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New Contributor
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Cox Cable TV Out in Ahwatukee
So it is Thanksgiving and my whole family is here and there is no TV, just "check back later" messages for all the channels. I understand it is out for a whole section and it seems like horrible timing. Just want someone to know.
Health_Edge
+5 more
Valued Contributor III
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You might want to try bypassing your cable box and connecting the cable wire direct to the TV. Then set your TV to Cable and to a auto program and see what it picks up.
If it doesn't pick up anything, try switching it to Air and doing another auto program. Even if the cable is 100% out the wire itself acts as a antenna and you can atleast pick up the parade OTA.
I ofcourse mean this as only a work around until the problem is fixed.
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KipK
Former Moderator
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Hmm. Matt, I apologize, but you got some incorrectly interpreted information. Sometimes I think we need to be more careful about what data we even let phone reps see, lest things like this happen.
Yes, a few other people on the same system hub as you are having a similiar problem, but that's pretty much always going to be the case, and there can be a hundred different reasons for that at the same time. This does not an outage make.
I just did a street-level check, and pulled 5 other houses on your street with 7 total receivers, and all of them are responding to signal checks while neither of yours are. I'd have to suggest following our standard troubleshooter, and if that doesn't work, we'll need to schedule a service call.
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Matt_W
New Contributor
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Our standard trouble shooter??? I have 15 people in my house including 8 kids. So really? I have to wait for a service call specific to my house on Thanksgiving day, so it obviously won't come till what, Monday? I hate to go to overstatement, but this is outrageous. Always going to be the case? But why my house on Thanksgiving day?
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Matt_W
New Contributor
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Sorry, KipK; I know this isn't your fault. I just want to know when I will get this fixed. I have a TV hooked directly to the cable, and the picture is unwatchable (though the sound is okay). So I am not going to pull my whole entertainment system out and start working on the wires for that. Okay for now with Netflix, kids pacified, but I am really hoping (praying) this can be resolved as soon as possible.
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KipK
Former Moderator
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I'm sorry, perhaps I should have been more clear. Believe me, I know there's no good time for something like this, and we always want to think it's a widespread issue, but it's more often an individual issue than a systemwide one. There are any number of things that could cause an issue with video service. With any service regardless of medium, be it satellite, fiber, or coaxial cable, there will always be a few customers with some issue. We have about 800,000 digital cable customers in Arizona, so even though we try our best to avoid problems, some of them are going to have some kind of issue at any given time.
As for why it hit your particular house on this particular day, I couldn't say. Sometimes it's something simple, like a cable amplifier being unplugged in the holiday shuffle. (That's the most common random event around the holidays, now that I think of it. If you have one, a power adapter with a coaxial cable - http://i.imgur.com/XfLtSSZ.png - needs to stay plugged in wherever it was originally found.) But sometimes it's something we can't even guess at, like a squirrel attacking an outside cable wire.
The standard troubleshooter I refer to is the in the link in my previous post - http://ww2.cox.com/residential/support/tv/guidedhelp.cox?articleId=bb793bb0-db1b-11e1-6d35-000000000000 - and it provides a number of different steps to help with your problem. If you follow it through and it doesn't help, then a service call is the necessary next step.
We should have timeframes available Saturday and Sunday in your area, but we'll need to verify specific timeslots and contact info, so you can either call back in or email us at cox.help@cox.com to set it up.
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Matt_W
New Contributor
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I guess I will get Direct TV. Sorry to bother you. This is really disappointing. So if it is "isolated" then there is no off-hours help?
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Matt_W
New Contributor
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I need to apologize but also offer some advice. I had no idea what "unplugged amplifier" meant. Apparently I have an amplifier in a guest bedroom from, oh, 10 years ago. So Someone unplugged it at 7pm last night, but since I didn't switch stations, we watched the same station till after midnight. Only when I changed channels did it stop working. Very confusing.
But I have TV!
I would say sorry more profoundly, but really, after 6 telephone calls and all this, someone should have said, "you may have an amplifier in your home. you should check every outlet with a TV."
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KipK
Former Moderator
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Whew. I'm glad it's back up and running.
Our field technicians are out from 8AM to 7PM 7 days a week, including holidays in most areas, but service calls are generally scheduled 24 to 48 hours in advance . We had just gotten to your email when I saw you posted that it was working, but we could get someone out Saturday if necessary.
No need to apologize, I've seen much more irate customers in my time at the Solutions Store, on the phones, and online. And holidays are stressful enough without the cable misbehaving.
That would be a peculiarity of how the system works. The amplifier was probably put in to support the number of outlets you have in your home, or the length of cables, or something. When it's operating properly, it boosts the power of the signals coming in from the Cox network side, and doesn't significantly affect the signal coming out from your home back to the Cox network. When the amplifier loses power, it sort of becomes a clog in the pipe. It impedes signals in both directions. Your cable box may have had enough signal for a picture on that channel, but it couldn't push a signal back to us to request a channel change to a switched digital video channel (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Switched_video ), or maybe signal was stronger on the frequency you were on but not a higher frequency, or maybe signal was just good enough to maintain a lock on that channel but not establish a lock on another one... basically, that channel was on a house of cards once the amplifier was unplugged.
And cable isn't the only service that's going to have technical issues of a similar nature. I used to sell plenty of replacement LNBs for dishes way back in the dark ages of the early 2000s when I worked at RadioShack.
This is a valid point, and I'm sorry I didn't think of it sooner myself.
In any case, I'm glad to hear everything is working now. Please let us know if there's anything else we can help with.
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Health_Edge
+5 more
Valued Contributor III
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Thats why I said bypass the cable box . Snowy picture on CATV is a unplugged amp most of the time.
Glad its fixed. Happy Thanksgiving. And good luck Cox on Black Friday. ::cringe::
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edb4pax
New Contributor
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Matt W, I am having a similar issue here in Queen Creek: EVERY evening exactly at 8:00 PM my Cox DVR turns off. Very irritating. I am getting very frustrated with Cox lack-of-dependable-seervice in my area. Several neighbors here have complained of the same thing. Still, I will persist in getting Cox to LISTEN and solve this issue.
Hope you issue was resolved.
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Domino
Valued Contributor III
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Which DVR? Which IPG (Passport? Trio/Contour?)
I sure hope that your timer isn't set to turn off your DVR at 8pm! Check all of your timers in "Settings."
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Becky
+2 more
Moderator
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Hi Ed,
I have no doubt that's frustrating! I'd like to take a closer look with you. There is a menu setting that allows you to "Set Power Off" to turn the receiver off at a specific time each day. This setting is specific to each receiver.
To check the setting, follow these steps:
If the Power Off Timer is already set to OFF when you first verify settings through these steps, set it to ON, confirm your selection, and then exit back to live TV. Then go back into the settings and turn the Power Off Timer to OFF.
Please let us know if any of these suggestions help!
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