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DSL Installation Fail
An anonymous reader writes "Here's an example of fine Qwest workmanship. In our business park, they just installed a DSL connection for our neighbors, for which we share an exterior utility space. They left: a DSL modem stuffed in a cardboard box, wrapped in a Wal-Mart bag, sitting outside in what will be below-zero (F) temps, on top of a bank of ten natural gas meters in some of the driest air of the year. They also left it plugged into an exposed exterior power outlet above a snowbank, with network cables running around the building, through snowbanks, coupled and protected by zip-lock baggies, and into our neighbors office. Not to mention the hack-job of patching the phone cable directly into the demarcation box. And if you're wondering — I was told upon calling them that this is not their problem, and I need to contact my primary phone service provider."
Looks like Qwest thought they had this job *sunglasses* in the bag.
YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!
I had the same work done last week and it cam e out great.
Im sure they will remove the suspicious package right away...
Support TBI Research: http://www.raisinhope.org
*I* Could do THAT!!!! And I bet they'll pay me more than Starbucks!
Seriously. Call the Fire Marshal, tell them this is what Qwest did as electrical/phone work, and ask if it meets safety standards. Try to control your laughter as you ask.
'Sensible' is a curse word.
I often call to complain that my neighbor's DSL isn't set up correctly...oh, wait.
Calls to have their DSL installed in the middle of a snowy winter?
ASSHOLES CUSTOMERS, that's who. /blame game.
...they forgot the duct tape! How do they expect it to stay up on those gas containers in strong winter winds?!
"I hope you know how very lucky you are to know me, because I am so incredibly incredible."
Just snip both ends of the cable crossing your office path and remove the health hazard from your premesis.
Step 1: Do the worst possible job you can at work.
Step 2: ???
Step 3: Profit!
Agree with Daniel
Call the fire marshal, and the town, I am sure there are codes regarding instillation of something like that.
The Lunatick, Carpe Corpus!
For comcast that a ok job but for dsl / phone they can do much better.
Looks more like the business owners son's job then a paid for Professional Qwest installation. I am curious to see what comes of this, and if a Qwest employee was actually involved in the installation/setup--i doubt it...unless like the poster above me says: $55hole customers-- can definately lead to some shoddy jobs becuase they had to have service yesterday and their losing tens of thousands of dollars a day. Sure you feel bad because you can't help them out but my favorite quote for this situation is:: "Lack of planning on your part, doesn't constitute an emergency on my part."
When the picasa album has a real name on it?
I had Qwest technicians on-site last October to get DSL working. They were knowledgeable and completely professional; the work was first rate. I don't believe this story is accurate. The "contact my primary phone service provider" bit probably indicates that some third party is involved and the submitter is falsely attributing this cockup to Qwest.
Oh, and my DSL performance is excellent as well. If you have the choice between Qwest and Comcast, get the former.
To that tech:
Update your resume, you stupid loser.
Either that or provide a case against unions.
Well at least if you lock yourself out of the office you have open ports at the gas meter to hook up to.
I Need someone to rebuild a Digitech Digital Delay pedal for me....for me...for me...for me.
Sorry, I call bullshit.
Maybe the neighbor did request the installation some time before the snowstorm started, or maybe not, or maybe this was a repair job because their service had died during the snowstorm. If the technician didn't want to do the job until the weather improves, he could either be professional about it and say "sorry, got to reschedule, weather's too bad for a new install", or at least be unprofessional in some reasonably professional way, like claiming "customer wasn't home" or "couldn't get access" or something.
'
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Note: I'm a low-voltage tech.
This kind of stuff doesn't suprise me. It's the nature of the industry. People don't want to pay $200 for a decent quality install, so a lot of the independent guys try to lowball where they can. Contractor companies will hire anyone to do the work, and they'll be lucky if they get a half a week of training. Most ISP's contract out their installs to these companies. (Mine is the exception to that fortunately.) This installer was probably never trained on this stuff, and his employer probably expected him to do it anyways or they wont use him anymore.
