Gadgets

Since I didn’t really plan to cancel my Vodafone subscription, I took advantage of this “contract extension” offer they had and upgraded my mobile phone to a Nokia N85. I also upgraded my subscription to Vodafone SuperFlat Internet, which is more or less what I was already paying so far for my previous plan anyway. The change is that now you have “flatrate” internet. It’s not exactly a real flatrate, after 1GB monthly traffic they throttle your connection down to 64kbps, but it’s more then enough for my needs.

Of course, you can’t get the N85 for 1 euro, like other mobile phones included in subscriptions, but overall the price was decent. This went into the “Christmas present” category, so I guess that’s it for this year ;-)

That’s the phone, images taken from Nokia’s website since I didn’t get to take my own pictures. It’s a slider phone and I had some reservations about this but I thought I’d try it anyway.  It’s a pretty big difference compared to my previous Nokia E51. I won’t list all the features because you can easily view them all on Nokia’s website but 3 features impressed me the most.

One is the Active Matrix OLED (AMOLED) display which has to be seen to be believed. The next one is USB Charging (less cables = good !) and the last one is the built-in accelerometer. Overall I am pretty pleased with it. Of course, as with any new gadget there are little quirks but I am still deciding whether I should whine about them or just accept them and find workarounds. Time will tell!

Now let’s talk about failed gadgets, because there are some of those too. My Plantronics Voyager 520 bluetooth headset had a small mishap, the rubber thingy which goes around the ear detached itself. The headset still being under warranty, I just opened a case on Plantronics website and requested a new one. I just had to send the broken one to them (they paid for the shipping) and 10 days latter I had a brand new headset. Plantronics has excellent support.

The next failed gadget is not mine. The display of Freya’s cute little Nokia 5310 phone gave up. The phone itself seemed to be working but the screen was blank. Since it was still under warranty I just took it to the nearest Nokia Care center. Initially the guy said it will be fixed in 3 hours but he kinda under estimated the problem. Still, after 3 days I got an SMS from them saying that it’s repaired and that I can pick it up. I hope that’s the case, I will check on friday when I am back home.

Online for good

After only three weeks ago I had murderous thoughts towards Deutsche Telekom, now I came back to more peaceful feelings. Finally the internet works decently at home. I still don’t have VDSL because it’s not yet available in my area but I do have 16 Mbps ADSL2 with the Telekom’s package Entertain Premium. A couple of the interesting features of this package:

• fixed telephony flatrate
• internet flatrate (of course!)
• decent actual speed, 12-13Mbps
• good upload for DSL: 1Mbps
• IPTV which works, good quality
• flatrate for all Telekom hotspots in Germany, 8000 of them or so

So I am kinda pleased so far. I am also in the process of setting up the multimedia system in the bedroom. After quite some searching we decided for a Fujitsu Siemens Amilo SL 3230T 23 inch monitor and a Zyxel DMA1000 digital media streamer. We’ll use this to watch the movies and episodes we have on the network server and for the TV part we’ll just get another receiver for Telekom’s IPTV. We don’t need a DVD player because we don’t really watch them but should the need arise, I can always just rip it and put it on the server.

I really hope the internet problems are gone, knock on wood!

No Internets!

What a shitty weekend, excuse my french. As I was saying earlier, Deutsche Telekom was kinda late in sending me the access information. To cut a long story short (not to mention that I get pissed off again if I think about it too much) on friday I manged to get a temporary DSL connection after a LOT of “discussions” with the people from the T-Punkts. The idea was that I can use this connection until the stuff that I ordered becomes available (16 Mbps Entertain package with IPTV and all kind of flatrates included). Surprise, surprise, they even activated it on friday afternoon. It worked fine until saturday before noon when it died again :evil:

It seems there was a bigger problem in our area and monday morning it was solved but we were left without internet access during the weekend. That was really bad. Anyway, we did all kind of things in the house, it’s not like we don’t have stuff to do. And I started to play again Mass Effect :oops: It’s an excellent game, I recommend it.

