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This post may be a repeat for those of you who follow me on Twitter, but for those of you who don't, it will be brand new.I have had a bad electronics week. Basically, everything that could have gone wrong electronically has. The only thing that hasn't broken, exploded, disappeared, picked up a picket sign and gone on strike, etc. is my iPod, and that's only because I refuse to touch it until the electronics curse is lifted.
This is how my week went:
- Sunday night: During Dexter, the TV downstairs starts making this loud, static noise that pretty much drowns out Deb's cussing, Angel and the Lt.'s flirting , and Dexter's thoughts on the Trinity Killer. I'm, of course, forced to watch the TV downstairs because I still have the 13-inch TV plugged in upstairs to see if the black and white problem transcends TV's. Have you ever tried to watch a 13-inch TV across a master bedroom? It's not easy or fun. Anyway, the static is so distracting that I spend most of Dexter sitting on top of my fireplace, switching out cords, tightening connections, and playing around with audio settings. Finally, around midnight (I was watching the second showing thanks to a late-running Amazing Race), I break down and call Charter. They tell me that there is an area outage but schedule an appointment anyway.
- Monday morning: The static from the downstairs' TV has gone bye-bye so I cancel the appointment. I also get fed up with my upstairs experiment and plug my old TV back in. The black and white problem returns almost immediately. I then spend most of the day searching for a solution online. Unable to find one, I finally look up how to do a hard boot of that particular cable box. Apparently, the directions that I find are wrong because when I do them, my cable box ends up with nothing on it, nothing at all. No time. No guide. No shows. Nothing. I have to call Charter again. They send about three signals before one takes and schedule yet another appointment. Due to the dog diarrhea that is still all over my carpet, I ask that the appointment be scheduled for Wednesday. They concur.
- The rest of Monday and Tuesday: I continue to search the Internet in hopes that I will find someone with a similar problem. I find a couple of postings on forums where the black and white thing had happen to people with Comcast and with a Tivo DVR. Their problem seemed to be solved by using the AV cords instead of the coaxial cable cord. Thinking that switching cords was the solution to everything, I tried AV cords and failed. The image on the digital and On Demand channels continued to change to black and white. Still convinced that it was the cords and that maybe mine were RG59's, which are only supposed to be used for analog signals, I ran to Walmart, Target, Best Buy, and Dollar General to see how much RG6 cords cost. Too much was the answer I got since no one wanted to sell a RG6 cord shorter than 10 feet. Frustrated, I returned home and went back to Google. For a minute, I was elated when Google returned a blog post about the same problem. That elation, however, quickly turned to embarrassment once I realized the post was MINE. I then gave up and went to bed.
- Wednesday morning: I get up early to finish cleaning carpet. Not long after I finish, I get a call from the local Charter office asking me if I was still having problems with my service. I said that I was. The dispatcher asked me what the problem was. I told her. She put me on hold for a minute. When she came back on the line, she told me that the technician wasn't coming because he said the problem was the TV and that he told me this last time. I informed her that he never said it was the TV; he said that it could be the TV or it could be the box. She responded by saying, "Well, he says it's the TV now. He's not coming." I said, "Fine. Cancel the appointment, and soon as you hang up, I'm calling back and asking for a manger." Five seconds later she told me the technician would come after all.
- Wednesday at lunch: The technician shows. He spends five minutes testing the line and royally messing up the settings on my TV. Then he tells me that it's the TV, that he won't give me another box, no matter how many times I ask for one, and leaves. I'm enraged and take to Twitter. The Charter rep on Twitter apologizes for the local office's behavior and suggests that I switch out the box with the one downstairs. I've done that before. I already know what's going to happen. It's going to go to black and white. I thank him for the suggestion, as I realize that I'm going to have to get a new TV, whether I want to or not.
- Wednesday afternoon: I spend hours at Walmart, Target, and Best Buy trying to figure out what I can afford. When I finally decide that I'll have to go with the off-brand that's on sale at Best Buy, even though I don't want to, I can't get a soul to help me. I spend a good 15 minutes staring absently at the 26-inch Dynex that I'm going to buy while I wait for the rep to assist me. When she finally does, she ends up talking me into buying the bundled Monster HDMI cord/surge protector/screen cleaning package. Having skipped lunch and having only eaten a Nutrigrain bar for breakfast, I could have cared less at that moment that I could have probably gotten all of those things at Walmart for cheaper. I just wanted to go home, eat, and watch a TV that was actually in color.
