OECFiber in Oklahoma

[mdonnelly]

I'm trying not to complicate things, we got him a 65" Sony 4K 900 series 2 years ago when we moved him from Las Vegas to Oklahoma City. The Plex app is on his TV, right next to YouTube, which he watches incessantly. He gets confused about which remote to use, so I set it up so he can use the Sony remote for everything, including Cox Cable. (I hid the Cox remotes in his nightstand)

I wanted to get him the 65" Sony because it had a great picture and he was moving his 40" Sony to the bedroom and replacing the 32" Sony there. He wanted to get a TCL 55" series 4, so when we got to Best Buy I proceeded with my plan. I showed him how much better the picture was on the Sony, how the software interface was so familiar, how much better the sound was. Unfortunately he kept comparing the prices, Sony $1700/TCL $600.

I think in my past life, I must have sold used cars, because, first I reminded him that in his lifetime he had NEVER gone near the "Top Shelf" items. Heck he went thru a 10 year period from 1960 to 1970 when he drove Ramblers, although the '64 Rambler Ambassador he bought new was really nice, he could have gotten a Chevelle SS or a GTO. In '63 I lobbied for a Jag XKE, but that's a whole nother story.

Anyway, it turned out that Best Buy was sold out of the TCLs, that was when I went in with my "Rock Bottom" deal. I told him if he paid the $600 for the TCL, I'd pay the $1100 difference to get him the Sony. He stepped back and asked why I would do that?

So, I took a deep breath, stepped up, put my hand on his 90 year old shoulder, and told the truth.

"Dad, I would really rather inherit the Sony."

Your dad sounds a lot like my mom. Even down the the Ramblers in the 60's. No color TV, only a 17" B&W on a roll-around stand.

Probably the Great Depression made a big impact on both. She would have been 103 this year.

 

[osu1991]

I fully understand not wanting to change what they understand and are used to using.


My dad has the Sony 75in XBR 900E and hates the Sony Android interface, he prefers the 65” LG in the bedroom with webOS, so much that we upgraded the tv’s in our Vegas Condo to 75 and 65in LG’s, but he got tired of switching from the LG for Plex and then back to Cox with the Tivos. My stepmom couldn’t do the switching, as long as the tv stayed on the TiVo’s she was good.

I recently dropped Cox TV after Christmas and switched to YouTubeTV. After my dad saw how it worked and the benefit of it having all his recordings no matter which house he was at, he was ready to switch too. That’s when I switched them to 4K Fire Sticks. No more input switching although we still have the TiVo’s connected to OTA as a back up for them. They just click the home button on the firestick and it turns everything on, then they just have to switch between the Plex or YouTubeTV app. They can click the home button to end and switch to the other app.

I should probably think about selling some of the TiVo’s now. They barely get used at my house as I also have an HD HomeRun Quattro and can watch the OTA through Plex.

My dad likes to keep his for the OTA backup at his home in Broken Arrow. We barely get OTA in Vegas, so those are kind of a waste without Cox tv. My mom does use the OTA tivo at my lake house in Wagoner where she lives.

 

[CharlieHorse]

I fully understand not wanting to change what they understand and are used to using.


My dad has the Sony 75in XBR 900E and hates the Sony Android interface, he prefers the 65” LG in the bedroom with webOS, so much that we upgraded the tv’s in our Vegas Condo to 75 and 65in LG’s, but he got tired of switching from the LG for Plex and then back to Cox with the Tivos. My stepmom couldn’t do the switching, as long as the tv stayed on the TiVo’s she was good.

I recently dropped Cox TV after Christmas and switched to YouTubeTV. After my dad saw how it worked and the benefit of it having all his recordings no matter which house he was at, he was ready to switch too. That’s when I switched them to 4K Fire Sticks. No more input switching although we still have the TiVo’s connected to OTA as a back up for them. They just click the home button on the firestick and it turns everything on, then they just have to switch between the Plex or YouTubeTV app. They can click the home button to end and switch to the other app.

I should probably think about selling some of the TiVo’s now. They barely get used at my house as I also have an HD HomeRun Quattro and can watch the OTA through Plex.

