It has been about a month since Hotwire Communications came to install their new service in our house in Boca Falls. We are finally throwing in the towel and having DirecTV reinstalled.
For past blog posts on Hotwire in Boca Falls, please see:
Hotwire Communications Problems; Hotwire Problems Continue; Hotwire Communications Update
We have had problems with the service almost every day. The problems ranged from brief glitches in the picture to the service not working at all. Hotwire staff have been to our house roughly 10 times. On at least two occasions they were in our house for hours, disrupting our lives.
Sometimes their efforts would result in brief improvements. On other occasions it would be worse after they left. At one point we were told the problem was in their central equipment and that was then fixed. The problems continued. Every day I hear from more residents unhappy with them, with many asking that we install Netgear Router systems instead.
I have requested a technical explanation, and the response has been silence. At this point we have the opinion that Hotwire Communications is not only incompetent but dishonest.
On the technical side, consider this 2008 Motorola press release. It indicates that Hotwire would be using Motorola equipment for the network and the home. I don’t know what they’re using at the center of their network, but the equipment in our home is not Motorola. We have a router from Alcatel/Lucent and a switch from “Trendnet”. If it was a Motorola brand router, we could have used Motorolas Router login instructions were we to try and alter any settings. Our set top box is branded ADB.
One theory as to why it works so poorly is that Hotwire chose to use cheap equipment. Another theory is that the whole idea of IPTV (internet protocol television) is fundamentally flawed. More likely we’re somewhere in the middle – that IPTV is difficult to deliver well, and Hotwire is not competent to do it well.
For an interesting if somewhat dated reference, consider this (pdf): Stephen Davies: Secrets to Successful IPTV Deployment
I love this quote from it:
We may never know why the Hotwire Communications setup in Boca Falls has failed. But we do know it has failed. The dishonesty comes from their failure to let us know ahead of time that we’re their guinea pigs. If they had been honest about that up front, our HOA might not have fallen for it.