Quest probably leases the lines and contracts the installations through AT&T, who then contracts the installs through someone else. (Can't confirm this though.) That's why Quest told the customer to call their "primary phone service provider", although I think Quest should have done this work for them.
This is pretty much what you expect with QWest.
In fact ... they must have gotten the good installer given the plastic bag.
I agree. The whole thing is so "over the top:, clearly not real. At least, not from Qwest.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
You can report it too, the location is the same as for his other albums.
If you were dealing with some local company or something, this might be ok to give them one more chance to 'make it right.' However, you are dealing with a big corp. The best thing to do, to avoid unforeseen consequences, is to call the fire marshal and inquire as to who is actually responsible if there is a situation like yours (the installer or the building owner). If it is the installer, then you immediately report the situation and get an official record of it on a government piece of paper. You then take that report and fax it to them while on the phone with their secretary and tell them they need to fix it, as the fire department has documented the faulty job and you aren't sure if they are being investigated . . .but you have confirmed with the fire marshal that they would be the ones found liable in case fault is found in the installation job.
I once hired a "network technician" to install Ethernet (coax... it was a long time ago) in a doctors office. He said he was "experienced". I got a complaint from the office after he left. They had an empty office between the router and a workstation. This fool punched a hole in the middle of the wall on each side of the room and ran the wire at about neck height across the middle of the room.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
Put on gloves and unplug one of the cables. Wait for them to send some one out to "repair it". Call the police and report that a suspicious person is attaching a package with wires to the gas lines.
http://forum.mikrotik.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=31711
Most of these are remote hotspots to bounce a wireless signal accross Europe, but even in the middle of nowhere there should be standards.
I take it this wasn't in Boston, or they'd have shut the entire city down, given that it has wires coming out of it. If there was a Mooninite on it, they'd probably hunker down for an invasion....
The service I get from Qwest field techs in my Denver neighborhood has always been exemplary. On the other hand, talking to tier one contacts who reply vebatim off a half-assed script in a dialect of English I can barely understand... Well, that's a different matter. Oh, that and Qwest's slamming me for services I expressly refused. But the Techs I've gotten were cool.
You're trying to help them out and they tell you to call someone else. I guess you did your job.
I saw a fire hydrant spewing water once, called the fire department, they said, "call the water department." I said, "OK." Hung up and didn't think about it again. Until now, I guess.
I am not a crackpot.
No DSL or any other kind of electrical installation should be done outdoors unless it's in at least a NEMA 3 or NEMA 4 enclosure so it doesn't really matter what the conditions were outside that install is just all sorts of fail.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Runny-nosed little whiner had his whole day ruined.
Yeah, I was gonna call BS on this one...the OP prolly installed it as a joke but I highly doubt any professional would install this...unless Qwest is hiring out of work crack-heads and hookers to do their installs on the cheap.
Thirded. Srsly. Although the guy who submitted this is new to spamming slashdot, doesn't he know you're supposed to link to your google ad filled blog?
Pretend that something especially witty is here. Thanks.
News flash: service employee gives poor service. Film at 11.
When I had Qwest DSL, the tech who came out when my service failed happened to mention that my house was several hundred feet beyond the DSL spec from their office. He determined that the problem was in their office, but being a weekend he had no way to get into the office to fix it. But that didn't stop Qwest service from closing my trouble ticket, so I had to spend another hour going through their phone tree to get another tech to come out and go through the process again. And then when I terminated my service they tried to charge me for not returning the modem that I bought from them months earlier. They hire nice folks, but it's clueless bureaucracy hell.
I hate Comcast, but when it comes to broadband I'll take evil over nincompoops.
Never let a lack of data get in the way of a good rant.
Just call Qwest and let them know you just saw some kids or crackhead steal it.
Deltron 3030 - Virus (music video)
They gave you a high quality high density polyethylene protective cover for free, what are you complaining about! :)
I had standing orders that no qwest people were allowed into our denver branch without somebody calling me. and they were NEVER allowed to touch anything without somebody watching them. every time they came into the building we'd lose something, most of the time it was our internet due to their horrendous wiring.
