Virgin Media Box: Class Act
 

In article , lid says...

ian field wrote:
"Sheila" wrote in message

I would go with "Virgin Media for such a pathetically insecure
installation". It may have been visited by vandals, but I am not totally
convinced. Three observations, VM contractors have been known to use force
to gain access to cabinets, no attempt has been made to vandalise the
contents

That'll be because it was copper thieves who lost interest at first sight of
the fibre-optic cables.

95% of the cables in there are copper coax, and power

No Mark.

The subscriber drop cables will be copper plated steel and the trunk cables copper plated
aluminium, so very little copper in there at all (apart from power).

My first experiences of cable was in the East End of London. It wasn't vandals who were
the problem but the kids.

The early build used locks with a triangular section key and were reasonably secure -
until gas and electricity meters started appearing in external boxes with identical
locks, albeit plastic.

Suddenly, every kid in the arera had a plastic cabinet key in its pocket!

The thing was, they didn't vandalise the cabinets - their idea of fun was to open them
and switch the power off!

--

Terry

Virgin Media Box: Class Act
 

Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
The Natural Philosopher wrote:
I grew up and are really poor area when I was a kid, the red telephone
boxes contained a coin box, a handset connected with nothing more
brown curly wire and a usually intact set of directories, yet they
were very rarely vandalised, then came the 'Never Had It So Good' era
of the 1950s and everything seemed to go so terribly wrong, what
happened?

Socialism.

The 'never had it so good' phrase was coined by Harold MacMillan. Didn't
know he was a socialist.

"We are all socialists now"


(1894, liberal MP)

That's what I like about here - you learn
something new every day.


I never said that Macmillan was the star of it, its just that giving
people a free lunch seems to mean they don't want to eat it and resent
getting it.

They still *vote* for it, mind you.

Virgin Media Box: Class Act
 

In article , lid says...

Graham. wrote:
"Gaius" wrote in message
...

That picture tells you all you'd want to know about VM.

Linked cable ties "securing" a door - FFS. BT's customer service may be
the pits, but at least their engineering hasn't sunk to that level.

Yet.

The primary locking mechanism seems to rely on a pair of granny's knitting
needles.

Well on my way home tonight, a fast response repair team seem to have visited,
and reinstated the high security cable ties, and applied some more insulation
tape just to make su-

http://www.markyboy.net/vmbox2.jpg

Did you forget to turn on the flash? All I'm getting here is a blank black screen ...

(The first one is still ok.)

--

Terry

Virgin Media Box: Class Act
 

"Sheila" wrote in message
...

"ian field" wrote in message
...

"Sheila" wrote in message
...

"Mark Carver" wrote in message
...
Photographed this on my walk to work this morning:-

http://www.markyboy.net/vmbox.jpg (850k)

Last week, the daisy chained white cable ties were half way up the
cabinet, holding the door closed, quelle surprise this morning it looks
like this. Curiously the vandals haven't ripped the guts out (yet)

I don't know who's the dimmest. The vandals, or Virgin Media for such a
pathetically insecure installation ?

--
Mark
Please replace invalid and invalid with gmx and net to reply.

http://www.paras.org.uk/


I would go with "Virgin Media for such a pathetically insecure
installation". It may have been visited by vandals, but I am not totally
convinced. Three observations, VM contractors have been known to use
force to gain access to cabinets, no attempt has been made to vandalise
the contents

That'll be because it was copper thieves who lost interest at first sight
of the fibre-optic cables.


The UK's Cable TV/Broadband network uses coax to distribute the network
from street cabinets to customers homes.


But as Terry has pointed out, it's not copper it's a stainless steel copper
plated inner and stainless steel braid, or all of the stuff that I've ever
seen (or used) has been, going right back to the days of the original United
Artists.

Virgin Media Box: Class Act
 

Mark Carver wrote:
ian field wrote:


They're just making it obvious there's nothing in there worth nicking.

This is one of the UK's most prosperous towns, people don't nick cable
round here, they don't need to, unemployment is quoted in 'hundreds'
rather than percent. Instead they go round mindlessly destroying
everything they can. The Post Office have even decommissioned a pillar
box outside of an arcade of shops, because of repeated vandalism. It was
so popular, you'd often have the mail brimming out of the slot. The
nearest alternative is now a mile away.

Bring back the birch!

Bill

Virgin Media Box: Class Act
 

In message ,
Terry Casey writes
In article ,
says...

Graham. wrote:
"Gaius" wrote in message
...

That picture tells you all you'd want to know about VM.

Linked cable ties "securing" a door - FFS. BT's customer service may be
the pits, but at least their engineering hasn't sunk to that level.

Yet.

The primary locking mechanism seems to rely on a pair of granny's knitting
needles.

Well on my way home tonight, a fast response repair team seem to have
visited,
and reinstated the high security cable ties, and applied some more
insulation
tape just to make su-

http://www.markyboy.net/vmbox2.jpg

Did you forget to turn on the flash? All I'm getting here is a blank
black screen ...

(The first one is still ok.)

The first time I looked at the photo, it was OK. Now its all dark.
However, the EXIF data says the flash did fire.
--
Ian

Virgin Media Box: Class Act
 

"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
In article ,
The Natural Philosopher wrote:
I grew up and are really poor area when I was a kid, the red telephone
boxes contained a coin box, a handset connected with nothing more
brown curly wire and a usually intact set of directories, yet they
were very rarely vandalised, then came the 'Never Had It So Good' era
of the 1950s and everything seemed to go so terribly wrong, what
happened?

Socialism.

The 'never had it so good' phrase was coined by Harold MacMillan. Didn't
know he was a socialist. That's what I like about here - you learn
something new every day.

--
*Do infants enjoy infancy as much as adults enjoy adultery?

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.


--
JohnT

Virgin Media Box: Class Act
 

"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
In article ,
The Natural Philosopher wrote:
I grew up and are really poor area when I was a kid, the red telephone
boxes contained a coin box, a handset connected with nothing more
brown curly wire and a usually intact set of directories, yet they
were very rarely vandalised, then came the 'Never Had It So Good' era
of the 1950s and everything seemed to go so terribly wrong, what
happened?

Socialism.

The 'never had it so good' phrase was coined by Harold MacMillan. Didn't
know he was a socialist. That's what I like about here - you learn
something new every day.


The expression was plagiarised from the USA Democratic Party's slogan for
the 1952 Election which was "You Never Had it so Good"!
--
JohnT

Virgin Media Box: Class Act
 

Ian Jackson wrote:

http://www.markyboy.net/vmbox2.jpg

Did you forget to turn on the flash? All I'm getting here is a blank
black screen ...

(The first one is still ok.)

The first time I looked at the photo, it was OK. Now its all dark.
However, the EXIF data says the flash did fire.

Indeed it did, but the camera's generally not that good. It does have a
really good mobile phone application though, and that does work very well.

Anyway, I'll take a shot in daylight tomorrow morning, and update the
gruesome picture.

Virgin Media Box: Class Act
 

"Mark Carver" wrote in message
...
Ian Jackson wrote:

http://www.markyboy.net/vmbox2.jpg

Did you forget to turn on the flash? All I'm getting here is a blank
black screen ...

(The first one is still ok.)

The first time I looked at the photo, it was OK. Now its all dark.
However, the EXIF data says the flash did fire.

Indeed it did, but the camera's generally not that good. It does have a
really good mobile phone application though, and that does work very well.

Anyway, I'll take a shot in daylight tomorrow morning, and update the
gruesome picture.


http://dl.dropbox.com/u/11815200/virgin.jpg