yachqua rafail benney

[Dorian Aldrege]

Over the weekend, without telling users, Netflix decided to stop displaying all titles from users instant watch queue if the rights to stream the content has expired. In the past, these titles remained in the queue and if they were to expire soon, they would also list the date when they would no longer be available for streaming. While Netflix took to their blog on Saturday saying they made this change to, "make the instant Queue easier to manage", clearly all they are trying to do is hide the fact that so many titles are expiring.

Even though Netflix says they didn't actually remove any of the titles from the queue and that they will reappear once again if they get the rights to stream the title, the fact is users can no longer see them, or manage them. And since most of us probably don't remember what all those titles were, how are we suppose to add them to our DVD queue since they are no longer available for streaming? Not to mention, the titles that we can longer see in our queue, count towards the limit of 500 titles you can have in your queue at any one time. So if we can't see them, how are we suppose to delete them so that we can add more titles to our queue?

What Netflix has done is take the problem of too many streaming movies becoming unavailable and turned it into two problems; we can't keep track of them to add them to the DVD queue and hidden movies count toward our queue count but we can't see them to delete them. How dumb. Not to mention, Netflix says while it "looks like some titles are gone", they didn't "remove" them. Really? So we can no longer see them and we have no way to manage them yet Netflix says it only "looks like" the titles are gone? The titles are gone if w can't see them! I am getting so tired of Netflix's blog posts lately which are starting to sound like they are written by a bunch of lawyers being creative with words.

Netflix can try and spin this any way they want but the bottom line is that the Starz contract is due to expire in about five months and at that time, a lot of users would have a bunch of titles showing up in their saved queue and would starting realizing just how many movies are becoming unavailable for streaming. And some Netflix users would reconsider keeping their account active or not. This is simply Netflix's way of trying to make sure we don't notice what's expiring, by not letting us see all the movies in our queue. Brilliant job Netflix. You just made your service harder to use and you announced the change only after people noticed it and started complaining. You may be in the driver's seat now, but I can't wait till Amazon eats your lunch.

We've had some pretty bad routers in the past: the old Verizon DSL Westell 327w's that were replaced every other week, the Actiontec Gen II. Rev. D. BHR, the Netgear R7000 Nighthawks which burned out in less than four months, and now the FiOS Quantum Gateway which replaced an Actiontec Gen III. Rev. I BHR that couldn't maintain a WAN connection.

Of course, that issue pales in comparrison to the fact that the FiOS Quantum Gateway can't seem to maintain a WAN or LAN connection. Even though we have a tech coming Monday for the 150M/150M upgrade, I doubt it's going to make much of a difference since clearly there is a problem with the Quantum Gateway itself.

We have had the router since Monday and in that time it has literally reset itself each and every single day. Right now, the Quantum Gateway reports an uptime of just slightly over 6 hours and 30 minutes yet it's been powered on since Monday. This of course is a frequent reoccruance; powered on since Monday but it can't seem to stay active throughout one entire day.

To further that, the FiOS Quantum Gateway seems to be having repeated errors with its DNS Server, providing errors , , , and in the log enough time that it is usually all the logging reports yet the only DNS changes made was to elect Verizon's non-hijacking DNS servers (for those of you who have been with Verizon for a long time wil know that those are the ones that end in '.14' while the DNS hijacking ones are '.12' and if you're new; congratsulations - you learned something today and welcome to Verizon). Of course, it's clearly not the DNS servers themselves because on of the first things we tried was switching it back to letting it acquire them automatically. Same results.

It is also clear that these issues are now affecting the entire network as ASUS RT-AC87R's which act as AC Access Points (i.e. they still rely on the Verizon router to get DNS) are constantly reporting the following:

At intervals concurrent with the FiOS Quantum Gateway presenting errors. However, since that's apparently not enough for this **bleep** of a gateway (I can't believe people paid or rent these devices!): WAN and LAN drop off whether you are connected to directly to the Gateway, on MoCA LAN, or via an Access Point so the only single common denominator is the FiOS Quantum Gateway.

