PEAK Internet

ClearAccess Managed Wi-Fi & Firewall: My Personal Testimony

How would you like a one device solution for your household or business Wi-Fi service?  How does one-call troubleshooting for all your home wireless networking devices sound? Have you ever thought about ways to reduce the complexity of adding devices to your home or business network?  If you answered yes to any of these questions, then today I’ve got good news.  This concept is a reality when you combine the service and support of PEAK Internet with the functionality of ClearAccess modems.

I’m a computer and technology power user, but when it comes to my home network, simplicity is the key.  That’s why I am a big fan of the Managed Wi-Fi and Firewall service currently available within the ClearAccess modems at PEAK Intnernet.   If there is a disconnection issue among my home devices, I don’t want to spend time checking my devices, then the wireless router, and then possibly the DSL modem – I just want it to work.  Same story goes with setting up a WPA password or adding new internet-enabled devices such as an Xbox 360 or PS3; it is always a hassle to remember my password or figure out how to open device ports for custom configurations.  Thanks to my current managed solution, I’ve called PEAK technical support and had my network up and running with just one quick call.

For these reasons the ClearAccess modem is a great solution for me as a power user, but even better for people that don’t quite have a grasp on home or business technology.  Remember that with all this technology around, simplicity is the key. Leveraging the functionality of ClearAccess modems with the expertise of PEAK Internet creates a valuable Internet provider offering.

Take a closer look at the Managed Wi-Fi service that is currently available for your ClearAccess modem.  Currently a one-time fee of $20 (plus standard modem fee) is all that is required to activate and manage your wireless service.  Take my word for it, give it a try!

DirecTV’s Spring 2010 Updates

On February 9^th DirecTV started their Spring 2010 National Offer and a lot of changes were brought along with it. For starters the savings are the biggest DirecTV has ever offered and I believe you will not be able to find another U.S. television provider that can offer more savings in the first 12 months of service. You can get 50% off the regular price for a full year. On top of that PEAK is still offering their Internet & TV bundle discount. As a sales specialist and the go to guy at PEAK for DirecTV, I believe that mixing the local friendly support of PEAK with the amazing service of DirecTV is the best way to go for television service.

Another huge change in DirecTV’s Spring 2010 update is the replacement of both the Plus DVR and Plus HD DVR packages with the new Choice Ultimate package. There was a lot of consumer confusion over what packages included what services (DVR and/or HD), so DirecTV made some well needed changes. Now all the base packages are free of HD and DVR services by default. I believe this streamlining process allows customers to better choose the channel line-up that best fits them, and then add the DVR and HD services on separately. This should also allow customers to have a more realistic expectation of what features and prices they’ll have post install. I think the Choice Ultimate package brings a much better value as a gap filler between Choice Xtra and Premier as it brings 11 new movie channels but leaves out the expensive premiums like HBO and Showtime.

There are some excellent sports packages that I’m pretty excited about right now as some sports are winding down while others are just around the corner. We are offering a Mega March Madness for the NCAA basketball fans out there. This package should keep you from missing a single exciting play throughout the entire tournament. The NBA League Pass should be going half price fairly soon if it hasn’t already. You can track your favorite teams and players with this extensive sports pack. It’s not too early to add MLB Extra Innings to your order, the preseason is close at hand. I don’t know about you guys but I’m hoping for a Red Sox vs Yankees series. I never get tired of that rivalry. Go Yanks! Last but not least let me mention that NASCAR is back and this year has some eye candy for the guys and (finally) a representative for the gals, a la Danica Patrick. I myself like Indy racing better but I’m sure the boys club of American racing will prove to be an interesting challenge for her.