- Late Wednesday afternoon and Wednesday night: I call and schedule a tech to come out the next day and install the HD. I make the appointment for after lunch in case something ends up being wrong with the TV. I ask the Charter rep if Best Buy was full of it when they said I needed the HDMI cord; he said that they weren't and that I did need it. After I hang up with him and eat, I start to set up the TV. Wanting nothing more to do with the box that the other tech would not take, I hooked the cable directly into the TV. The cable tuner picked up 155 channels instead of the normal 96. I was happy until I couldn't figure out what all the other cords that came with the TV went to. After looking at the HD boxes on Charter's web site, I realized the what--the cable box. The cables were component cables that were used when the cable box did not have a HDMI outlet. From the looks of it, Charter had very little of the HDMI ones. I got a sinking feeling in my stomach and called Charter back. The rep assured me that if I wanted a HDMI box, I would get one. All she had to do was put it in the notes, and the request would print out on the work order in the morning.
- Thursday morning: I wake up with the same sinking feeling but try to ignore it while I wait for my 1 p.m. appointment. At 11 a.m., I decide to risk missing Charter's confirmation call and go get lunch. When I get back, the Charter install guy is already blocking my driveway and waiting on me, almost two hours early. I go in, put the dogs in the bathroom, put up my food, and wait for him to finish looking at whatever he was looking at outside. When he comes in, he has what I was dreading he would have--the component cable box. I admittedly flip out. He claims that it wasn't on the work order but calls to see if he can get me one. The warehouse claims to have one left, and someone agrees to drive it out. An hour later he finally installs it. I'm less than impressed with the picture on the non-HD channels, but he tells me that's how it's supposed to look and gives me some kind of 10-day warranty that allows me to call him directly if something malfunctions. Not long after he leaves, I flip the receipt over and see that, despite his claims to the contrary, the work order does say HDMI.
- Thursday afternoon: Having read online that you need a progressive scan DVD player or better on a HDTV, I attempt to switch out my 8-or-so-year-old DVD player with the el cheapo one in my office, which claims to have progressive scan capabilities. However, when I plug the component cords into the TV, the TV refuses to recognize the player. I freak out because I'm scared the outlets or ports or whatever they're called are bad. To test this theory, I unhook my DVD-R player from the guest room and plug it into the same holes. The TV miraculously recognizes it, and I realize that you get what you paid for when you buy a DVD player from the Dollar Store.
- Thursday night: I'm super excited to watch Survivor and CSI in HD. The excitement is short-lived when I realize that the sound is dropping out every 5 to 10 minutes. At some point during CSI, I stop putting up with it and start trying to fix it. I change every audio setting I can on the TV and cable box; nothing helps. I plug in the old DVD player that was originally in the bedroom. The sound is fine. I think back to the sound yesterday; I noticed no drops then as well. I call Charter and ask what was I supposed to do. They tell me to call the install guy in the morning.
- Friday morning: I call the guy. He tells me it's probably something with the matrix setting and that he'll come by and fix it once he's through with his other four installs. While I'm waiting, I decide to go to Walmart and see if they have a cheap, progressive scan DVD player. They have a $30 Magnavox one. I grab it and hurry home, not wanting to miss the cable guy. I go to hook it up, only to discover that the picture is so grainy you can't even watch it. I say a few choice four- and five-letter words, pack it up, and go back to Walmart. After standing in line at customer service, I return to the DVD player section. I quickly realize that what I need is an up-conversion DVD player, not a progressive scan, but that Walmart is all out of cheap HDMI cords. Refusing to pay more for a cord than I do the player, I leave empty-handed.
- Friday afternoon: The cable guy still hasn't shown up at 4 p.m. The Twitter rep tells me to call him to see if he can give me an ETA. I do and find out that the guy still has two more jobs. He says he'll be here just as soon as he can. Soon turns out to be around 6 p.m. He plays around with the sound settings, tells me that matrix is usually reserved for external speakers, and that putting it on stereo should fix the problem. He also tells me that it's perfectly normal for the fan on the box to run nonstop and be as loud as it is (I can hear it a foot or more away).
