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Announcement of Copper Retirement

Started by mariepr, March 03, 2017, 11:16:18 PM

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Stan S

Hey folks.
Below is a scan of the letter officially announcing the 'retirement' of copper by Verizon.
And so it goes.
Stan S.

mariepr

Welcome to the "club".  If it follows the same time line as it did for me by October you will get a notice to switch by November, and that will follow with a notice that your service will be suspended in you don't set up a conversion appointment.  My letter was dated February 2017 with retirement by the same month next year.  Last week my building super told me that all of the apartments that still had copper phone service got suspended.  As I outlined in detail in my July 27th post, fiber conversion is much more convoluted for an apartment compared to a house.  The whole project cost me about $1K by the time the electrical work, structured media components and hardware was purchased - plus my time and work. 

For a relative who lives in a house, the process was much simpler.  The fiber was run from the outside along a clothes dryer vent.  The ONT was mounted on a basement wall, and internet was set up via a wireless router. 

The voice service that I now have is "Verizon Freedom Essentials" which (so far) supports rotary dialing and electro-mechanical ringers.  Fios digital voice doesn't and it is an entirely different service that integrates with TV. 

Stan S

Marie
Perfect timing. I was going to ask you what the official name for just the phone service was and if it supports rotary dialing.  I have no interest in the Fios package. My TV service is handled by Spectrum. I have a thing about putting all my eggs in one basket.
My Internet service is currently DSL riding on the pots line. That's all I want from Verizon. Exactly what I've got now only fiber.
There's one spot in the apartment that has AC power, a phone line and is near the front door where the fiber will be brought in. It's in an unused kitchen cabinet. They can put as much of there fiber junk in it as they want. Whatever room is left will be filled with backup battery power and chargers. Don't think I want to depend on a few 'D' batteries to keep me 'on the air'.
After the current round of storms hits Florida I wonder has many fiber customers will have phone service after the first day.

Stan S

'Retirement of copper'

Dear valued customer.
No negotiation.
No discussion.
No excuses.

Their way or the highway.

Spectrum is looking better and better!

See scan below.
Stan S.

mariepr

#49
Since I never had Spectrum for TV or voice I cannot vouch for whether or not it has rotary support.  One key difference however is that cable doesn't need a 110VAC outlet but phone company fiber does.  At least you have a cabinet to hide all that stuff. 

I had to connect my ONT to the old copper distribution spider in a back linen closet about 40ft away.  Below are two examples of hollow moulding available at home improvements stores.  They're listed under electrical "channel raceways" and not building trim.  I found the quarter round version a real help for the horizontal run.  Once painted it looks like standard quarter round moulding.

Like you I had DSL over POTS which suited my needs.  Got just the 50MB Fios and they tried to upsell me to 100MB with "only $10 more per month".  "Only" tends to creep up in price.

Stan S

Marie et al.

Well, after 2 holes and 10 feet of fiber the job was done. I figured I'd goof on the guy for a while and played dumb. Actually that's not hard for me to do.

Anyway, he saw a refrigerator magnet of a wood wall phone and commented that his wife bought a full size reproduction of one. I figured it was a good time to show him where I wanted the router, so I walked him into my phone room. He stopped dead in his tracks and his jaw dropped. From that point on we got along just fine.  As things go today, he's an old timer. He's only got 7 more years until retirement. He actually remembered rotary dialing and party lines.

He was able to answer a legal question for me. I was under the impression that Verizon had the right to install fiber in any building they previously had copper. Nope! In fact most of the contacts (such as with Spectrum) explicitly bar any other cable or telephone company from providing service. The bottom line is if the building you live in signs an exclusive contract with any other telephone service provider except Verizon, on the cut off date if you haven't bought phone service from the other company Verizon will disconnect the entire building. Legally the only service Verizon MUST continue to provide the building is 911.

I got a kick out of how they find your 'line' with fiber. In the good old days it would have been with a buzzer and a butt set. Today it's a tiny flashing led light source that gets connected to one end of the fiber. The intensity of the flashing red light at the other end of this super thin fiber is amazing.

For those who care. Fios DOES support rotary dialing.
Ain't technology GREAT!

Walk toward the light (fiber).
Stan S.

Pourme

Every cloud has a silver lining.

My grandson just came home from serving in the U.S. Army earlier this year. Looking for employment he finally landed a job making nearly double most people I know, at Corning...manufacturing fiber optic cable. They gave him preference because he is a veteran.

Benny
Benny

Panasonic 308/616 Magicjack service