A quick mention of a few more changes DirecTV made on February 9^th. The XM Satellite radio service was discontinued in exchange of SonicTap radio. The main difference you’ll notice here is the lack of DJ’s and commercials. SonicTap is all music all the time. The rebate process has been slightly tweaked to where you need to have an email address registered with directv.com to receive the full discount. Please check out PEAK’s DirecTV section at peakinternet.com/directv for more information on the updated rebate process. DirecTV has updated the promotion for their high end receivers (HD and DVR). You can now get two high end receivers for free during the installation, which will save you up to $400. Of course, you’ll still need to make sure you sign up for the services to match your new hardware.

I would like to mention to everyone out there on cable or the other satellite company for television service; DirecTV is the only television provider PEAK is partnering with and we’re doing it for a reason. We honestly believe they offer the best quality service at the best price. I personally believe that since our customers’ only point of contact is going to be with local PEAK reps, they will have the best experience a DirecTV customer could hope for.

There will be more DirecTV posts on PEAK Chat in the future to keep you up to date as changes happen. Make sure to bookmark blog.peakinternet.com and peakinternet.com/directv to keep them handy for quick viewing. If you have any questions regarding DirecTV please don’t hesitate to give one of our many knowledgeable reps a call or stop into one of our local offices in Corvallis or Lebanon. I hope you all have a wonderful Spring Break.

Customer Survey Now Live – We Want Your Feedback

Each year valuable insights come from interaction with customers that help shape the way PEAK delivers its variety of services.  Most of these insights come from spontaneous, action-driven activities such as support calls, in office tasks (paying bill), or online channels (blog, chat, email).  We get such great information during these customer interactions that we only plan one major customer feedback initiative each year, our annual customer satisfaction survey.

Click here to take survey

Questions on this survey range from basic geographic and service demographics to future initiatives and overall service quality/satisfaction.  Each year this survey is our blueprint on which we build our customer outreach and business planning for the next year.  Services such as DirecTV, SOS Online Back-up and Online Chat are all a result of the feedback we’ve received from customers in the past.  Other objectives like increasing technical support training and network equipment investments are also initiatives that we started from the input on the survey.   Accordingly, I am glad to see the overwhelming participation and honesty in our survey each year.  As a customer you have a good deal of influence over the service we provide. Remember, we’re listening!

Last year we received over 800 responses to the survey and a great deal of information. In 2010, we want to top this figure and get more information that will help PEAK become the provider that gets you the service you need.  This year when you take the Customer Survey you are automatically entered to win one of several prizes, including a year of free internet service or a new iPod Nano.

Thanks for your help, keep the comments coming!

Click here to take survey

New features and functionality announced for your Clear Access modem

About a year ago PEAK made the decision to make modems from Clear Access its primary customer premised equipment (CPE) for DSL customers.  This decision was made because Clear Access provided a higher quality device that offered the promise of added value through expanded services for customers.  Over the past year some of these features were released, providing simplification to the increasingly complex home network.  Over the next month, we would like to showcase some of the impressive functionality Clear Access is building into its devices that will soon be available to you.

Face it – you’re no network administrator.  Even if you were, the last thing you want to do when you get home is troubleshoot your daughter’s Internet connection or figure out why your latency is affecting your gaming on Xbox Live.  The complexity of today’s home networking is rapidly increasing; and with the introduction of so many Internet-enabled devices around the home it’s only getting worse.

The Clear Access modems, offered by PEAK Internet, offer a complete home networking solution so you can relax and enjoy the technology coming into your household.  Through a “connected home” concept, the new modem has the ability to provide Managed WiFi, Parental Internet Controls, Home Monitoring, and Home Network Optimizing.  In addition to these offerings, Clear Access will soon provide integrated services with other organizations to bring home Power Monitoring through Smart Grid technologies, Online Backup from Carbonite, Online Device Management (printers, etc.), and control over other bandwidth enabled services.

This is a lot of information and too many promises to deliver on in just one article, so the one takeaway is to stay tuned for more information coming out about the next generation of releases.  If you haven’t already tried them yet, several of the new services are already available.

