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Old 03-17-2015, 07:14 PM   #162
Solecismic
Solecismic Software
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Canton, OH
I've spent far too much time on this in the last few days. Turns out xFinity is spending a fortune mailing me stuff every week for no reason at all. They can't provide service here.

So I'm stuck with Charter for Internet/Phone, unless I want to go back to ATT - a company I've really come to dislike over the years.

The question is whether streaming is OK. I'm probably too far away from the stations to get over-the-air networks without a rooftop antenna. While I could probably fight the HOA over this issue, they are forbidden and at least a couple of my near neighbors are antenna haters. I was the guy who showed them the law wasn't on their side when one of my other neighbors got a satellite dish. But that isn't worth the fight just for one partial solution.

Sling is looking promising, but I think cord-cutting is about a year off. Meanwhile, though, I wanted to look into whether dropping to the most basic service and adding other pieces was worth while. So I have to get speed up.

I found I was getting 15 Mbps, when 60 is advertised. A couple of phone calls later, I'm at 40-50. That's probably good enough, but the tech advised me that perhaps my router's firmware was an issue.

It's an old Linksys router (still highly rated). But my firmware level is several versions behind the latest. Problem is that the latest is no longer offered because the router is out of warranty. I contacted Linksys and they told me to buy a new router.

I can find the firmware update online, but is it safe to trust those sites? Is there a safe site that archives firmware updates?
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