- Friday night: I turn on the TV around 7:15 to watch The Young and the Restless, which is on the non-HD Soapnet. You can probably guess what happens next. The sound drops out. At 8 p.m. I turn it to Law & Order on the NBC-HD channel. The sound drops out again. I'm close to losing it at this point, but I put up with it through Law & Order and most of Monk. Towards the end of the latter show, however, I've had enough and call Charter for the 100th time. The lady sends a signal that she hopes fixes it and tells me that, if it doesn't, to call the install guy in the morning. I express my concern about getting a new box that has a HDMI outlet. She assures me that I'll be able to get one, even if it means going on a waiting list and having to use a loaner, non-HDMI box in the meantime. I told her what I've been told before about the local office refusing to give you a newer, better box if nothing is wrong with yours. She tries to assure me that their policy wouldn't apply to a loaner, but I'm not convinced.
- Late Friday night: Nearly an hour later the signal has not gone through. I unplug the box and plug it back in to see if it would work. It didn't. Not only did it not work, it caused the lips and the words to be out of sync. That makes me even more nuts than the dropped sound so I call Charter once again. I tell the new rep what's happening with the lip sync, as well as the dropped sound, the grainy picture, and a new problem that I had discovered in the last few hours (a very, very hot top to the box). The rep tells me that the overheating is probably causing all the problems and that I need to call the install guy. He then sends a signal to try to fix the lip sync problem until the morning. I'm so exhausted at this point that I don't even stay up long enough to see if the new signal fixed the dropped audio as well.
- Saturday morning: I wake up, down some donuts I shouldn't be downing, get a quick shower, and call the install guy. The install guy tells me he has the weekend off, which of course makes me feel bad for calling, even though Charter told me to. He says he'll talk to the warehouse Monday and see if he can get me another HDMI box, but he can't guarantee that he can. Once again I voice my concerns about the local office being willing to replace a loaner that has nothing wrong with it other than it has the wrong kind of cord. He says he'll see what he can do, but I'm not feeling very assured. I'm also scared the hot box is going to burn down the house.
- Saturday at lunch: I decide to go price up-conversion DVD players and HDMI cords since I'm up and dressed. I find out that, while Best Buy's players are about the same price as Walmarts, their cords are twice as much. Since my stomach is feeling extremely queasy from the donuts, I drive as fast as I can to Target or, more particularly, to Target's bathroom. I say sayonara to the donuts and then head over to the electronics department, expecting to see much of the same. Instead, I find that they have an up-conversion player for $7 less than Walmart and Best Buy ($33 on sale), but that the sale ends today. I spend 15 minutes debating whether to get it and the 3-foot HDMI cord, which was the cheapest HDMI cord anyone sold. I finally decide to get them, even if it means that I have to stick the player behind the TV to get the short cord to work, check out, and drive home.
- Saturday afternoon: I turn on the oven so I can reheat last night's pizza (yes, the no-dairy experiment is over). I figure that I can quickly install the player while the oven preheats. I figure wrong. The first DVD I put in, the one from Netflix, makes all kind of crazy sounds in the player. The picture also flickers several times when it first comes on. All I can think is, "Ah, hell. Here we go again." I spend the next hour trying out various DVD's while silently hoping the oven doesn't burn the house down. I discover that some DVD's, the newer ones with zero scratches, hardly make any sounds in the player, while some, the ones that are dirty or scratched up, make loud noises. I also discover that taking the player off auto-convert and changing it to 720p or 1080i output solves the flickering problem. I calm down a little, but only a little.
- Saturday night: I'm sitting here, typing this post, praying that my laptop doesn't decide to go the way of the cable box. After talking to Best Buy on the phone and finding out that they'll let me return the HDMI cord, I'm also thinking that maybe having component cables and a less sharp picture aren't such a bad thing after all, if it ends all the electronics drama. In a few minutes, I'm going to play that Netflix DVD. If it turns out that I hear the crazy noises all the way through or the picture isn't converted into HD like it's supposed to be, I'm going to take the player back to Target tomorrow. That means I get to waste another entire day on electronics drama and that a deserted island with no electronics whatsoever is looking better and better.
(Edited at 1 a.m. to say the new DVD player has now quit as well so I get to go back to Target tomorrow, which is technically today, and beg them to take it and the cheap, piece of crap HDMI cable back. Meanwhile, the box is so hot I'm probably going to have to unplug it to go to sleep.
Seriously...freakin'...cursed...)
