Daily Report: Smart Globe

On Sunday afternoon, for the first time in 14 months, my SmartBro wireless internet went down and (even more surprising) it didn't come back.

Yesterday morning, I loaded up my phone with 200 pisos load and called the help desk. After being on hold for 190 pisos' worth of time, somebody came on to say, "How can I help you?" just in time for my load to run out and disconnect me. So, I drove in to Cagayan De Oro to the Smart Center at Limketkai, where I was told that if I had a Smart telephone (which sister-in-law Susan does), I could call *1888 and it would be free. A waste of a couple of hours... but at least I got some grocery shopping done as well.

I went home and at about 5 p.m. called the free number, and this time was told that there was an upgrade being done on the network. However, since Mike Bird's SmartBro internet was working, and he connects via the same tower that I do, I doubted that was my problem. I called my technical support guy, Paul Cruz, and he sent his brother, Louie, over to troubleshoot every piece of hardware and determined that the problem must be with the antenna on the roof.

I called SmartBro back and told them again that it was my antenna (as I had suspected) that was the problem, and that they needed to send out a repairman no later than tomorrow if they wanted to keep my business. They agreed. Then I called Paul and told him to set up an installation with Globe wireless internet as well. Whether or not SmartBro was fixed tomorrow, I can't have this kind of thing happening again: I need backup.

So on Monday at noontime, the Globe installation guy and Paul showed up to do the installation of Globe wireless internet at my house. (It costs 795 pisos per month, with no money up front.) When they were finished, they said, "By the way, your SmartBro internet is working as well." I called up SmartBro to cancel the service call that was scheduled, but it was too late... even as I was still on the phone making the cancellation, the SmartBro people arrived. So, they took 20 minutes to super-tune my SmartBro internet connection, and I gave them some money for their time. (I wonder if the hotline people were right in their original assessment: That it was system upgrade, and it really did take 48 hours.)

So here is what I have now (tell me if this is okay): The SmartBro internet is hooked up to the "internet in" port on my wireless router, while the Globe is just plugged in to a regular computer port on it. I'm told that the wireless router will just switch to whatever internet connection is fastest. Thus, I will always have the fastest internet possible, and both wireless systems will have to fail before I'm ever disconnected from the internet again.

Oh, by the way, Paul Cruz asked me to put his name up on this blog post, and I can recommend him without hesitation and with the highest praise: If you ever need help with your television cable or satellite, or your computer, or your internet connection, and you live anywhere in Misamis Oriental, call Paul Cruz and he will come to your house and fix it. He's also a licensed technician of Cignal Satellite, Dream Satellite, and has worked closely with both SmartBro and Globe systems as well. His number is 0-906-966-5778.