On 12/27/15, 4:57 PM, Larry Sheldon wrote:
On 12/26/2015 23:49, Mike wrote:
[snip]
Firstly, they are all junk. Every last one of them. Period. Broadband
routers are designed to be cheap and to appeal to people who don't know
any better, and who respond well (eg: make purchasing decisions) based
on the shape of the plastic, the color scheme employed, and number of
mysterious blinking lights that convey 'something important is
happening'. Further, the price point is $45 - $70 thereabouts, putting
some definite constraints on the actual quality of the engineering and
components that go into them. I feel that we, the service provider,
endure a significantly high and undue burden of cost associated with
providing ongoing support to customers as a result of the defects
contained therein.
Why don't you offer an acceptable (to you) device at a price
acceptable to me as a part of the service. I'd buy it.
NO SUCH DEVICE EXISTS, because you can't afford it. If I were to take
you seriously however - and we're talking about eliminating all excuses
and simply getting down to it and making a marginally qualified showing
at expecting uninterrupted service - the entire environment is what has
to be solved. The device would be cisco or juniper branded, internal
redundancy / failover features to allow hitless upgrades or module
failures, have dual (preferably, triple) power supplies, would be
required to be housed in a locked enclosure with air conditioning and
online double conversion battery with the addition of an external backup
generator with its own separate backup fuel supply, which is further
tested weekly and mantained with inspections and oil changes. The router
would be under service contract with the manufacturer, would be
monitoring by my noc, and would receive appropriate software upgrades as
required, and you would pay for this monthly in addition to your
internet service. Furthermore, you also would be required to have at
least two distinct connections to me and make a deposit to provide
credit in the event you falsely claim 'trouble' where no trouble exists.
A seperate 'test pc', also in it's own enclosure and normally offlimits
to you, and connected to said router and backup power and such, would be
agreed upon as the test fixture that we would monitor TO. It would
display current network statistics including packet loss and latencies
to various on and off-net locations, with current time and date logging
on screen. You would agree that you are to blame each and every time you
'can't get on', while the test pc clearly shows on it's local screen to
you otherwise. You would be required to forfeit a portion of your
deposit each time you called for technical support and were determined
to be at fault and to blame for your own issue.
