shouldn't I? archived

Verizon is supposed to be coming to hook me up next Tuesday, but I'm having second thoughts. Mostly it has to do with my computer. I read somewhere else on MOL recently that things can get pretty screwy when you make the switch, and I know I just can not deal with that. Is it really worth making the switch?

Definitely worth it, even through the screwups. The only thing I would do differently is skip the Verizon DVR and stick with TiVo.

klh - what's the issue with the DVR? (I have Comcast DVR now - no triple play).

FWIW

fios is not yet available in my area. comcast sent out a flyer that they will add up to two add'l digital cable boxes for no add'l charge for 1 yr. so, they should be here tomorrow.
maybe fios will be ready before the free year is up.

oots

How much is the FIOS triple play after the one year, $99 for everything deal expires?

We didn't have any problems with our computers. But I didn't let them install anything...just connected to the new router myself.

Hi All,

Any speculation on what the new rate will be after the promotion is over. I am guessing around $129. Most of use are moving from Comcast and such to be on the newest network and GET the best price for triple play service. Is that a correct assumption?

What price would cause you to rethink your technology needs? Currently my aggregate communications bill is better than $200.00. What is a lot to spent?

TD

Meand -

It's goooood - don't worry, totally am 100% pleased with the new faster, clearer, everything.

Only casualty was our TiVo, which didn't work with the new gazillion channels, I opted for the Verizon version of TiVo which sounds about the same.

Be ready for the Verizon installer to spend a solid 8+ hours. My guy wasa here for over 12 hours - we had trouble with the Mac recognizing the new server codes - he finally had to call for back-up.

2 "fixers" came over w/ mysterious briefcases and NO time for chit-chat or refreshments - 20 minutes later everything was purring.

Oh folks.... I am so torn...

Let me start by saying that I have just returned from Texas where my hyper-active (and over zealous pinch-penny) little brother insisted that my parents install Vonage for their phone line. They have had it for almost 2 years and it truly SUCKS! I can't believe how bad it is! It was like talking on a cell phone from inside the house and yet this was supposed to be the "land line".

So.....is the digital phone option on Verizon's Fios system as bad as Vonage? There were weird background noises and times at which the reception just went in and out again. What ever happened to the old " You can hear a pin drop!" tag line?

I am also a very talented, very gifted intelligent woman who finds digital cable remote controls unbelievably complicated! I don't need any of the "bells and whistles" of digital cable. I don't need recorders; I don't need HDTV. If I get Fios I think I MUST change over to all that digital madness. I honestly enjoy my "cable ready" Sony Wega TV that has no converter box. Why would I add one?

The truth is that I - like my little brother - can not stand to over pay for a service (or services). I am considering the switch to Fios only to save money. I just don't know if the inconvenience of the nasty digital cable TV and the flaky telephone line would be worth it....

Let me know your experiences. I hope it is otherwise.

The problems were more of an inconvenience than anything, but we just got our first bill.

The only reason that I am not going to kill The Person Who Had It Installed And Swore It Would Be Cheaper is that all the would-be bail money is going to Verizon to pay for the triple play.

Overall, our bill will be light for a year - the only other regret I have is that I don't have working assets for the long distance anymore, but I switched to their credit card and I can still participate.

There's NO static with Fios because it's fiber optic - I'm pleased with the plunge.

Hi lydial,

I don't understand. What is the working assets?

We had Fios installed recently. I am overall pleased with the performance of the system. The internet has been outstanding with noticeably faster download times than our Comcast High Speed service and absolutely no problems with MOL. I really like the picture quality of the HD service, since I recently invested in a moderate HDTV. And we're getting all the super-cool digital channels and there are a lot of HD channels on their regular expanded package. We don't have any premium channels like HBO etc.

The day of installation everything went smoothly. Technicians arrived on time, everything was done neatly to my satisfaction. I had two older TVs directly hooked up without a converter box ... this gets you channels 2-13 which is all I wanted for those two TVs since they're mostly used for watching DVDs and tapes. But since they connect up to three TVs for free I figured what the heck.