I work for a telco... your regular local phone techs would never do this. They have procedures they follow and getting some weird-ass setup to work is not their problem. They make sure service gets to the Demarc and then they leave. What happens however is a salesman sells the customer something that's nearly impossible. Or they sell them a package they think will work without ever visiting the site. Inevitably what happens is the tech shows up, drops service off at the demarc, which happens to be some closet or outdoor space in a huge complex... the customer is literally half a mile a way and would have to pay to have cable run through the whole building. But the sales guy wants his commission. So what does he do? He shows up in person and does something like what we see here. I've actually seen worse. Then the customer calls in to complain but according to the techs records he dropped off normal service at a normal demarc. There's no record of this mess... There's arguing back and forth... but in reality the sales guys just got to prevent the customer from canceling within 30 days and the commission is his. Qwest has no idea what any of that extra cable is, and as far as anyone in their facilities division are concerned they probably think the customer ran it themselves.
Thanks for documenting this. I had a similar experience with cable a few years ago and I regret I didn't document it at the time. In my case we were renting a house next to a vacant lot, and on the other side of the lot was the curbside cable box that the installer had decided to use.
They ran the cable straight across the vacant lot in the grass and into one of our ventilation conduits to get under the house. Then, one day the cable stopped working. I could see that they were starting to develop the lot next door and a tractor had run across the cable laying on the ground. I called the provider, they came out and strung another cable across the lot, on the ground.
This was a regular occurrence in the weeks ahead. Once or twice a week I'd call that the cable was broken again, and someone would come out and patch it and drop it back in the dirt.
Then one day it stopped working again and I called again and then watched what the guy would do when he came out. They had poured concrete next door, and the cable now went from the box down into a fresh sidewalk never to emerge on the other side.
He scratched his head on that one, and just when I thought he was going to stretch a replacement cable across the new driveway, he instead went to the other side of my house, connected a new cable to the cable box over there, stretched it across part of my neighbor's lawn, diagonally across my lawn, and back through a different vent to the underside of the house, where he patched it in.
I called and told the cable company about this, that I had to disconnect the cable in order for either me or my neighbor to mow the lawn, but they said there was "nothing they could do". They said it often, and eventually, when I got on their nerves, they said it at high volume.
So we canceled the cable. I disconnected it on my side and wrapped the excess around the box. To this day I regret not documenting the experience through photos.
Later we had DSL and then fiber optic service, which were quite satisfactory. I never got an indoor DSL box installed outdoors, but they did run the line along the ground on the side of the house before punching into the bedroom I was using as an office. I didn't notice it at the time, but did notice that the network failed about a month after the air conditioner was installed. The installers had poured a slab of concrete on the side of the house for the air conditioning unit and -- you guessed it -- the cable was now part of the slab. I'm surprised it worked for as long as it did.
When we had fiber installed, I had them run it to the corner of the house closest to the curbside box (which fortunately was on my property) made sure they TRENCHED it this time, had them mount the fiber modem and router on the inside wall of the garage, and then did the rest of the network myself. So far flawless.
What I learned from this is to be sure to meet the installer outside, be sure he's called the utilities and knows where to dig, be sure he intends to trench the cables he needs to run to the house, and make sure he intends to run all other cables either along the walls well above ground level, through the basement, or through the attic.
And if they don't do these things, call the salescreature back and cancel the service. You can do that within 30 days, even if you signed a multi-year contract. By telling them you're going to cancel up front and why, you are then in a position to negotiate from strength. But if they don't fix it in a week or so, cancel in earnest and look for another provider.
Under no circumstances should an installer be allowed to work unsupervised.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
I wouldn't immediately dismiss it.
I worked for an ISP for a while. And while our techies were at least halfway decent and didn't cause too many problems, the installations we outsourced to various companies were sometimes rather crude hacks. They got paid by the installation, so anything that required more than a "go in, assemble, turn on, go" would cut into their profits. And that in turn led them to quite odd practices sometimes, where cables were thrown across rooms because the installing technician didn't have enough cable with him at that time to move along the walls, network boxes that were tossed behind desks instead of being neatly screwed to walls, bent and twisted cables that weren't replaced when they accidentally dropped something on them and simply "stealing" power cables because they had two installations to do and only one working power cable with them (so they installed it at the first customer and simply swiped that cable to be able to install the other one).