The absolute best parts: there's no apparent way to bypass the Quantum Gateway and let an ASUS router control the DNS and QoS is locked out of the Quantum Gateways leaving the STBs which were in Queue 5 on the Rev. I (an acceptable queue) maxed out at Queue 7 (the highest) which should be reserved for devices that need that queue such as transmissions from the Access Points.

So while I have a tech dispatch on Monday to wire everything up for Quanntum 150M/150M who isn't hopefully incompetent (yes, I have encountered tech visits where the tech was so incompetent that they said my Actiontec router wasn't a Verizon router because the SSID was not default even though it had the Verizon branding and when he wouldn't listen I kicked him out of the house and called his manager and Verizon Executive Relations).

Is there anyway to bypass the Quantum Gateway. I tried a DMZ method I saw posted here whereby two subnets are created and a route is added to route the Quantum Gateway traffic to the router of your choice but it always errors out at setting up a Static NAT and the Quantum Gateway won't even accept the route to the appropriate subnet.

I have a laundry list of complaints for that tech on Monday whose here to install the 150/150 internet but honestly I will cancel Verizon if I can't get a working internet after it's been three weeks! There ETF fee is less than my bill from Verizon Wireless so it's not really a big deal to throw away Verizon's rather lackluster FiOS service which is what it's been for a month. This after eleven (11) years of being a Verizon customer.

Sorry for not mentioning it; it's been a long three weeks (thank God for VZW's high bandwidht plans) but yes, we do have FiOS TV (and FiOS Digital Voice if that matters) too. FiOS TV was switched over to Quantum about a year ago I want to say (shortly after the VMS1100's came out we got it). In fact, we can't even re-enable Caller ID on the STBs since getting the Quantum Gateway ("CIDR_0004" error in the troubleshooter with a contact number for Verizon)

I do know that the tech being dispatched is being done so not only because we upgraded to 150M/150M but it should also be a repair order (their replacing the ONT) and running Ethernet for the 150M upgrade. Right now it's sitting at 100M Quantum service (and the reason why they sent the Quantum Gateway to begin with) on Coax at MoCA 2.0.

It looks like their intending to replace the Quantum Gateway too as the order shows that they are taking the current one (the serial numbers match on items to be returned) and the order shows a new Quantum Gateway.

However, this would be the second bad router I got from Verizon in a row. They sent a replacement Rev. I to hold us over until the Quantum Gateway got here and that one had the same exact issues which is a little pecuilar now that I am thinking about it (dropping WAN and LAN - not DNS) but that one was definitely defective (power light was always blinking red even though it was "operating").

Well, after about two weeks of using this router I can throughly say it's a piece of junk and not worth a dime which makes me rather happy that I never paid for it nor do I have to pay any absurd rental fees on it.

Like seriously, if I could get a BHR 3 back I would. This thing is a total piece of junk. If I could put my ASUS router in front of it, I would. If I could use anything other than this BHR 4 piece of trash, I would.

Do you know how many problems I had with a BHR 3? Zero. Except that it burnt out after about a year. Can I go back to a BHR 3? No. Because I have the 150/150 package on a MoCA 2.0 link (available very limitedly in the Verizon footprint as they can't drill through super thick concrete wall) and the BHR4 is the only MoCA 2.0 compliant router Verizon offers.

Verizon's sending a new router "supposedly" as I haven't seen a confirmation email whatsoever. Billing liked to call this "advanced and sophisticated service" but I own multiple 10GbE continental networks across two continents and FiOS Quantum is most definitely not sophisticated or stte of the art. I'm leaning towards canceling and/or contacting Verizon Executive Relations. The billing person I spoke to also lovlingly said that "we have to pay to get a network extender" even though we sent them the email that Verizon confirmed a Second FiOS Quantum Gateway was supposed to be sent for the Home Theatere.

Verizon's become a joke after eleven years with them. Perhaps it's time for me to move on because nobody can do worse than "no working internet." I am tired of tech dispatches for something as simple as send me working devices and send me the proper amount. I'm no longer wasting my days with technical support people who have no intelligence. I will be shocked to even see the Quantum Gateway even show up to replace the current one and they still haven't replaced the second BHR 3 I had with a proper equivlaent for "Quantum" which according to them is a "Network Extender." I am not paying $74.99 for something I already had.

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