The instruction manual which came with the HD DVR we got was overly simplified. It made it sound like all you had to do was use the universal remote to turn on the TV, turn on the cable box and bang, you're watching TV. It neglected to mention anything about changing video inputs to watch different sources. For instance if we want to watch a VHS tape we need to switch to A/V inputs, Component for DVDs, HDMI for cable TV. I was able to figure it out but it could be complicated for someone who intends to rely on the manual.

Two major problems:

If you have older telephones you will very likely have static on the line. For instance we have an AT&T Trimline phone which we've had for about 15 years. We have to replace the handset cord every few years, but otherwise it has worked perfectly and continued to do so until we had Fios installed. There was a terrible hiss immediately. The technicians said that the signal was "too pure" for older phones and they would have to call and ask to have the telephone signal "dirtied up" (their words). They also said it might take "a couple of hours to a couple of days." We also had a bad echo on a nigh-brand new portable phone set. They told us it was because we had two older phones connected as well.

How did the situation finally resolve? I replaced two phones which were in perfect working order. Only fifteen bucks apiece but add that to your cost of Fios if you got an old reliable phone somewhere in your house. The main source of my ire was not being informed of this ahead of time.

The second and far more infuriating problem happened when the DVR started making a lot of noise, like the fan was constantly running really hard. It didn't go away and I called to schedule a replacement. I won't give you the full gory details, but the technician arrived for our supposed 8 am - 1 pm service window at 3:30 pm. This was after we were told that we would be the first call of the day. Customer service and the technician directly contradicted each other. It also took them almost two hours to replace the DVR. I think their service and technical staff is so tied up trying to sign people up for this new service that they are unable to keep up with normal maintenance demand.

Lastly beware of what you let them load onto your computer. I now have a little "V" in the upper right hand corner of my Internet Explorer window which I can't seem to get rid of. It gets animated when I download or change pages. They also offer a choice of free security and other "enhancements" which I declined. This may be what causes the problems with MOL.

Okay, so the service itself I give a B+. Verizon gets an D- for their customer service.

at the risk of sounding really dumb, how does the internet service work? is it wireless? right now i have comcast high speed with the little modem box and like a telephone wire running from the box to my computer. i am frequently knocked off the internet and it really is frustrating me...especially lately.

Oldstone, you could never sound dumb...

The internet service comes into your house via a coaxial cable (same kind of cable as the TV). The connect it to a box called a router. They give you the router for free. You can run an ethernet cable between the router and your computer, exactly like the one connecting your computer to the modem box. The router is also wireless but you might get faster transfer speeds over the ethernet cable.

So you would replace the cable modem with the Verizon router (it's significantly bigger), and connect it directly to your computer. The Verizon technicians would make the connection between the router and the ONT (the grey service box on the outside of your house).

For comparison sake I got about 3-4 Mbps with Comcast High Speed. 15 Mbps with Fios, and that's a wireless connection. I have not tested it directly connected with a wire to the router.

Got it about a month ago and it has been well worth it. Two days for the install (total of about 11 hours) but that was their issue, not mine. Download speeds are much faster, phone service is identical, and the TV has been great. A little ticked that you need a box for each TV as we ran coax direct into two TVs in our house (one a flip-down mounted under the kitchen cabinets and the other over a treadmill)... with Comcast we got all channels to 99, but with Verizon only the real basics, but no big deal as they managed to fit the boxes and mounted them well. Used most of my internal lines as they were brand new, but didn't do a good jjob of removing much of the old phone lines, (we wanted to keep one, just in case but we had like seven different lines from the previous oqwner). Cost savings were in the neighborhood of about $80-$90/month.

THAKS mrincredible...i think i am beginning to understand what a router does now. so even if i keep comcast, if i don't want the cable from the modem, i can buy a router and the cable would go into the router instead of the cable modem and then i would be wireless, right? wireless is really what i am interested in but i never really understood how it worked.