Managed WiFi:

New modems from Clear Access offer a Managed WiFi service that can be enabled at your request.  This lets a trusted PEAK support agent create a secure wireless broadcast with a password so unknown users aren’t accessing your network.

Time Blocking:

The Time Blocking feature allows you to set limits on your devices that access an Internet connection.  If you are interested in implementing limits on computers, gaming consoles, or other devices, this feature will do the trick.

Parental Controls:

Content filtering allows you to set which websites and general content are allowed to be viewed on your connection.  If you need a layer of control on your connection, this is a good place to start.

Of all the features mentioned, I am most excited about the Home Control Panel for devices and integration with Application Partners.  I don’t have descriptive details yet, but from what I have seen it will provide an enriched Internet experience.

In brief, the Home Control Panel gives you an easy listing of all the devices accessing your network and all the services you are using (time blocking, parental controls, WiFi).  You are then able to take actions based on your services.

The Application Partners feature allows you to have access to a network of different services all in a portal format.  This interface will give you one screen to manage all the different home computing services you utilize.  Services like Online Backup, Home Security Monitoring, and others are planned as part of this offering.

Thanks for tuning in.  We’ll be using and reviewing these services in-depth and reporting back via PEAK Chat, so check back for additional information. If you would like to see a sample of these services, come into the PEAK office and try it out.

FCC decision in Blazers favor marks positive movement for DirecTV

Where have the Portland Trail Blazers gone on TV?

Unless you currently subscribe to Comcast for television service, it is unlikely that you have been able to watch many Portland Trail Blazers games this year.  So why can’t you watch the games on Fox or ESPN? This is due to an exclusive programming contract Comcast SportsNet Northwest holds with the Blazers that lasts for 10-years, starting in 2007.  The result of this contract has been a relative blackout from other television providers, unless they are willing to pay the exorbitant fees Comcast is requiring (which a few have opted to do).

It is clear that the Blazers would like a, “do-over” with regards to this contract.  They have made repeated demands to rework the contract and recently requested that Comcast share the Blazers programming via internet streaming offers.  However, we have seen no progress – until now.

In a sign that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is noticing some of the anti-competitive tactics that Cable and Satellite television providers are using to gain market share, the FCC voted January 20th to close a “loophole” that allowed cable operators to withhold local sports programming from competitors.  This action apparently doesn’t affect the current state of affairs in Portland (and is largely unrelated), but will free up other markets where other television providers have employed similar tactics with local sports teams.  This action shows some increased scrutiny by the FCC in the dealings of television providers around the country. We hope it means more access to Trail Blazers games in the near future.

As a DirecTV dealer and supporter of our Oregon sports teams, we are very interested in seeing negotiations between Comcast and the Trail Blazers occur with a fan-friendly outcome in mind.  At PEAK we feel very strongly about providing quality services (like the Internet service we provide), thus we strive to ensure DirecTV is providing the best service available and this includes access to your local sports team programming.  DirecTV has been very responsive to our frequent inquiries about Trail Blazers programming, but unable to offer many comments other than that the pricing for Comcast SportsNet Northwest is prohibitive within the current DirecTV customer pricing (in other words, they would need to raise their prices).

So if you are a Trail Blazers fan and are frustrated by the lack of access to their games over the past two seasons, please understand it is a high priority item for PEAK as well.  In all the lobbying influence we have at our disposal with DirecTV we are asking for Trail Blazers.

In an effort for disclosure – as it stands today, satellite providers Dish Network and DirecTV can offer Comcast SportsNet Northwest to customers.  Unfortunately, Comcast SportsNet Northwest has been priced so that the satellite providers have not elected to purchase the programming.  Comcast in no way has denied access to any interested provider, but has chosen to restrict access to only subscribing providers.  The Trail Blazers are negotiating within the means of the their contract to explore ways to more effectively offer the Trail Blazers content.