I have no idea what could possibly get a tech to do a hack like this, but I wouldn't deem it completely impossible without knowing the whole story behind it.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Looks like something you would see on the repair blog "thereifixedit.com:
Improvised heatsink
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
I can think of 2 different reasons to submit it anonymously.
1: The anonymous poster wasn't him, just someone who stumbled across the pictures in the picasa gallery.
2: He is Benjamin, but he doesn't want us to know his Slashdot username.
Seems so very unlikely a paid technician would perform this sort of "install" unless they were deliberately trying to get fired and/or cause trouble.
I worked at Qwest for ten years and because they contract independent techs in a lot of the CLEC regions (where they're not the incumbent carrier), and based on my own experience years ago fielding provisioning/repair calls, what you describe does not particularly surprise me.
I'm checking with my former manager in the IPNOC to see who you might escalate this issue to directly. I'll get back to you if they can give me someone.
Turns out this was not Qwest after all, but another ISP in our area. My apologies to Qwest for the error.
Turns out this wasn't Qwest after all, but another (to remain nameless) ISP in our area. My apologies to Qwest for the mistake.
Qwest fail fail!
looks like QWest sent a Cease and Desist letter or something... the photo on Picasa has been replaced with an apology.... sorry Mr Corporate Attorney Sir: http://lh6.ggpht.com/_sU7dL3OFMpY/TTeLgGH6COI/AAAAAAAAM-E/lmPuM9IC_b8/QwestSorry.png
We have a Qwest network juncture in our back yard. When it was originally installed, there were phone cables laying on the ground for much of the neighborhood. Worked pretty good, so long as people had no plans to mow their yards.
Hello, this is Steve at Qwest. I am a manger in the social media group. We have tried contacting the poster trying to find an adress associated with this to no avail. When we go back to the posted links, the pics have been removed. If anyone knows where this is located, please let us know at talktous@qwest.com, Steve in the subject line, much appreciated! Regards Steve Q-TalkToUs www.socialmedia.qwest.com
A former QWest CEO went to prison. In my experience, the new QWest CEO is no more honest.
Or he could do like I do every single day, and just do the job, and do the job right.
Unfortunately at this point the only picture to reference is the one in the slashdot summary as the original has been removed, however based on the summary description and picture, I just can't even imagine what they were thinking. I have seen some pretty creative installs though, and the usual culprit is contractors who are paid by the hour instead of by the job, if they can save 10 seconds they will, no matter what it does to the quality of the job. And management usually loves them for it, because their numbers are good... unless you include the number of repairs they cause...
I install phone, internet, and TV, including ADSL, Fibre Optics, and Satellite services. I do it in Canada, and I do it year round. Weather is not a valid excuse. I have installed satellite dishes in blizzards at -25c, I have terminated fibre optics when I couldn't feel my fingers, and couldn't keep the snow out of the mechanical splicer, and I have terminated aerial service drops at the top of a pole while soaked to the bone and feeling the line voltage through my soaked gloves, and I have NEVER cancelled or rescheduled a job due to weather.
Weather is part of the job, if you don't want to work outside in whatever the weather happens to be, you don't work as a telecommunication technician doing residential and small business installs and repairs. It's pretty much that simple.
That said, I also get to work outdoors in the sunshine in the summer, I have worked on connection boxes on the side of the road not 5 meters away from a moose with 2 calves, and I have worked on rooftops and at pole-tops with views you could sell, and I get amazing variety and no managers watching over my shoulder, I never want to work a desk job again.
Yeah it seems to be BS because the target source says "it wasn't qwest but another anonymous group". Sounds to me that they got threatened by Qwest for this joke.
If you check the website linked to in the article, they're now hosting an image that says: "Turns out this wasn't Qwest after all, but another (to remain nameless) ISP in our area. My apologies to Qwest for the mistake." Oops.
Dear god, that is horrendous. More pictures, please!