Still, in order to avoid such painful moments, I ordered a USB UMTS stick from Vodafone. From what I read it should even work with my Fritzbox. It’s a prepaid deal so access is not really cheap (4.95 € per 24h) but this is only for backup so it’s acceptable. What kind of speeds I will get, I don’t know yet. In theory we live in what Vodafone calls “UMTS Broadband” area so I should be getting speeds up to 3.6 Mbps but we’ll see.

In other news: Freya makes some delicious “Red Rice”. More details and pictures in a future post ;-)

Internet

Since we had some “very pleasant” experiences with Alice, we decided some time ago that we will switch to another internet service provider, to Deutsche Telekom actually. This friday on the 27.02 the switch is supposed to take place. The thing is, besides the confirmation I have not received anything yet from Telekom: no modem, router, connection info, etc. I wrote them an email some time ago but I got no answer so far.

Today in my lunch break I went to the local T-Punkt in an attempt to find out what’s going on. Unfortunately the lady there was not so helpful. She has to get in touch with the Porting department (since I come from Alice) and she can only give me some news tomorrow, so I have to go there again. She did give me a good news though, apparently if I dont get the connection info in time, I can request some kind of instant login/password so I can use the internet temporarily. Which should be enough because the router I am using now (a Fritz!Box 7270) should work just fine with Telekom.

I hope things will go smooth because it’s gonna suck big time if friday comes and no internet is available. It’s going to be some really dark times for the internet junkies in that house!

Thanks for nothing, KabelBW!

Well, today we finally got an answer from KabelBW to our request to move the access to our new house. The house does not have a cable connection but the house next to ours has it. So we thought there should be no problem, in our naivety. I mean, how hard can it be to extend the cable to our house ?

Very hard, as it seems. In the letter we got today they say they are unable to provide their services to our new address because of “economical reasons“. So instead of extending the cable to our house (for which they would’ve charged us anyway, some 400-500 Euros) they would rather lose us as a customer. Good riddance! As a result we just wrote them a letter of cancellation for all our subscriptions: internet, telephony and television.

So it seems we will have to stick to DSL because there are no other alternatives. But not from the idiots at Alice, that’s for sure. I will send them too a letter of cancellation, they were a temporary solution anyway. I looked around to see what else is available and so far the most reasonable offers are from Deutsche Telekom and 1und1. The one from Telekom is a bit more expensive but you have 25Mbps or 50Mbps VDSL, starts at 60 Euros. The one from 1und1 is a bit cheaper but you only have 16Mbps, starts at 35 Euros. Both are with everything inclusive: flatrate internet, telephony (flatrate in the fixed network), IP television, free modem/router, free (or almost) set-up-box. I am still looking around, trying to find out which one is really worth it.

Another yucky day

It seems that each day spent at work this week is a yucky one. Friday is my last workday before the vacation so this feeling is kinda understandable. Besides, the weather is yucky too: it’s cold as hell, does not go above 1C, windy and the sky is a dark gray. I feel like falling asleep if I look out the window.

At work nothing interesting to get me out of this mood. I am typing away at my routers but it’s just routine so it does not help.

In other news KabelBW, my current internet service provider, upgraded the bandwidth from 16Mbps to 20Mbps. For free, that is we still pay the same subscription (29.99 €). Not bad ;-)

Nightmares with Alice-DSL

At our current address we have internet via cable, 16Mbps download, 1Mbps upload, 29 euro flatrate. Works perfectly. The thing is, KabelBW (the only cable company in this land) are not present at our new address. They are at the next house, but not at ours. Which means they will most likely make us pay a LOT for the connection. Anyway, I am still waiting for an answer from them.

In the meantime though, we need temporary internet access. Everybody in the house is a heavy internet user so we can’t do without. I ended up deciding to go with Alice-DSL since they don’t force you in a 24-months contract, you can cancel every month. So I go to their website, I choose one of the tariff plans and I start filling out the formular. Only to discover it’s not working in Firefox. Damn it :evil: Ok, I fire up Internet Explorer, everything goes ok and at the end I tell them I want the service to be activated on the 5th of December, there is an option for that.