Regulatory Cost Recovery Fee

Starting in February of 2010 a monthly “Regulatory Cost Recovery Fee” will be added to your bill, initially in the amount of $0.75. This fee applies only to customers that are using “Access” services (i.e. DSL, Dial-up, and some other connections).  Please note that this fee is being added to help with the increasing costs of various taxes and fees PEAK gets charged each year to access the network facilities associated with Internet services.

Traditionally PEAK has absorbed these fees and has not altered service pricing, thus making this additional cost invisible to customers. However, as these costs continue to rise, it has become necessary to begin offsetting these charges in order to maintain the high quality service PEAK promises to provide.

We were careful in our approach to this fee and decided to make it a separate line item on your bill, similar to what your utility bill may already reflect. This way, we hope you understand that this isn’t a price increase adding to PEAK’s profits, but rather a fee that is being collected to offset our regulatory expenses and taxes each month.

If you are interested in discussing this matter please call us at 800.731.4871 or comment on this post; and again, thank you for choosing PEAK for your Internet service needs.

New Spam Filtering System

Ready for a spam blocking upgrade?  I’m happy to announce that PEAK will soon be upgrading to the Red Condor Spam Filtering service starting in February.  Red Condor offers a set of different features and a sleek new interface that should make navigating your spam console easier.

Red Condor is a next generation email security system that eliminates unwanted email without the need to continuously monitor and adjust spam filters. With no intervention from you, your spam problem simply disappears.

Red Condor also offers better filtering abilities than the current Barracuda system and will provide capacity for the ever-increasing proliferation of spam.  This investment in upgraded services is the latest effort from PEAK to provide premium email service to customers, so accordingly look for this effort to continue (remember: new email system coming soon).

The battle against unsolicited and malicious email (spam) is a constant and ongoing part of providing email service to customers.  This is a tough fight, with over a million messages delivered each day to PEAK domains. Around 90% of those messages are spam (you may notice them being blocked by the Barracuda Spam Filter). This figure drives the PEAK engineering team to stay vigilant, constantly monitoring the email platform and making upgrades as necessary. This is a timely upgrade and I’m certain you will all enjoy the improvements that Red Condor offers.

The Red Condor system provides a familiar interface to most email clients, the difference being that Red Condor contains messages caught by the filter and not delivered to your PEAK mailbox.  To view blocked messages, delete, or release messages you simply need to log in to your Personal Dashboard with your PEAK credentials.  From there you may navigate and configure your settings.

Here are some resources provided by Red Condor that will help you learn the new system (note: these links will navigate you away from PEAK’s blog site).

Flash Video:

Personal Dashboard – (3 minutes, 5 seconds) (recommended for Broadband users)

Spam Digest – (1 minute, 8 seconds) (recommended for Broadband users)

Manuals:

Personal Dashboard User Guide (online) (recommended for Dial-Up users)
Personal Dashboard User Guide (pdf)
Personal Dashboard FAQ (online) (recommended for Dial-Up users)
Personal Dashboard FAQ (pdf)

Remember the transition to Red Condor will begin in February. You will notice a different set of “Spam Digest” emails from Red Condor when your email account has been migrated.

M. Laport

Oregon’s New Area Code

As the countdown draws closer, we wanted to give one more mention of the new Oregon area code that is set to be introduced on January 10th. The new area code, 458, is set to augment the entire 541 area code that is already in place in southern, mid, and eastern Oregon. The addition of the new area code brings about the requirement for ten digit dialing for all local calls (541/458‐xxx‐xxxx) and will take effect in January 2010.

What does this mean for your Internet and telecommunications services? At PEAK, this means that if you connect to the Internet through a Dial‐up connection, you will need to update the area code section of your connection settings (either 541 or 458). Otherwise you will most likely receive an error when dialing.

Here’s how to make the change on your computer.  If you need help updating this prompt, don’t hesitate to call and ask for help.

Configuring your mailbox applications

The mail server upgrade may make it necessary to update your mail application settings to connect with PEAK mail servers and receive mail.  Please utilize these screen shot guides as a way reconnect your computer to your email.  Note: these guides are only necessary if you are using an email application such as: Outlook, Thunderbird, or Apple Mail.

