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Cox Mobile and access to Cox Metro WiFi Hotspots
Greetings, Last week I returned my Panoramic Wifi modem to the Cox Store. They explained that they would be forced to disconnect my Home Internet Service with this return and without any replacement equipment. I was sad to lose access to Cox Metro WiFi Hotspots (CMWFH), but it was a necessary step. Now I subscribe to Cox Mobile with a Pixel phone issued by the same. This morning when the Home termination became effective, I sort of panicked about the CMWFH access going away. So I contacted Cox Technical Support by chat and voice telephone. Peyton was patient and spoke clearly about what is and isn't available with my current Cox Mobile wireless service. But I also needed to read between the lines and discern why the confusion, because I was reading web pages that seemed to contradict this official explanation. So here's what it seems to be: the CMWFH access is advertised with all Cox Mobile wireless plans. CMWFH is "available" to subscribers like me, who only have the Mobile plans; we can connect to those hotspots around town, and wherever a business or customer has opted-in to share bandwidth with other Cox customers. However, Cox Mobile subscribers would not enjoy free unlimited access to those CMWFH. Peyton explains this free access (up to 3 devices, according to support web page) is only available to those customers who maintain their Home Internet connection with modem and cable into the wall. Therefore I conclude that the advertised CMWFH for Cox Mobile customers is a marketing line item. It refers to the access that any person could connect and have a Free Trial session, pay as they go (per session), or use a coupon/code to connect. The Cox Customer Sign-In for free and unmetered WiFi wouldn't be included with Cox Mobile, of course: Cox Mobile plans offer Mobile Data plans and users of phones who leave home should be using Mobile Data on their plan, and not leeching off other customers' bandwidth. See, the other confusion for me was: I thought Cox owned and operated most of all CMWFH access points, such as on top of a utility pole, or installed on a public right-of-way, but indeed it seems they are all "customer equipment", including some home consumers who can activate this "CoxWifi" SSID to share bandwidth with strangers. So now it's making sense to me, and why Cox Communications Tech Support wouldn't be troubleshooting or taking responsibility for CMWFH, since it is a "federated mesh" composed of their customer's devices, rather than Cox-owned-operated premises and hardware. It's also impossible for anyone to "police" the SSID names, so for security reasons, connecting to an open-WiFi-SSID at your own risk, even if it should display official Cox sign-in and logo, is untrusted network in the middle. So wow, it's been 9+ years I've been a Cox Home Internet customer, and enjoying the CMWFH service in many ZIP codes, and only now do I figure out how it's more like Amazon's mesh nets than I had imagined. And I'm also learning how Android 15 is coping with only Mobile Data and no WiFi, because I had all settings oriented to avoid metered Mobile Data, and now there are dozens of apps and system settings to modify so that it will operate properly without that WiFi which I depended on at home, from my router, from my neighbors, and from strangers on the street. Thank you, Peyton.
Nightly scheduled maintenance daily
I used to get scheduled maintenance outages about 3 times a week. Usually around the same time at night. Now this week they are nightly in a row. I know it's not just me because my next door neighbor is having the same issues. Cox does not send a notification that this is happening. They just take internet down while watching a movie. Very frustrating. Should I change services? Frustrated in Tulsa/Catoosa OK.
Can I do custom speeds?
Hey all, I've been a Cox customer since 2023. I started with Gigablast, and the Cox Panoramic Gateway. I had stable service for about a year, and then started experiencing random issues into 2024. The first issue was when the Panoramic gateway failed to update it's firmware, and a tech had to come out to force it. Aside from that, I've had random speed drops in download / upload speeds (more so than usual peak time fluctuations, and when it was the upload, it would cause the connection to reset resulting in no internet.). They are in the process of laying a new line to my apartment from the tap, as the last tech out said that's what needed to be done to completely resolve the issue. However, I've been taking notes on my own since I've had some formal computer and networking training, and know some of what to look for, and somewhat, what's normal behavior, and what's not. I just haven't officially been trained in cable networking e.g. coaxial cable networks. Anyway, the notes I have taken are as follows: The overall origin of the instability started after Cox upgraded their upload speeds from 35 Mbps to 100 Mbps on the Gigablast and higher plans. I should also mention that I purchased an ARRIS S33, to do away with the modem rental fee, and I trust ARRiS as a modem manufacturer and this was on the certified modems list supporting up to the top 2Gbps tier. My other observations include the gap in speed drops for upload / download: On Gigablast, typical speeds when working correctly were between 890 to 940 for download and up to 115 for upload. Prior to the upgrade 35 Mbps for upload. When dropping downloads could go as low as 300 Mbps but usually didn't go below 600 Mbps, uploads could go as low as 40, and that's when the internet connection dropped. Usually when a tech came out it would stay fixed for about 2 weeks and drop again. Unscrewing coaxial cable and reconnect it would restore things for a bit before problems again. I did som reading on the CoxCommunity Reddit discussions and saw others mention similar issues after the upgrade, some having a home vs an apartment. So I decided to test a theory, I dropped my plan down to the 500 Mbps plan with 50 Mbps up and 500 Mbps down. i usually get around 596 Mbps down and about 57.0 up on average now. I've also noticed the connection has remained stable since doing this. However, they are still in the process of doing a new line as I told the man from Cox construction to go ahead so we can rule that out and he has apartment management approval to do the new line. So after giving a rundown of the situation, here is the question, can I go back to Gigabit and request only 50 Mbps upload instead of the standard package of 100+ to see if I can keep gigabit downloads and remain stable? 500 Mbps down isn't hurting me at all to stay here with what I currently do, but I invested over $300 in my own equipment to take advantage of next generation speeds, but I cant do that if the connection is going to remain unstable if I take Cox's defaults for the package, or until they finish the line replacement. Thanks for reading and if anyone can offer suggestions let me know. Also, just to include this, the 2Gbps plan works with my modem and my new router + the usb 3.0 to 2.5 Ethernet adapter i got to connect to the iMac. It's just the connection to cox that makes it unreliable right now.
Contour 1 guide search function only returns on demand programs not future play date channels
The search function on both my Contour 1 boxes will on return programs in the On Demand directory - it no longer returns channels and future date entires so I can easily set my DVR recordings ? The search function used to return both when I searched by program name. Has the guide SW been changed to only search On Demand programs. Must I now manually select a channel in the guide and manually search day by day to find my future programs being played to set up a recording ? Why doesn’t the search function do this anymore ??Tv modem updates
I am having an issue with the time of updates. I was told that updates are scheduled to happen around 2 am. But over the past two weeks the updates are happening as early as 7 pm. I contacted tech support and was told that there was nothing they could do. As an apology for the hassle they gave me a credit for each day the updates occurred early in the evening. So...my question is...has anyone else experienced the same issue? And if it was resolved, how? 12/10/2024: Okay. This is getting ridiculous. This is the third night in a row that my contour box went out at 7:30 pm. Without advanced notice. And my updates are set to happen at 2 am. Last night when I try to reboot, I got an error message stating that Cox was performing maintenance and couldn't reboot. I tried emailing Cox support earlier this week per their direction to try to figure out what's going on but got no reply. So why am I paying for TV service if I can't rely on?