Did the installer(s) by chance have accents which might suggest they came from Arabia or African proper? Rumour has it that kind of bumfuckery is common there.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
Contractors who are paid by the hour wouldn't be the ones that try to save ten seconds, they would be the ones who take 4 hours to do a 30 min install. Its the ones that are paid by the job that will try to finish as fast as possible and get out.
"unplug it and shuck it in a Salvation Army box" ?
I have no idea what could possibly get a tech to do a hack like this, but I wouldn't deem it completely impossible without knowing the whole story behind it.
Quotas.
SB
It's old. The more humans I meet, the more I like my cats. At least they are honest.
Fake...and he's already removed the pic from Picassa and backpedalled it being quest.
Mike @ The Geek Pub. Let's Make Stuff!
So what ISP was it then? I mean you called out a national one, why not the local one?
oops... I meant to say paid by the job instead of by the hour...
I'm paid by the hour, but half our workforce is paid by the job. the difference shows, and finally management is admitting the same thing!
It's not just internet installations. When our DirecTV was installed, the installer installed the dish directly above the cable box (pointing halfway into the roof) and connected the dish to the cable, letting him use the existing cable wiring. Of course, that meant only one of our dual tuners was actually set up, and the signal strength was 70% (60's the minimum) in good weather. Then, when Comcast figured out we were no longer their customers, they cut all the wires leading to the cable box, turning off our DirecTV.
The main thing I learned from this was not to let my wife sign for the work of installers.
This was not Qwest. Please +up this post. I cannot get Slashdot to retract.
if you want s**t done right, do it yourself.
Comcast would have put the equipment in the snow.
I watched as a crew hammer-drilled through an 18" thick brick wall of a >300 year-old building to install a single Cat-5 cable. Hole was dead center in my rented apartment wall. They shoved in grey conduit for the cable, duct taped it to the convenient handrail of a staircase, then down the wall to the receptacle. Job well done, they went to lunch. Some else showed up a week later to install the cable itself.
I am getting a 404 error code when I tried the link.
Can people please validate the link before posting?
Thank you
Luv
Mark
Most Respectfully Yours Mark Allyn Bellingham, Washington
I used to work for both cable and satellite companies, and would believe an installer did this FAR quicker than any one else... This is mild compaired to what ive seen.... satellite dishes mounted to the trunk of a car, a wire run waste height right accost the FRONT GOD DAMN DOOR, electrical wire run through creek beds.... HELL, id almost compliment the installer for not putting a self tapping screw into the gas main to ground the bitch, but then again, i wish installers like this would attempt that... it would fix the problem... well no it wouldnt, the problem comes from the contractor paying the installer shit to do a HELL of a job, and over booking by 200%... thats how our media company's roll these days.... over booked and under paid (with 0 accountability).... result: shit work.
As of about 7:33 PM Pacific time, I am getting a 404 error on your link.
Please check your links prior to posting!!!
Most Respectfully Yours Mark Allyn Bellingham, Washington
I wouldn't deem it impossible, and would likely deem it probable.
I used to work for a large american ISP whom I am not at liberty to name. However I worked in support. We had everything from a call from a guy whose wife was in his bed at the time banging our technician to a call about a tech that took a shit while he was in the customers attic fixing some wiring.
After having worked inside one of those companies where these things get reported... I'll believe damn near anything I hear about them at this point.
I highly doubt any professional would install this
You have no idea what you're talking about then. I work in the physical security industry, key cards, camera systems, alarms, etc. Not homeowner crap, businesses and government customers. Our company has cleaned up stuff at least this bad left behind by our competitors more than once. In most states a DSL install doesn't even need an 06 licensed electrician unless a building permit has been pulled. The guy who did that "install" was probably changing oil at Quickie Lube last week and is flipping burgers this week.
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
If they showed up on time, hell I'd give them a call to set up my connection. And I will insist on the same level of quality as yours.
WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
and charged you for damage to company property
Ask Me About... The 80's!
Customer: your!tech!is!banging!my!wife!in!my!bed!
Support: Sir?
Customer: !!!!!!!
Support: Sir, he's a professional. So please just relax, and let him finish his installation.
Kid-proof tablet..