Update: decided I didn't want to switch over now. Too much going on and I'm not interested in dealing with any hiccups it might cause, particularly with e-mail. Will look in to it again in the fall, when I'll be around and might have a little more time to deal with whatever complications may arise.

Anyone have experience--good or bad--with using Comcast for all three services?

Good choice me. I'm going to wait until Fios is a little more settled before taking the plunge. I'm happy with what I have now.

I have Comcast for tv only.

bklyngirl

i wonder if there is a fios package that also includes cellphone service. i have verizon land and cell phones. comcast tv and internet.

Oldrock,

Your Verizon cell phone can go on the same bill. They knocked $10 off our monthly bill for doing so.

And yes you are correct about the wireless router. The router connects to the modem and then you are like, totally 21st century with the wireless access.

mister, so you have verizon fios tv, internet, land and cellphones and how much is it? also, if the router is downstairs will i be able to lay in bed and watch internet p...i mean, use the internet upstairs? :wink:

I was going to go with FiOS and they screwed up my appointment so many times, I figured I would wait. I called Comcast for the triple play, the problem was they offer one package only. I wanted to swtich to the service, but it made my cable bill go through the roof. So we are skipping that too!

youandtheboys, now that you made that decision, which is a rational one for you, I highly recommend you change your email address now. You can do it at a leisurely pace, since your service is not going away suddenly. Get something like gmail or aim mail, so it isn't tied to your ISP. Also, you'll be able to pick it up wherever you travel.

Signed up for FIOS yesterday with a setup date of July 2nd. What finally made me go for it was the extra $100 AMEX gift card they are now offering (must have setup date before 7/15 for this offer) and losing free HBO on Comcast (channel 14), which was the only thing keeping us with Comcast. I'm just keeping my fingers crossed that they actually show up and that nothing goes wrong!

Only problem is, Tom, will I be able to do that fairly easily and simply? Is there a "Changing E-mail Addresses for Dummies" book out there somewhere?

First big question: If I switch to Gmail, how will "everyone" know my new e-mail address? Is there some automatic setup, or do I have to notify "everyone?" Because if I have to, that sounds like a gargantuan task!

What a lot of people do is to import their address book from the old email to the new and then send a "blast" email to their entire addressbook (or broken up as needed to avoid being labeled a spammer) informing of the new address. There are also some "services" for notifying correspondents of new addresses, that I mostly know about from having received such notifications. (I don't have the info handy, but you can probably find them by googling on something like "email address change".)

I'm getting ready to change my email address without really changing it ... I've set up a forwarding email that, for the time being, will forward mail back to my current address. But, later on, when I change to FIOS (or whatever) and lose my current ISP-dependent address, all I will have to do is change the address to which mail is forwarded, with no further communication needed to my correspondents.

The challenge is what steps to take to protect my new address from spam. The last time I changed email addresses, I resolved never to enter the new address on any website or use it for any commercial transaction. From then on, I used a separate email address for all such purposes. However, thanks to misguided friends who like to send big pass-along emails, my personal address got "into circulation" anyway and spam is now getting worse and worse on it. I try to tactfully "instruct" my friends about using the BCC field and deleting out email addresses before forwarding emails on, but many of them "just don't get it". Sigh!

I don't even use my Verizon address for anything. I don't even remember what they are. Instead I have AOL (which you can now get for free) and Yahoo. I'm guessing I'll loose the Verizon one when I switch to FIOS. My problem is I don't want to loose access to West Coast ABC and NBC. If I switch from Direct TV I will loose them. And I can't get them again if I switch back.

Are the posters who said it took eight hours plus to hook up FIOS serious?

Why wouldn't Verizon let you keep your verizon address if you move to FIOS?

I haven't heard of anyone who got their FIOS installed in less than 8 hours and quite a few in the 10-12 range.

I'm waiting for all the early adopters to get the kinks out, but I think I'll be going there eventually.

I heard today that CCN isn't on FIOS yet but they are working on it. Anyone know the status of that?

only took 3+ hours here.