Verizon DSL

Stephen R Laniel steve at laniels.org
Sat Aug 13 03:15:51 UTC 2005


On Fri, Aug 12, 2005 at 10:56:34PM -0400, Rajiv Vyas wrote:
> I just ordered Verizon DSL and am having trouble getting on the net.
> The tech support said they don't support Linux and that I need special
> software to access the net. Is there a solution to this?

Here is the big, glaring secret about Verizon, which I pass
along to you with as much earnestness as I can possibly
convey over email: Verizon tech support are a bunch of
talentless, incompetent hacks who don't know a thing about
technology. You should literally NEVER call them about
anything.

For instance. Take the following conversation I had with
Verizon a while ago, when I wanted to get the password for
my client's SMTP account, or have them reset it.

Me: "Hi. I need to get my client's SMTP password."
Them: "SMTP?"
Me: *groan*
Me: "Yeah, do you know what an SMTP server is?"
Them: "No, is that an Outlook thing?"
[I kid you not]
Me: "No. Could I talk to your supervisor?"
Them: "Hang on, I'll go ask them about this."
[Hold music for 5 minutes]
Them: "Yeah, my supervisor tells me you'll need to call
Microsoft. We can't help you with that."
Me: "No. That is false."

It kept going. They haven't a clue what they're doing.

The easiest way to get online with DSL is to connect your
machine to a router, which then does all the (relatively)
complicated PPPoE stuff for you. Then you connect to the
router using standard Ethernet, which is really easy to set
up under Linux.

Tell us what you've tried and what difficulties you've had.
We'll walk you through it. We know more than Verizon does.

-- 
Stephen R. Laniel
steve at laniels.org
+(617) 308-5571
http://laniels.org/
PGP key: http://laniels.org/slaniel.key
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