FusionMods

I thought this would be something great to talk about after reading an article on the MEN, No Internet No Interest

I’ll avoid digging deep into different stats, and just stick to the stats from the story. The article mentions that 25% of Americans don’t have the internet, and 17% don’t even want to go on the internet. Now I’m a full time web developer, I’ll admit, my life kind of hinges around the internet. But honestly, I do feel I really bennefit from it.

Probably the best use of the internet I have is for information. I just bought a house earlier this year that needed some work. haha and as a web developer, I’m just not as handy as I wish I was, but you can find out how to do anything online, and a lot of the time you can even find videos on how to do anything as well.

The other great thing is online shopping. I’m really as far as you can get fomr a shop-aholic, but I do appreciate the ease here, as well as the option to compare prices and read product reviews. Saving the time and money has been a huge help.

One recent example was, my house needed all new cupboard doors. After checking with Lowes and Home Depot, and hearing them reccomend I just purchase new cabinets since the price of doors will be sooo high, I found a place online that sold cupboard doors at any size, with many styles, for about half the price.

I can understand the point of, “I’ve never had the internet, so I don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything”. I can say that about a lot of things. As a child I didn’t see what people liked cable TV for, but now I enjoy the larger program line up and always great signal. I used to not see the point to cell phones, but now I have mine with me just about 24/7.

So while life will still keep moving without the internet I think it’ll move a little smoother with the internet.

It’s been 5 days since installation and I believe a full week since I ordered everything from ATT. The modem was susposed to be in the mail, so hopefully it arrives today. I’m a web developer and I live on the internet so this has been a really long week.

Last night I did bring my main computer over to my house and set it all up in the hopes that any moment my modem would arrive. haha needless to say, it didn’t. I do have to say though, My computer looks pretty sweet, lol.

This is a perk of reviewing hardware (though I’ve been busy enough that I haven’t been doing much of this at all lately). I get to try out new products first had and get a much stronger feel for what is effective and what isn’t. It makes purchasing new equipment much easier to do when you have a strong idea of what you want already.

Oh and to add to some unfortunate timing… My Xbox died on me last weekend. The dreaded ring of death. Luckily Microsoft apparently has some experience in this warranty process. It took me an entire 10 minutes, starting with searching how to claim this warranty, to the point that they were shipping me a box and prepaid shipping information to my front door. The timing couldn’t have been at a worse time though. When it happened, I had no internet (still don’t) and no cable yet. I mean I can only rewatch all my DVDs soo many times, lol. And to top it off, I had just purchased Rock Band 2 and had 5 other new games on the way in the mail. Like I said, it was some real great timing.

Hopefully I’ll luck out and I can get online today… Blogging on my lunch break just isn’t as fun. I’m going to be placing a call with ATT today over this, especially since I’m paying for the service already, and yeah it’s not much but it’s the principle of it all. They could have just as easily given the ATT technician a modem to bring out to my place when he hooked the phone line up.. but they didn’t

Also, I’ll update this potentially tonight, but more than likely it’ll be tomorrow, with a few pictures of my new “office” setup.

Well the entire process of purchasing a new house is a struggle in itself. For me and my house that still needed a bit of new construction, I placed a bid back in october, and just received occupancy about 2 weeks ago, no there really wasn’t that much work that needed to be done on the house, there was just that much red tape…

Well, one downfall I’ve been working with is getting my cable and internet hooked up. My parents have charter and they’re close and I’ve really liked their service for they were my first try for these services. But of course they don’t provide in that area. My second attempt was comcast… not a move I was really thrilled for, but what can you do when you’re running out of a short list of options? Well… as it turns out comcast does cover my area, but not my house, lol. Unfortunatly, to reach my house they need to put in some more cable hook up points. The last time I talked to comcast they told me that they should have their services up and running in 1-3 months…. awesome.

So in a final move of desperation I turned to ATT. Their prices are pretty competitive, but I’ll have to wait just a little longer to really test their DSL (the modem is in the mail still). Since it was a new house, i needed a phone line run to the house as well as all the intenal wiring. The ATT guy who connected the phone line was really great and was able to get everything done fast. The direct TV guys were another story.. I had planning to take off the first half of my say. Looking back that was a stupid idea, I should have taken off the second half. In the 4 hour window they were scheduled to show up, direct TV sent me a pre-recorded confirmation call at 11, stating they’d be there within 30 minutes. The 4 hour window I was scheduled for ended at noon… So at 12:30 they showed up. They made a big deal over just about everything they had to do and quickly gave me the feeling i needed to babysit them or nothing would get hooked up. After 2 hours, they had managed to put up my satellite, run a cable about 50 ft in my basement, and pop up through a vent (that was my idea since I didn’t want them to drill a hole in my brand new wood floors) and connect my two TVs. So after those two hours, they had managed to show up later than scheduled and keep me busy for an extra two hours.. At this point it was clear I wouldn’t be able to get even half a days worth of work in.

When comcast does come to my area I’ll likely be switching.