« Back In PA | Main | Dark Side Of The Rainbow »

July 26, 2004

Network Woes

I'm still dealing with the fallout from the electrical storms two weeks ago which I believe caused problems with some of my network gear. When I got home Saturday, my Internet connection wasn't up, and it took a power-cycle of the cable modem to get my router (which lost two of its switch ports in the storm) to re-connect. So I still don't know if the cable modem or router is to blame for the problems.

I bought a new BEFSR41 router (same model I have now, but a newer revision) today and that will go into use tonight. If I continue to have connectivity problems, I'll suspect the modem is flakey and will have to decide whether to try to get Comcast to replace it or just buy a new one (which would save us $3/month once I return Comcast's modem to them). I haven't looked very hard at a new cable modem yet, but I think a compatible one can be had for about $60. Since I don't plan on bailing from Comcast's service any time soon, a return-on-investment 20 months from now isn't a bad prospect. However, I wish Comcast would get off their duffs and begin supporting the cable modem included in their Motorola set-top boxes. That would solve my problem and prevent me from spending money I don't need to.

Posted by Alex Harden on July 26, 2004 11:28 AM |

Comments

I've hooked up the new router. For some reason my external IP has changed. I've just updated the DNS record for icyg.kicks-ass.org; the new IP is 68.83.72.133.

Posted by: aharden | July 26, 2004 7:29 PM

Well, the modem wigged out again today, so I called Comcast. The first technician wasn't very helpful; he asked me to power off & on the modem before he would diagnose it. Of course, it works fine after that, so he saw no problems and wouldn't agree to place a service call. I also couldn't get him to agree to a situation where a technician would be sent out the next time the modem had problems that didn't involve me leaving the modem in the bad state (and leaving me off line) until the technician would arrive on site. A classic chicken-and-egg problem. I think he just wanted to get me off the phone since I had the nerve to insist that they replace the modem.

I called back to Comcast's local number to see if I could just bring the modem in to the local office to exchange it, but I was routed to their call center once again. However, the second technician was much more helpful, agreeing to send a service tech onsite on Sunday with orders to replace the modem without diagnosing the situation. He said the modem might be going offline because of a thermal sensor on it being tripped erroneously (which, of course, isn't logged or viewable in their diagnostics). Sounds fine to me, as long as they replace the modem. Hopefully there won't be much hassle.

Posted by: aharden | July 28, 2004 7:36 PM

The modem was replaced this morning; the Comcast tech who came out was very helpful. Things are going swimmingly right now. I may hook the old router back up to see how it does, so ICYG's IP address may change again.

Posted by: aharden | August 1, 2004 1:13 PM

I've plugged the old router back in. ICYG's address has been updated in DNS back to 68.83.72.195.

Posted by: aharden | August 1, 2004 2:14 PM

Post a comment

(If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)