I was wondering if there is some sort of list of areas that are getting the Fios cables installed for my area or if anyone knows when we will finally get it.
I have been waiting for like two years for Fios at my house and they keep sending flyers in the mail, but its still not available yet. I think every single person in my neighborhood would get it when its available. We are all currently forced to use time warner cable to get decent internet speeds since DSL sucks.
Someone tell the Fios team they will make a ton of money in my neighborhood if they get it installed here.
It's the same case here. Verizon did not install FiOS, and as of right now most of my neighborhood, if not, all of my neighborhood except me uses Cable modem service simply for the speed it provides. I'm sure that once FiOS shows up, a lot of my neighbors would gladly sign up. I've been waiting years for it to show up, and just recently in June they have begun to build the network out at a very slow pace very close to me.
Has Verizon done any major work in your area recently with putting up new cabling everywhere, as well as some tan colored boxes? That is usually a sign of FiOS. If not, you will have to look on Verizon's Community website for any news on a FiOS buildout being planned. Even though FiOS is technically on a halted build-out, Verizon seems to be doing a very slow buildout in some incomplete service areas. It isn't agressive like it used to be when the service was first introduced. I wish they would bring back those days.
I havent seen Verizon doing anything. I did see private contractors putting huge red cable of some sort under ground which is why I decided to try to find out if service was available yet. I guess it wasnt Fios though.
I have had Fios at my business for a couple of years now. Its sweet and I have never had a single outtage. I have the 50 meg down 20 meg up business line and its so fast I can stream video directly from my work to my house in full 1080P. They offered me recently a 135 meg down and 35 up, but later said it wasnt available yet.
I am just tired of Time Warner. They suck and I would love to get the 89.99 Fios package internet/phone/tv. I would save money and have faster internet.
That might have been conduit. As far as conduit goes, it could be any sort of cable for any company providing service. Even if Verizon's database says it isn't available, for sure keep an eye out for neighbors who might get it installed. Database issues aren't too uncommon it seems around here 🙂
A lot of people in my area have done something very similar. They have gotten the cheapest or second cheapest bundle with FiOS, and even though they give up some local sports games in HD (MSG HD dispute), they absolutely love it. The quality of service alone on the basic FiOS package destroys what Time Warner offers. So sure, triple-play bills come out to be $110 once taxes and fees have gone through, but they love it. Wish they'd build it out faster here.
Why is Fios only available in certain areas? I have wondered about that. My parents don't have access to the service and yet my uncle who lives only 10 minutes away from them has it. To be quite honest though and this is just my opinion...I have seen the Cablevision that my parents have. Their whole fight over Channel 7 in New York and New Jersey was ridiculous, all over these bloated money figures but aside from that, Cablevision TV looks the same as what I have with Fios, only with different channel numbers. I could care less about not having NJ news 12. Fios 1 is no different as far as I'm concerned.
Out of a force of habit, I still often refer to the Fios as cable even though it's fiber optics but I really don't see the big difference. If it were up to me, I would much rather go back to analog TV which was more dependable and free to watch.
Don't mind me. I'm old school. 🙂 I'm just not terribly impressed with the whole thing and the way it's become such a priority for everyone to have such perfect TV reception with extra stations and more things that I don't want to watch per se is pretty sad.
@questioning wrote:Don't mind me. I'm old school. 🙂 I'm just not terribly impressed with the whole thing and the way it's become such a priority for everyone to have such perfect TV reception with extra stations and more things that I don't want to watch per se is pretty sad.
Agreed. Back when I used to watch TV, there were only a handfull of channels besides the locals that I watched. If I could do A-la-carte and significantly reduce the TV bill in the process, that would be wonderful. I still pay for TV service, but for others to use around here. Everything I do now is on the Internet. Less of a hassle and most of what I used to watch on TV can be found on sites such as Hulu (which I'm afraid is on it's way down). I have yet to get Netflix here since we lack the capacity to do so, but that option stands around unless they shoot themselves in the foot some more. It's too bad most of what I really, really enjoyed on TV back "then" has since been canceled and taken off air.
FiOS is unfortunately the very expensive to build, cherry-picking network. Verizon when they first decided to build it picked areas where there would likely be people signing up to use it. Considering Verizon has spent billions on the network, that comes as no surprise. As to why they failed to build out areas that are full of people wanting to sign up for it (and aware of the price) as is the case with my area, who knows. It probably came down to politics more than intentions by Verizon.
Oh well. Don't despair. I really was doing well with analog TV reception being that I live in close proximity to New York City and I really went back and forth for quite a while hoping that the converter box would be enough. That was a failed experiment. lol
I only signed up for the Fios service because after the converter box, I really had nothing left and my landlord had already signed a contract with Verizon so we tenants can have the service in our individual units if we want it. I had had the Verizon DSL service before Fios and being that I'm not paying a whole lot more per month just for the bundle package, it was the best I was going to get. I actually staged my own little "protest" by going without any TV at all for several weeks before having the Fios installed. lol...I really wanted to see what it would be like to be without the TV being that there is still a lot of stuff you can find on the Internet and news information you can get from the local public radio stations. But after a while I got bored and it's nice to have some entertainment and to be able to watch the national news and some movies on TV. So I had to come back to reality and deal with what we now have.
The other thing too about the Fios is that the installation is very much the same as the installation of any other TV cable service. It's an all day project with setting up the wiring to go through a cross base or a basement and finding a grounded electrical outlet to run one of the boxes through and installing a bigger box in the bedroom closet. I have no doubt that it's fiber optics instead of cable but it can also be just as sensitive if something happens to the outside telephone lines, like if a squirrel runs across it or if a tree falls down.
I know plenty of people want Fios and are even jealous of those of us who have it. One of my co-workers is like that and he has Cablevision but quite honestly, you're not missing a whole lot. If you read the comments (including my own posted) about the TV Guide listings, you will see it's not such a great picnic for everything. The new version of the TV Guide Listings now has these brightly color coded graphics in the background with small white print that's difficult to read.
Basically, the selection of TV programs is very much the same but I will definitely attest to Verizon's claim that its Internet speed is blazingly fast. And now I have Verizon's voice mail for all my voice messages and caller ID display. I don't really understand what was so wrong about not knowing who was calling until you picked up but with telemarketers and some nutty people out there, I guess we now need that too.
I'm not dispairing, honestly. Lately Verizon has begun laying some new cables down for what appers to be the FiOS service, so it has given some hope back. It's unfortunate it has taken them months to lay a small area down, but you do have to keep in mind everything that happened to Verizon as a company during the summer months. I'm still waiting for it though!
About the TV service, that is how I get my fix these days, by doing it online. I'm annoyed by the buffering since we have a slow connection, but what can you do? Back in early Spring of 2011 when we had a wind storm come by, somehow our Satellite Dish had gotten bent from something heavy being picked up by the wind and hitting it, and knocked out almost all of our TV service. Some stations still came in, but most were out and a handful of them were pixelated beyond repair. If it wasn't an object that hit the dish, perhaps it is from how open everything is where I live and the wind simply did it's thing and bent a pretty thick rod. Whatever the case, the weekend without TV Service ensured our Internet connection was beyond destroyed due to load, but the house was very peaceful. I hooked up a tiny antenna to our HDTV to receive the local stations, which came in pretty well so people were still able to get their fix of the local news and perhaps watch shows they've never had interest in watching before: Price is Right, Jeopardy, King of the Hill... I guess a TV service outage really woke everyone up to what not paying for TV can really do to them, and it seemed to be rather positive from my view.
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