My dad likes to keep his for the OTA backup at his home in Broken Arrow. We barely get OTA in Vegas, so those are kind of a waste without Cox tv. My mom does use the OTA tivo at my lake house in Wagoner where she lives.

We cancelled DirectTV two years ago, OTA is not feasible here for us. We tried DirectvNow then Hulu before we signed with YouTube TV. Wow are we happy, the best part is the DVR. During "Tornado" season our TV programing is often taken over by the "Best" storm coverage in the nation. And yet 2-3 days later our DVR recordings are pristine, with no interruptions, I love it.

We also prefer the WebOS on the LG65OledB6P in our bedroom and the remote is the best I've ever used, Wiley agrees and he should know since he ate one. they are a little pricey, I bought 2 just in case.

When I stopped working local and started running cross country, being gone 2 -3 months at a time I had a satelite dish and watched DirecTV. Later I found an app called DroidTV that turns your Android phone or tablet into a DVR. Initialy the file sizes were small (70MB/hr) and the image would not fill a 7" tablet, but a few years ago they upgraded to 720p. It used to cost $9/3mo, but I bought a lifetime subscrition for $54. They carry all major network Prime time shows, and a back catalog of older rerun programing. I select the shows to DVR and about 2 days after airing they download to my phone. When I got home I used the WDMyCloud app to upload to my drive for watching on a bigger screen. Now that I'm retired I want to transfer my old LaserDisc collection to digital (no copygaurd).

There are many Criterion Collection Discs that I especially want to save, hopefully my Pioneer LDS2 player will still function after 14 years packed up in the shop.

 

[CharlieHorse]

Your dad sounds a lot like my mom. Even down the the Ramblers in the 60's. No color TV, only a 17" B&W on a roll-around stand.

Probably the Great Depression made a big impact on both. She would have been 103 this year.

mdonnelly,

It was indeed a very different time. My Dad tells stories of shining shoes, paper routes, selling magazines and doing odd jobs so that he had the money to go to the movies, because he didn't want to ask his folks. Thankfully I never had to feel like I needed to work as a child. He was born and raised in Taft, CA, an old "oil" town about 45 miles SW of Bakersfield, where he lived his adult life until retirement in 1986, at which time he and my step-mother sold the house and went fulltime RVing for 14 years.

Thanks for sharing about your Mom, she sounds like she was very special to you. My mom passed in 2005 at 72, I think of her often, remembering the "little" things she did for us.

 

[mdonnelly]

Still waiting for OEC Fiber at my house. I looked at their map today, and I see that the service is now available two streets away. At that pace, we my have it in 2022. I really want to drop att DSL, but I don't want Cox.

 

[bchandler02]

For those that got OEC Fiber, approximately how long was it from the time they started marking your area until you were able to buy service?
They've been on the pole about 6 houses down my street for over a year now. Last week, they marked the utility easement in our backyards for the entire street. I can't imagine they mark too far in advance of digging since paint fades and flags get ripped up by lawn crews, etc.

Just looking for a ballpark idea on if we are a few weeks or many months away. The day that I can give Cox the big middle finger will be the highlight of this decade for me.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Just looking for a ballpark idea on if we are a few weeks or many months away. The day that I can give Cox the big middle finger will be the highlight of this decade for me.

For most companies the build out normally stars within a few weeks after the markup.

Sounds like you have exciting times ahead. I moved from DSL to gigabit fiber and I love it.

 

[Bruce]

AT&T put fiber in the ground in my neighborhood more then a year ago, still nothing offered.

Have Spectrum’s Gigabit Service, great for the down speed, but limited to 45 up.

Would love to have the faster speeds fiber provides for the upstream, just started a new job and will have a few video meetings with the bigwigs, would hate for the video to keep breaking up.

 

[bchandler02]

For most companies the build out normally stars within a few weeks after the markup.

Sounds like you have exciting times ahead. I moved from DSL to gigabit fiber and I love it.

Thanks. Turns out I should have waited about an hour to ask this question. They are laying fiber across the street right now. I assume they will do my side of the street next.