Yer, Quit Yer Bitchin'!
Back In My Day, we only got given PAPER protection covers!
---
Not sure how it is in America but in many other countries doing a "temporary" job does not allow you to bypass the safety regulations, of which you have plenty to choose from here. You have electrical equipment not suitable for their environment, you have breach the API hazardous area zoning, and I wonder what the phone company thinks of this installation when an equipment fault sends a spike back up their line.
Temporary installations need to be rendered safe before the worksite is left. In a situation like this it would mean that the power is isolated and locked out, and the equipment is not put in service.
You sir, are a credit to your job and i hope the installers i meet in the future are even half as dedicated as you.
People, what a bunch of bastards
lol, Americans... 200 comments demanding a lawsuit.
How about you start with putting in another call, or sending an email, saying you want the matter escalated. Explain what's wrong and what you think needs doing to fix it.
Really no need to involve lawyers just yet - learn to manage your suppliers a bit better.
I would be removing it anonymously or getting the ground keeper to clean up the rubbish.
I've been in Telecoms for a long time, and I have a hard time believing that a Qwest installer really did that. Whoever did it should definitely not be doing installs. There must be more to this story than we are being told.
-- -- Warning. Do not stare directly at the sun.
Take the sh!t and sell it on Ebay.
Does anyone know if the welded gas pipes in the photo are common? I don't remember seeing anything like it.
Normally I ascribe all life to intelligent design, but in your case I'll make an exception.
Funny, the original poster of this article, aka "bablakely", has taken down both his picaso site and personal website in response to this. He's a PhD candidate at Iowa State University of Science and Technology. Don't you have better things to do with your time?
Does it power on? Can you get on the internet? Then the installation was a success...
Loading...
At least it wasn't a Target bag.
It looks to me like the tech told the sales person, "Well why don't you install it then!". And the Sales person said "OK I will!"
Mod parent up.
Who else in the telecomm industry stood up to the job-killing Bush administration?
Vote with your wallet if you like privacy.
We did, and Qwest is far better than our previous broadband provider (you know, the one with the 37% drop in direct subscribers).
And, no, never have worked for Qwest, although I have worked for another telco.
There is nothing wrong with yr Internet. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are controlling the transmission - NSA
Of course he should have done the job right. But this one looks over-the-top egregiously badly done, not just a regular-slacker bad job.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
He's removed the pictures (why?) and now put up a single one saying that it's not Qwest (shoot first, ask questions later, eh?), but that the ISP who did it will remain nameless. WTF? So if it had been Qwest, he would have been fine shaming them (a good thing), but since it's not, whoever did do it doesn't deserve to be shamed? I don't really care which ISP did it, anyway, I just want to see the pictures. Why are they gone?
Service inaction.
Really it's Service in action but it sounds like the former when you hear it outloud.
When travelling, it's ok if the airlines lose your emotional baggage.
The Picasa album link isn't working. 404 from Google. 1800 UTC.
"All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain."
Spelling, grammar, punctuation? We need something that checks logic.
As a resident of Ames, IA (Iowa State University student). My guess is the company responsible is ICS advanced technologies. They've got a horrible rep in the city for slow service and shoddy infrastructure (ie not capable of handling the off campus student traffic).
Call the local government and a bureaucrat tells you effectively not to bother him because of their internal administrative divisions. This person makes an above-average salary, gets primo benefits and has a golden retirement package.
Go to the local Walmart, ask the PFY stocking the cereals where to find a lightbulb, and he puts down what he's doing, brings you to the hardware section and helps you find the lightbulb if needed. He gets a bit above minimum wage, and probably no benefits.
One of these two knows how to handle customer service. The other has a monopoly.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Who was this Ben? I thought the business park had fiber from the Univ.... Aren't the only ISPs in town Mediacom & Qwest??? or is there another one that I know nothing about?? Also, I thought you KNEW better then to post anon stuff linking back to your picasa account... I guess you can hit us back 30x harder though! DON'T MESS WITH BEN!
I wonder if the Intel engineers in the story a few days back envisioned this use case scenario when they were testing their Base-T devices.