Need some help re: Cox internet

[Doug5984]

Need some help with some internet issues I've been having at m house... I'll do the cliffs, then the expanded version

Cliffs:
- Get Cox Internet in Aug/Sept
- Connection issues, make numerous calls
- Swap out 6 modems, and at least 7 service calls in a few months
- Sitting here watch my connection constantly drop and reconnect
- Slowly losing my mind
- Cox is actually ok in customer service for once, actual service is crap

Around the end of August, early September I switched from AT&T DSL to Cox internet, mainly due to the speed/price. AT&T wasn't perfect, I'd have to power cycle the modem probably once every couple of weeks. I have direct TV for my TV service.

1st Modem/Router
I had purchased my modem/router myself through Amazon, an Aris something or another... would look it up but the internet is down while I'm typing this
After a couple weeks it started giving me problems and so I originally began trouble shooting through Aris, and after going through all their steps for a month or so they decided to send me a new modem. We changed what seemed like all the settings in side the modem, and the connection was constantly dropping, or just going slow. New modem comes in, and Aris kindly lets me know that they will no longer be helping me as if it continues it will be a cox issue. Ok, that's fine...seems reasonable (and as we'll find out- correct)

2nd Modem/Router
Not long into it- it is behaving the same way, I remember some of the steps they had me take on the previous modem so I go check those things, change the channel- do trouble shooting with Cox, blah blah blah- same issues. After a while they send out a tech who changes a connection in the attic, makes sure everything looks good then resets the modem, he leaves, it works for a couple days.

Problem continues for a while, Cox sends out another tech, a nice lady who checked all the connections, changes some splitters and other pieces and parts, and concludes that I must have gotten a bad second modem.

The whole time these two modems have acted similiarly, the connection would go extremely slow at times, other times it would simply drop until I power cycled the modem and it'd come up for either a couple minutes, maybe a day or so.

3rd Modem
This cox tech got me to get a modem through them (I figured this would be a good idea so that they couldn't point the finger at someone else during this time). She installs the new modem, seems to be working fine for a few days- a few minor issues, with dropping a connection, but nothing like I was experiencing. Eventually it starts getting bad, and I'll have to powercycle every 30 minutes or so, and pray to get 10 minutes of internet. I feel like Randy Marsh in that south park episode. Eventually, the modem just dies, nothing I can do to bring it back up- numerous phone tech supports and they can't see it. Can't send it a signal, it's gone. RIP Cisco Modem # 1.

4th modem
Call them back out, they replace more peices and parts (connections around the house), and replace the modem. This time the tech asks me not to change the network name or password. I don't know how this would effect anything but whatever. As you can guess by this post- it doesn't work. This one works almost exactly like modem # 3, eventually being killed.

5th modem
I'm lucky enough to have a service manager, and a tech out to the house this time. They are very thorough (have to give Cox some credit- they are trying their damnedest to fix the problem). They replace everything from the street to the box, every connection from the box to the modem, and replace the modem itself. After about a 2-1/2 hr service call I'm up and working again. We plug in the xbox, direct tv, I hook up my laptop and desktop wirelessly- oh happy day we have internet. They leave the house, and I'm so happy I go to get on my computer and post how happy I am on facebook- and it's out. Luckily they are still sitting in the driveway doing paperwork so I go outside and say to come back in we have a problem. The service manager does all kinds of tests, and settings, and somehow comes to the conclusion that plugging something into the ethernet port killed the modem. Whatever, he knows more than me- we'll go with that. He asks me to not plug in anything to the modem (I can handle this). I'm up and running, and this time they drive off quickly. About 20 minutes later, my internet is gone. This modem was pretty much DOA. RIP. (Modems 3,4,&5 were all the same type).

Modem # 6- The modem that was promised...lol jk
Service call and modem # 5 were on this Thursday, the service manager said he would call me back around lunch on Friday to see how things went, and I told him they went very very badly. He is convinced that when we plugged in something to the ethernet port it nerfed the modem. Ok... sure. He says he can come out on Saturday (yesterday) and do some other things, so I sit around and wait and read my book since I have no internet (Ready Player One- great book so far).

Service manager shows up yesterday and says he had been watching my modem from their end, and it was constantly power cycling itself. I was out of town, and the only device on was my desktop. So he goes into the attic and replaces the actual line from the cox box outside to the back of the modem. Now every single component has been replaced... as you can imagine I'm skeptical when he leaves. He asks that I don't hook up anything to the ethernet ports, and don't change the wireless name/password. I oblige. Not long after he leaves it starts losing connection- I only hooked up my desktop, laptop, and xboxone. So I become curious and start trouble shooting the issue myself. I turn off my laptop, problem continues. I unplug the xbox, problem continunes. I don't want to turn off my desktop because I have a probelm running that checks my internet connectivity and I want to log all the problems. In the 14 hours since the tech left late yesterday my connection has dropped, and reconnected 393 times.

