So, you may have read about my not-so-good experience with Cablevision (found here).
It’s been little over 4 weeks and so far I am very pleased with Verizon FIOS.
On the contrary to what was told me by Cablevision disconnect department, my experience with Verizon FIOS have been very good with fast internet speed, better set top boxes and superior customer service.
If you currently have Cablevision and are thinking about switching over, I would like to outline the following steps to minimize any down time to your home based business.
PREPARATION
- This preparation step is actually for you, the homeowner, PRIOR to Verizon FIOS installer coming to your house. The approximate installation time is 6 hours but if you can get some basic stuff out of the way, it will go much quicker
- If possible, plan on having two services simultaneously for few weeks. Yes, it will cost extra to pay for 2 service providers initially but this will allow you to iron out any kinks in the setup. In my case, I could not afford to have any down time in accessing the internet.
- Decide where you want to install the Verizon FIOS Optical Network Terminal (ONT) box. It should be very close to where the fiber will be attached to the house
- You should install a brand new CAT5 cable from this ONT location to where you want your fax and/or answering machine to be located. Installer can do this for you, but it will cost you extra fees. This direct connection to the ONT provides dial tone during power outage (ONT has a battery backup). Just make sure that if you have a cordless phone, you have a separate battery backup for it as well
INSTALLATION DAY – NEW FIBER DROP
- My Verizon FIOS installer was very professional. He called 45 minutes ahead of scheduled time to confirm and showed up on site, on time.
- Because this was a new install, my technician had to install a brand new fiber drop
- In addition, my driveway is approximately 65 feet long (about 100 feet from the aerial drop splice enclosure to the attach point on my house) so I asked the technician to ensure that the minimum height of the wire at the lowest point was at least 10 feet from the ground. That way, any future tree service guys with their cherry pickers will not snag my precious fiber cable.
- After few measurements, he drilled a hole and pushed in the fiber inside the garage. The hole itself was quite a bit larger than the width of the cable because of this prefabbed fiber connector at the end. Thankfully he brought some green putty to seal up the hole
The entire process took about 1.5 hours. On to installing the Optical Network Terminal!