AT&T put fiber in the ground in my neighborhood more then a year ago, still nothing offered.

Have Spectrum’s Gigabit Service, great for the down speed, but limited to 45 up.

Would love to have the faster speeds fiber provides for the upstream, just started a new job and will have a few video meetings with the bigwigs, would hate for the video to keep breaking up.

Luckily this isn't Ma Bell I am dealing with - it's a local electric co-op with much less bureaucracy.
I share your pain on the speed though - I have Cox Gig which is 940 down/35 up. Unless you have many other uploads going on at the same time, you'll be fine though. Video meetings are a few meg at best.

 

[Bruce]

Luckily this isn't Ma Bell I am dealing with - it's a local electric co-op with much less bureaucracy.
I share your pain on the speed though - I have Cox Gig which is 940 down/35 up. Unless you have many other uploads going on at the same time, you'll be fine though. Video meetings are a few meg at best.

I hope it will be fine, first they wanted me to fly to California every few weeks for meetings, then changed it to wanting me move there so I would be in the offices everyday, I refused so they agreed to the video meetings.

I just finished my first report 2 weeks ago, so a major meeting about it next week, my video feed will be going to a bunch of different offices, a couple in different states.

 

[Ronnie-]

Luckily this isn't Ma Bell I am dealing with - it's a local electric co-op with much less bureaucracy.

Our electric co-op lit us up mid last year. I want to say withing 4 months of them stinging the fiber, we had working service. Maybe less time than that.

 

[osu1991]

Windstream announced about 18 months ago that they would wire 90% of BA with fiber. Still haven't seen that as they still only offer 3Mbps DSL to my address.

Cox on the other hand surprised the heck out of me last spring/summer boring and pulling fiber thru my neighborhood in Broken Arrow. It was delayed a lot in the spring by the rains we had. I think they reflagged and marked my backyard 3 times.

The fiber went active about 3 weeks ago. I got set up for the change from coax and Docsis 3.1 to fiber to the home the day after they sent me an alert that it was now available. Took the installer about 4.5 hrs to run fiber to the house and then into the house and install the ONT. Boring crew came out last week and buried fiber line to my house.

They stuck me with their buggy Panoramic WIFI router saying it was required. As I expected, it failed after 4 days and I went back to my own triband setup. I took the Cox equipment back and had them remove it from my account and low an behold, as I thought, it also reduced the bill $18. Sucks they still impose a data cap on fiber service, but its been great otherwise. $58 for 250/250 with the 1.2TB data cap for first year then goes up to $80. I've paid $50 for 100/100 fiber from the electric co-op in Grove, OK at the lake house with no data cap for several years.

Cox started boring to pull fiber in my sisters neighborhood in SE Tulsa by Meadowbrook Golf Course a few weeks ago. Windstream hasn't done anything in that neighborhood either. Still ancient 10Mbps DSL.

 

[bchandler02]

That right there is the issue with Cox. You have some competition in your area so you get 250/250 for $58.
Those us who's only "competition" is 6M AT&T DSL... Cox rakes us over the coals. $119.99 for 940/35, you can get it down into the $80's if you really try. When I called last week due to it going back up to $120, I told them fiber was here. They actually went and checked and flat out told me "it's not there yet, but when it is, give us a call back and we'll make you a deal then". NOPE. No way I'll be loyal to a company like that.

 

[osu1991]

That right there is the issue with Cox. You have some competition in your area so you get 250/250 for $58.
Those us who's only "competition" is 6M AT&T DSL... Cox rakes us over the coals. $119.99 for 940/35, you can get it down into the $80's if you really try. When I called last week due to it going back up to $120, I told them fiber was here. They actually went and checked and flat out told me "it's not there yet, but when it is, give us a call back and we'll make you a deal then". NOPE. No way I'll be loyal to a company like that.

Yeah, they only deal and remove the data cap in neighborhoods that also have windstream, ATT or BTC fiber which are very few. $58 is just the 1 year intro price. It’ll go up to the same current price for 250/10 docsis next year.