This is a different modem, this one is a netgear something or another, and the symptoms are actually completely different than the previous 2. This one is dropping the connection for a minute or two at a time, then reconnecting and seeming to work fine for a minute or two. It slows at times at well, but it's at least frustratingly useable.

I'm at a complete loss- I have no idea what to do, where to turn.... other than continue with the circus with cox.

Everyone else in my neighborhood seems to be working fine.

Any words of wisdom, advice on things to look at and try? I know we have a lot of smart computer guys on here...

[Doug5984]

This is what my internet connectivity monitor looks like right now, it shows total disconnections since the tech left yesterday around 6, and the past few minutes. I think this is a pretty accurate representation of the past few hours




Oh yeah, the reason it has taken so long to go through all these problems is sometimes it'll work fine for a day or so- or I'll just be exhausted and only care enough to power cycle the modem to and get a few minutes before bed. In that time we've found out my wife is expecting our first child, planned and tried for of course- and everything is going well- due June 4th. (pretty crazy to think I've been a part of this community since I was 13 or 14 and now I'm married with a child on the way and I still recognize quite a few of the posters from back in the day)

And last month my father in law passed away pretty unexpectedly, and so we've been away from the house a lot- and just not caring too much about how the internet has been acting up..


I most likely left out some details- if y'all have any questions that would help trouble shoot the issue please let me know

oh yeah- re: hooking up via ethernet, I had never hooked up the DTV via ethernet until this past week, only because it kept dropping wireless, and the xbox wasn't hooked up until it was released around Thanksgiving, so the problems predate that as well.

[Shkspr]

The weird thing for me about your saga is the part where replacing the buried line didn't fix the issue. I was having very similar issues, and after extended modem replacements and visits to the house, the issue was determined to be an incorrectly shielded connection underground in the backyard. Water would seep in ans short out the connection, then a few hours later it would dry out and work. Do you get cable from Cox too? How is that connection?

[Doug5984]

Originally Posted by Shkspr

The weird thing for me about your saga is the part where replacing the buried line didn't fix the issue. I was having very similar issues, and after extended modem replacements and visits to the house, the issue was determined to be an incorrectly shielded connection underground in the backyard. Water would seep in ans short out the connection, then a few hours later it would dry out and work. Do you get cable from Cox too? How is that connection?

Cable TV is through Direct TV, so nothing to compare to

[JonInMiddleGA]

2nd person I've seen mention a modem going into an endless powercycling loop in the past couple of weeks ... probably coincidence, but it was interesting to me.

It almost sounds -- purely uneducated thinking aloud here -- like something is frying your modem to the point of making it be a barely functional brick. All your electrical stuff up to par as far as you know I guess? Maybe along that line, have you changed out the power strip (or whatever) that you're plugging it into?

[PilotMan]

Similar to Jon, I'd start looking at the electrical supply to the modem or even the house in general as a next step.

[Doug5984]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

2nd person I've seen mention a modem going into an endless powercycling loop in the past couple of weeks ... probably coincidence, but it was interesting to me.

It almost sounds -- purely uneducated thinking aloud here -- like something is frying your modem to the point of making it be a barely functional brick. All your electrical stuff up to par as far as you know I guess? Maybe along that line, have you changed out the power strip (or whatever) that you're plugging it into?

I originally had it into a power strip then throughout the process we went into the same outlet as the power strip then this most recent modem is on a seperate outlet. The tech did check the outlets, and all looked good.


Next step I may ask them to install it somewhere else in the house- just to see really? Running out of ideas.

[Flasch186]

Looking to buy or sell a home? I could send you a referral to great agent however when they come to the home they'll want to attach to your wifi to show you a presentation.

[sterlingice]

Trying to look at this from another angle: what are you doing on your modem? I noticed that back in the day when I was using Bit Torrent a fair amount, I would have to cycle my modem /a lot/. Basically, I would be filling up the routing table with all the different random connections, and then have to reset the modem. However, that's the only time I've run into an issue kindof similar to what you are describing.

SI

[cartman]

Do you have a way to see the upstream/downstream signal levels on the cable modem? You'd be able to see these if they gave you admin access to the device. What I've seen in the past is that sometimes the signal level spikes, and this triggers a reset of the modem.

Since they've replaced everything between the pole outside and the modem, if this is an issue, it is something past the pole.

[Doug5984]

I should turn this into a dynasty thread just to follow the progress, lol

Originally Posted by sterlingice

Trying to look at this from another angle: what are you doing on your modem? I noticed that back in the day when I was using Bit Torrent a fair amount, I would have to cycle my modem /a lot/. Basically, I would be filling up the routing table with all the different random connections, and then have to reset the modem. However, that's the only time I've run into an issue kindof similar to what you are describing.

