As you read this, avid web surfer, I would ask that you say a prayer and bless the people and technology of hurontario.net. Without them, you would not be reading this text. Ahh… I can already hear your thoughts… "But Praetorian," you think to yourself from the comfort of your computer chair, "You subscribe to Shaw@home- THE fastest and most high-tech, affordable method of connecting oneself to the Internet! WHY would you need the services of a local ISP?!" Well, steel yourselves, ladies and gentlemen. I need and thank the services of hurontario.net, because I have been unable to access the Internet via my cable modem for over a month. And Shaw refuses to help me on a technicality.

It all started… well, it started when I first got my cable modem. Every now and then, I would notice that it "hiccupped", or seemed to pause. This I easily dismissed and forgave, in light of the blazingly fast connection I now had. Then, every now and then, the modem wouldn't work at all. The "online" light would glow a solid green, yet I could not browse the Internet (I would later learn this resulted from an inability of my modem to connect to the DHCP server which hands out IP addresses). Again, this I could dismiss and forget, if not forgive. However, the situation worsened rather than improved. Eventually, my modem stopped working altogether. Running winpcfg (a utility for changing settings such as IP address, where my problem existed) did little to help, as attempting to renew all the information always resulted in an error message: '…Unable to reach DHCP server renewing adapter ""…', whatever that means. So finally I called technical support.

I was discouraged to be put on hold before I even spoke to someone, but a mechanical voice was very happy (in its own cold, indifferent and annoying way) to let me know that I would be waiting no longer than eight minutes and twenty four seconds. Super. A very tardy thirteen minutes later (roughly- the mechanical voice's math skills are slightly better than mine, if a little more optimistic), a human being answered and spoke to me in English. Well, almost, anyway… eventually, I was able to tell him my problems. His solution? Well, it was pure genius. So intelligent, in fact, I had already congratulated myself for thinking of it- he said he would transfer me to a technical support representative. Wasn't that what I was on hold for? Apparently Shaw feels it necessary to invest money in middlemen.

Again, a mechanical voice told me I would wait no longer than nineteen minutes and fifty-three seconds… and again, I waited much longer. Eventually, a tech representative was with me. I had to repeat my problems to him, and together, we diligently and tirelessly tried the same putzy solutions (that I had already attempted long before calling technical support) over and over again. I am personally very, very confident that my 131072 KB RAM is, in fact, "OK", as my boot-up screen repeatedly told me.

Finally, after trying everything short of praying to Americania Onlinicus, the God of desperate and totally ill-informed Internet access, the brilliant and insightful words I received stunned me into silence: "Hmmm… well, you work in a computer store, right? Hmm… well, you tell ME what YOU think is wrong, and I'll walk you through the steps on how to set it up properly." In that moment of stunned silence, I very much wanted to say, "Well, you perfectly damn well know how to go to the bathroom, right? So how about I go in with YOU and hold your dick for you and then shake it when you're done." What I ended up saying was, "Well, I don't know what's wrong. In fact, I don't see how there could be ANY problem on my end. My TV reception is fine. The 'Online' and 'Connection' lights are lit. There must either be a problem with your DHCP server, or my modem itself is screwed." To this, he deftly responded, "Well, it's definitely NOT the DHCP. Really, the only thing that I can say must be wrong is your Ethernet card."

I pondered that asinine answer while digging my phone out of the wall. I currently own a D-Link 10/100 Base-T PCI Ethernet card, having scoffed at the over hyped paperweight of an etherass card the techie who installed my modem proudly brandished upon his arrival, a simplistic 10 Base-T. I feel it important to note at this point that every single person I know with a cable modem uses this exact same card as myself, the reasons being simple and multitudinous: (1)- D-Link makes quality products. (2)- At the computer store where I work, we have a 100 Base-T network, and so if we can have 100 Base-T network cards, we do, (3) they had these cards BEFORE getting their cable modems, and didn't have any problems working their cable modems with this card, and still don't have any problems using this card. However, since I was not using the default brand of Ethernet card supplied by Shaw, they would NOT send a technical representative to my house to check out the problem (It should also be noted that more than one of my friends with a cable modem had the aforementioned brand of D-Link Ethernet card brought to them with the installation of their cable modems, because Shaw had run out of their 3Coms. Guess where those cards were bought at retail price- correct, the also-aforementioned computer store at which I work).

And so, this is the impasse at which I exist. Shaw's hesitance to send a techie to my house apparently doesn't extend to their billing department, since I just received a bill for a service I have not been receiving. Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls- fuck that. Restricted to a few precious hours of online time when my computer is at the store, I have otherwise been world wide webless for over a month. And so, here, on Shaw's own server, I continue the battle, one page at a time.

-Praetorian

since the writing of this article, Shaw has sent its techies to my house- it turned out to be a problem with a "spigot" at a cable junction (very much so OUTSIDE of my house and having very little to do with my computer OR my ethernet card...)