In these guides, where you see “vmail01.peak.org” for the server addresses, you should use: “mail.actionnet.net“

Using POP to read your mail:

POP (Post Office Protocol), which most people use, downloads mail to your computer to read, where you can keep as much of it as you want, but you can only access it from one computer. We frequently have people complain about missing mail, only to find that they left another computer running a pop mail client and it fetched the mail there instead of the one they wanted it on. If you only need to access mail on one computer, this is the simpler solution however:

• Thunderbird

New account

Update existing account

• Outlook

New account

Update existing account

• Apple Mail

New account

Update existing account

Using IMAP to read your mail:

IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol), increasingly common, is a more complex protocol that leaves your mail on the mail server, where it can be accessed from multiple computers, even at the same time. It is more flexible, but you are limited on how much you can leave there, and will still need to move it to your local computer if you want to keep it indefinitely (otherwise, you’ll eventually run out of room on the server):

Thunderbird

New account

Update existing account

Outlook

New account

Update existing account

Apple Mail

New account

Update existing account

Note that because of the completely different message management involved, most mail clients can’t switch an account from one type to the other. If you want to switch, you need to delete (or disable) the old account configuration in your mail program and add (or re-enable) the new one.

ActionNet Email Upgrade

To Actionnet.net email users -

Don't Forget to update your user name when logging in to the new system. You must have: "@actionnet.net" as a part of your whole user name.

(setting changes and actions involved in this migration only affect actionnet.net users and not other current PEAK administered email domains)

Thank you for your continued patronage as a PEAK Internet customer. As part of an ongoing effort to provide quality services for customers, PEAK will be upgrading the email system that is currently providing your service.  It is expected that this process will be seamless and your current email and contacts will be preserved.  Please note the important access changes in this note:

• PEAK will be migrating from the current mail system to an upgraded mail platform.  This upgrade will provide added stability, ease of use, and improved user-interface.  The exact date for this transition will be December 2nd, 2009.  Your archived mail will be migrated soon after the account transition.

• To access your mail after December 2nd, you must use your complete customer username to log-in.  As an example, rather than using “user124,” you must now use “user124@actionnet.net.”

• During this process, all easily exploitable passwords (less than six letters, no special characters,

  

  If have trouble logging into your account, try appending the text included in the notification email from PEAK to the end of your password.

  etc.) will be reset with the appended text originally sent in the notifying email message.  After you log-in using this new combination, your password needs to be changed.  You may do this by accessing: http://zmail.peak.org/ with your updated account information, clicking on “Preferences,” then “General,” and “Change Password.”  Note:  weak passwords are being actively exploited by spammers.  This step is being taken to prevent the threat of account hijacking and subsequent fraudulent activity.

• Please select a password with at least eight characters that includes digits, uppercase letter, lowercase letters and special characters (such as those above the digit keys on your keyboard).

• General mail settings:

Email account name:     user@actionnet.net

IMAP or POP server:     mail.actionnet.net

SMTP Server:                    mail.actionnet.net

If you want to connect to the mail server in a more secure manner, using TLS or SSL, then use http://zmail01.peak.org for IMAP, POP, and SMTP servers so that the security certificate will be properly identified by the mail server. This is highly recommended for users accessing the Internet via a wireless connection and recommended for all email users. 

For more information, a short guide on setting your advanced security options.

For more information on updating your mail application, visit our guide.

Thank you for your cooperation during this upgrade and please understand that your complete satisfaction is our first priority!  If you have any difficulties or questions about the transition, please call PEAK at 800.731.4871 for support.

Remember! PEAK Internet is a full service provider, giving you a wide range of Internet-related service choices for your home or business.  In addition to our reliable emails services, we offer high-speed DSL, and a variety of hosting services.  Please feel free to contact us for more information on any of the services we offer.