SI

Really I've been very tame on the internet since the issues arose, basically just browsing normal web pages- and youtube. Not even trying to stream netflix, or porn or anything- trying to keep things simple to diagnose the problem.

Originally Posted by cartman

Do you have a way to see the upstream/downstream signal levels on the cable modem? You'd be able to see these if they gave you admin access to the device. What I've seen in the past is that sometimes the signal level spikes, and this triggers a reset of the modem.

Since they've replaced everything between the pole outside and the modem, if this is an issue, it is something past the pole.

I can't, or don't know how- but they are now watching my modem constantly for connectivity and ping times, and my neighbors modem very closely to track them throughout the day.


Update on service call yesterday-
Tech comes out (again have to give cox some credit as the guys is nice as can be, helpful, professional, he seems like he genuinely cares my stuff is messed up). We get it up and running and just watch for about 5 - 10 minutes, and it's humming along no problems. I decide to test something out, turn on my laptop in addition to my desktop- still no problems. Give it a few minutes then go turn on my tv in the living room. And it goes out almost the exact second I turn it on. So we watch, it comes back after a minute or two. Turn the TV off- and back on, and it does the exact same thing. So we watch it for a while and it's working fine once it comes back up. Try it a 3rd time, and while it didn't disconnect it had a definite slow down. So he says pretty simple lets just put the modem on the ground and try it- no problems.

I've had the modem on the ground for roughly 12 hours, and had only 5 second disconnection on my internet connectivity monitor in those 12 hours.

Now, this does not make sense with all the problems prior, and he says very likely were having other issues in the line that have been fixed- and there may be more issues that have to be fixed as well down the road- but it seems logical that the RF transmitter on my remote would knock out my modem which was on my entertainment center in the living room... I know that that wasn't the problem from the start, just because it doesn't match up with the problems I was having- and it really doesn't even match up with the problems I was having Sat Night / Sunday Morning- it was connecting / disconnecting while I was sleeping.... but right now I have internet, and I'm happy. He says just to log every time it gives us a problem, even down to the weather, and we'll watch it and try to find out whats going on.

[DanGarion]

Originally Posted by Doug5984

I should turn this into a dynasty thread just to follow the progress, lol



Really I've been very tame on the internet since the issues arose, basically just browsing normal web pages- and youtube. Not even trying to stream netflix, or porn or anything- trying to keep things simple to diagnose the problem.



I can't, or don't know how- but they are now watching my modem constantly for connectivity and ping times, and my neighbors modem very closely to track them throughout the day.


Update on service call yesterday-
Tech comes out (again have to give cox some credit as the guys is nice as can be, helpful, professional, he seems like he genuinely cares my stuff is messed up). We get it up and running and just watch for about 5 - 10 minutes, and it's humming along no problems. I decide to test something out, turn on my laptop in addition to my desktop- still no problems. Give it a few minutes then go turn on my tv in the living room. And it goes out almost the exact second I turn it on. So we watch, it comes back after a minute or two. Turn the TV off- and back on, and it does the exact same thing. So we watch it for a while and it's working fine once it comes back up. Try it a 3rd time, and while it didn't disconnect it had a definite slow down. So he says pretty simple lets just put the modem on the ground and try it- no problems.

I've had the modem on the ground for roughly 12 hours, and had only 5 second disconnection on my internet connectivity monitor in those 12 hours.

Now, this does not make sense with all the problems prior, and he says very likely were having other issues in the line that have been fixed- and there may be more issues that have to be fixed as well down the road- but it seems logical that the RF transmitter on my remote would knock out my modem which was on my entertainment center in the living room... I know that that wasn't the problem from the start, just because it doesn't match up with the problems I was having- and it really doesn't even match up with the problems I was having Sat Night / Sunday Morning- it was connecting / disconnecting while I was sleeping.... but right now I have internet, and I'm happy. He says just to log every time it gives us a problem, even down to the weather, and we'll watch it and try to find out whats going on.

What type of remote are you using?

[cartman]

Yeah, RF interference can do crazy stuff. I had one customer who had all sorts of issues with the UPSes in their new server room. Turns out the issue was a bad microwave oven in the break room on the other side of the wall.

[jbergey22]

Did Cox check on their nearby transmitter up on one of their lines? It may sound obvious that they would do this but the house tech doesnt usually mess around with that stuff as that is for a tech higher up on the food chain.

I was having similar problem a few years back and that transmitter was running at a very low level. It took months to diagnose that as the issue because the house tech doesnt normally check on that stuff from what I was told and had to have the other tech come test it.

[Doug5984]

Remote: the issue was When I was using my Xbox one to turn on the unit which turns on the tv / dtv.

They've begun checking all the main lines, which we so far are looking good, but the service manager wanted another crew to come take a look also.

Over 24 hrs and no major drops. I think the connectivity monitor had 5 drops, but all for less than 10 seconds.

I've been slowly adding devices to the net work