Internet update
Post date: May 30, 2016 10:25:13 PM
My neighbors are getting connected to the fiber optic Internet. My immediate neighbor, whose communication comes off the same connection box as mine, and whom the phone company would not — at first — believe could also provide me with internet, is connected but will not use it.
Because the ISP (Internet Service Provider) lost my application, my house fell to the bottom of the (long) waiting list. I reapplied, and hope they have not lost this one.
It is maybe just as well, because the conduit from the communication connection into my house came up outside of their box, not inside as needed. So I dug it out and ran it inside. When planning my house I had phone the ISP, asking them what size conduit I needed to provide. After some delay, they reported that I would need 2” conduit. That, of course, is huge. (The actual glass fiber that carries the signal is about the thickness of a hair, but is protected by layers of plastic. Still, it is only a little over 1/4” wide.) There was no room for a 2” conduit elbow in the connection box, so I reduced it to 3/4”, punched a hole, and it now terminates inside their box.
The other two houses (that I have seen, at any rate) were fed by cable that the installers directly buried — after digging a trench. Mine will be easier to install and will not even require attaching an (ugly) box to the outside of the house.
Meanwhile I’m still using (with permission) the WiFi internet from my neighbor. Sometimes it is so slow to be effectively useless. Other times it is fast enough to watch (low resolution) video. I cannot figure out why the variation. My repeater is located in my dining area and their WiFi router/modem is in a utility closet. Maybe when they put the car in the garage it blocks the signal. I may never know.