Forum Discussion

Myandlc's avatar
Myandlc
New Contributor III
6 years ago

Same problem for months, 5-6 tech visits, no fix

It's really insane how many times I've tried to get this issue fixed, and it seems like cox has just completely given up. The first four tech visits they just sent contractors out to check the coax and splitters and the usual stuff on the property, going off the assumption that the issue is not on their end. Later on, the 4 most recent times I've contacted support nothing has been done whatsoever, not even a tech visit. First time they told me they scheduled a field advisor tech visit, but instead they just sent a contractor who literally replaced the arris modem with one of the exact same model and left. Next they tell me to wait until an outage is finished. Then they tell me they've scheduled another supervisor tech and I'd be called within a day, never got the call. Now I'm waiting for another call from the tech (they said he'd call within 24h, that window finishes in 5 hours from now, I'm kind of expecting it wont happen, ref number KSR000008945846). With nearly daily contact with customer support, the last tech sent out was 6/12, and the last tech who actually did anything was on 6/5 (this was when i requested an in-house tech since he can actually touch cox equipment).

We've been having t3 and sometimes t4 timeouts for months. The modem is being commanded to use some really absurdly low power level more than 6dB below the lowest it's allowed to use. One of the 5-6 techs measured our signal at the drop and told us the issue is 100% on cox's end, and the signal drops to failure range once every 30min or so. Since then, they've supposedly worked on the node twice, and never followed up. They're saying its 'fixed' when it's only gotten worse, and I'm basically just being ignored at this point. The only thing on our end that has not been replaced is the coax inside the walls of the house, which is almost certainly not the problem.

Here's our modem's error logs for just 6 hours of today (it's enough errors to fill up the log completely and push everything else out of existence).

We used to use our own docsis 3.1 netgear modem that cost a few hundred dollars, but we eventually replaced it with the one provided by cox to remove a variable, and then, as I said before they sent some contractor to replace that arris modem with another, identical arris modem. The netgear modem would refuse to bond 8-12 of its 32 channels when it was being used.

Here's what the channels look like right now (the modem has been reset recently, so the codeword count is lower than it usually is):

We've seen uncorrectables up to hundreds of millions in a single downstream channel before.

Using any amount of upload bandwidth causes latency to spike tenfold.

I'm not certain, but it looks like one of the four upstream channels isn't bonded right now:

It's just incredible how many hours I've spent trying to get this issue fixed, only for cox to repeatedly restart/replace our modem, eventually confirming the issue IS in fact on their end, and then nothing gets done about it. The modem just randomly restarts itself multiple times a day (sometimes 6 times an hour, other times once a day) due to unacceptable signal quality.

An example of me simply pinging google during a problem:

I will post an update if I actually receive a call from the tech within the next 5 hours, but I'm highly doubtful they will call. At this point it's as if our account has been flagged not to receive any customer support. I'm aware this post just sounds like ranting, but I have wasted probably hundreds of hours to try to get this issue fixed, and by now I feel I'm just repeating a script listing all the issues to CS, except this time on a forum. Everyone acts professional, and each CS rep agrees it's insane, but no one actually does anything to fix the problem. We pay for the coax version of gigablast. Is our node just too congested and they won't tell anyone, since its too expensive to upgrade? Tethering to my phone with a 1 bar cellular connection seems a hundred times more reliable than being directly plugged into the modem, which just astounds me. Let me know if there's any other information I can provide. It seems like cox just wants me to give up, but I've invested so much time that it's a sunk cost to me, so I'll continue to the end.

  • After a THIRD attempt at a fiber line install (3rd one being done by a field tech lead), everything finally seems to work properly (for now).

  • Myandlc's avatar
    Myandlc
    New Contributor III

    never received the call i was told I'd receive, will post back after talking to support once again

    • Myandlc's avatar
      Myandlc
      New Contributor III

      support said ticket is still marked as pending, so they cant do anything or learn any info on it until tomorrow

      • Becky's avatar
        Becky
        Moderator
        Hi Myandlc, I'm sorry this has been such a frustrating and disappointing process for you! We've reached out to our Field leaders and asked for an update regarding the ONT issue. We'll update you as soon as we have further details. -Becky, Cox Support Forums Moderator
  • Myandlc's avatar
    Myandlc
    New Contributor III

    second time in a row now that the tech never called, the 24h window has passed

    • Myandlc's avatar
      Myandlc
      New Contributor III

      definitely gonna have to go with fcc report unless something changes or odog responds, this is insane

      • Myandlc's avatar
        Myandlc
        New Contributor III

        Scheduled yet another tech, if this falls through a third time in a row I'm just going to have to do the FCC complaint since nothing else gets things done

  • Myandlc's avatar
    Myandlc
    New Contributor III

    Tech showed up, seemed to know what he was doing. He said somehow all 9-10 of our coax lines (mostly tvs) are causing a lot of noise on the modem's line, and all of the previous 5-6 techs just replaced things at connection points since coax in the walls are rarely a problem like this. We'll either need to have all the coax lines replaced, or we're just going to swap the modem to a fiber one and have one fiber line installed, since it's immune to EMF noise and see if it fixes it. I think this was initially two compounding issues, a problem at the node that was fixed between 6/12 and 6/15, and also the noise in the house. Will post again at some point after either coax is replaced or fiber is installed, but might be multiple days til then.

    • Myandlc's avatar
      Myandlc
      New Contributor III

      fiber install scheduled for 10am-12pm wednesday, will post update after

  • Myandlc's avatar
    Myandlc
    New Contributor III

    fiber was installed but it didnt work, was likely damaged cable somewhere, guy tried to get it to work for 6 hours but couldn't, earliest reschedule is this coming tuesday. The place we want the fiber installed is in a really weird spot in the house so I'm not surprised this happened, and he said we'll get credit added to the account for it

    • Myandlc's avatar
      Myandlc
      New Contributor III

      Second fiber install was successful, but the signal is so poor that it just straight up cant connect to the internet. The cables are fine, but the tech said the fiber tap we're connected to just doesn't work and has to be fixed. He said he called his super and he'll schedule the maint but I have no way of knowing if or when they'll actually come, so the usual, one problem after another still not fixed. It's pretty annoying that I can't know if or when the maintenance guys will come, because the fiber may as well not even be installed until its fixed. The fiber tap should be the ONLY remaining variable, and I have no date that I can rely on for it to be repaired. The whole reason we wanted to switch to fiber was because the noise basically makes our coax not work, and now the fiber doesn't work either. Will anything ever work?

      • Myandlc's avatar
        Myandlc
        New Contributor III

        contacted support, they said maintenance guy will be calling us today, hopefully they do

  • Myandlc's avatar
    Myandlc
    New Contributor III

    Received a call a little over 4 hours ago from someone saying it should be fixed, I told him it wasn't and he said maybe he called too early. Called back a minute ago (4 hours after initial call) because nothing has changed but no response. ONT still only has two lights on: power and red "ALERT" light, absolutely zero internet connectivity. Probably going to have to contact support again.

    • Myandlc's avatar
      Myandlc
      New Contributor III

      CS was telling me to just wait 3-5 days and there's an outage, but im 100% certain its unrelated to the outage, but we got a lead field tech to call us and he's coming out within 80 minutes or so without even scheduling an appointment which is nice of him.

  • Myandlc's avatar
    Myandlc
    New Contributor III

    After a THIRD attempt at a fiber line install (3rd one being done by a field tech lead), everything finally seems to work properly (for now).

    • Karen_R's avatar
      Karen_R
      Former Moderator
      @myandlc Hello Myandlc, glad the services are working properly. Please let us know if there are any other problems. Thanks

      Karen