A few days later I get couple of phone calls from hidden numbers. As I was in a meeting, I ignored them, of course. After a while I realize it may be the guys from Alice-DSL so I plan to answer the next one. I still don’t understand why are they hiding their phone number ? And since they called anyway, why don’t they leave a voicemail ?

Anyway, it turns out it was a guy from Alice-DSL afterall. We’ll call him Idiot1. Idiot1 starts and asks me all kind of questions which I have already answered in their online formular. I try not to get annoyed and I answer the dude. Until he tells me the service will be activated as soon as possible. I reply that no, that is wrong, the service should be activated on the 5th of December, as I told them in the online thingy. I ask him why doesn’t he look over that data but Idiot1 starts to babble and tells me that he will correct it (correct what ?!) and that 5th of December is ok.

2 days later I get an confirmation SMS which says everything is ok and the service will be activated on 10th of December. WTF ?! I look up their last email, see a contact link, I get from there the hotline number (free call) and I ring them up. Their stupid system make me input my new phone number before they connect me. Of course I don’t have yet anything like that, this is a new connection. Another automated message tells of another hotline number that I can call, if I don’t have a number. So I call that (not free anymore, of course). I talk with a lady, we’ll call her Idiot2. I try to explain that I spoke with someone else from the hotline for 5th of December but she has no idea what I am talking about. Since 10th of December is not good for me, we set it up for 15th of December.

Yesterday the nightmare begins. I get another confirmation email, with the contract attached, which states that on 10th of December my service will be activated and that the Telekom dude will arrive sometime between 8:00 and 16:00h! I start to get really annoyed. The email comes from a generic address, some like info@bla.bla , so I reply and explain that the date is wrong, correct is 15th of December and that I need a certain time, I can’t wait the whole day for the guy. I get a reply from Idiot3 ([name removed]) which confirms the 15th of December and also slaps some copy/paste shit with all kind of info about the Telekom guy, how they have no control over his schedule, that I have to be home between 8:00h and 16:00h, etc. She also informs me that if the guy comes and I am not there, next time they will charge me with 50 Euros.

I answer that it’s completely absurd, I live in another city, the house is empty and I drive there especially for this appointment. I can’t waste all day, without going to eat and so on, waiting like an idiot. I ask them to talk to the people at Telekom, to give them my mobile number and have the technician call me before he arrices. How hard can it be ? I get an answer from Idiot4 ([name removed]). She just tells me that they can’t get in touch with the guy. I answer that I don’t care about that, they should get in touch with someone who can contact the guy.

I get another answer from Idiot5 ([name removed]) who tells me that it’s not possible and then slaps the same copy/paste crap. I get pissed, I reply that I am sick and tired of theyr copy/paste useless information and that if they don’t deal with this, I am canceling the contract and look somewhere else for internet. Finally, another lady replies, she appologizes and tells me that they will give my number to the Telekom guy (aha, so it CAN be done!) but she can’t guarantee that he will call me. Ok, I find that resonable so I answer and thank her for the first helpful email. Only to get another reply from Idiot6 ([name removed]) who gives me again some copy/paste totally unrelated to my email. She didn’t even bother to read it.

I just sent them an email which says that if the guy does not show up on the 15th, or if he shows up without calling, I am canceling the contract because I had enough of their incompetent hotline people.

Unbelievable!

Random facts from today

Before I go to bed in this .. umm, wonderful hotel room. Stuff from today:

• I officially worked only half a day.
• It was cold outside.
• I got totally owned by an ICE train which passed me and 2 other cars as if we were standing still. We ware cruising at 200-210km/h. I felt small and insignificant.
• Food on the autobahn most of the times not good. Like today.
• You can find a complete clusterfuck even in big companies (or maybe especially there).
• Cisco office has a nice game room, played pool first time in 8 years.
• Hotels which do not offer free internet to their guests are so very lame.

Good night!