Comments on: My NTL digibox is a goddamn piece of crap

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Jan 2005 08:21:00 +0000

I had an engineer around to investigate my goddam piece of crap a few months back. “Yeah well, they tested the new software on a dozen employees and then rolled it out to all customers. Apparently it can’t cope”. (I’m a telecoms software engineer. We call companies that do things like that cowboys. Yee-haa NTL).

I decided to be rid of it last October, but the bastards are still billing me each month. Back in December I was being hounded by a debt collection agency for £65.50 that I not only didn’t owe NTL, but that they had taken from my account anyway! The amount they owe me is now up to £95, but they’re still trying to get me to pay for a service they stopped months ago. Personally, I think it’s all a ploy to frighten me off cancelling my phone and broadband.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 25 Nov 2004 15:21:00 +0000

My NTL box was fine for months, but now every few days all the program information disappears.. and wont come back until the thing is rebooted.

I’d go back to sky tomorrow if it wasnt for broadband

By: Gary

Gary — Wed, 17 Nov 2004 20:58:00 +0000

Heh.

David – who commented earlier in this thread – tells me that he was talking to an NTL rep today who informed him that the Pace box is indeed a goddamn piece of crap. However, there is a newer box which – and we have to take the rep’s word for it – *is not* a goddamn piece of crap. I will investigate and report back…

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 17 Nov 2004 20:13:00 +0000

MY NTL BOX IS NOT A GODDAM PIECE OF CRAP. I prefer to call it a f***ing hump of s***. I want to get rid of it but I’m put off by the thought of having to actually talk to NTL, who are a bunch of dickless, spineless c**k munchers. Please excuse the foul language…

By: David

David — Thu, 11 Nov 2004 10:13:00 +0000

My box obviously isn’t as bad as yours. I do lose all the channel listings every day, anything interactive fails 9/10 times and I have to reboot it every 3 or 4 days (this is more an ntl: broadband thing)

I was watching something the other day. (Top Gear, I think it was) At complete random the channel suddenly changed to one of the history channels, despite the box telling me it was BBC 2. The only way to fix it was to turn off the power (at the wall, no less) and wait awhile. It seemed to work – I soon got the closing credits of the show on screen. Ruth tried to buy a movie on it the other day and it started asking for a PIN number. We don’t have a PIN number. We’ve never had a PIN number.

Overall, I would agree that the NTL digibox is a goddamn piece of crap.

By: Gary

Gary — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 16:07:00 +0000

> I never asked him what the point of developing advanced functionality was when they couldn’t even function as well as, say, the Sky box (no model of rock-solid stability itself) for basic channel-changing duties

You’ve hit the nail on the head. I lose track of all the gadgets or programs with pointless bells and whistles that haven’t bothered to get the essentials right. You even find it in games – sure, those FMV cut scenes are impressive, but when the player camera makes it impossible to see what’s going on the disc is still going to become a frisbee.

By: Stephen

Stephen — Wed, 10 Nov 2004 11:37:00 +0000

Couldn’t agree more. I had a housemate who is paid by the BBC to develop interactive content for these terrible machines, and he didn’t even own one! He used to borrow mine to inflict his dreadful creations on people, until I put a stop to it. I never asked him what the point of developing advanced functionality was when they couldn’t even function as well as, say, the Sky box (no model of rock-solid stability itself) for basic channel-changing duties, but I should have. To say nothing of trying to explain to girlfriends etc that some of the TV functions are controlled by one remote, while others are controlled by a different one. And why does it take seconds to react to a button press? It’s a good thing I got mine for free, because it’s certainly not worth anything.