Signal Flow

I needed to recharge my iPod Touch. Instead of walking over to an open outlet, I thought I'd save time by moving a plugged in cord on a power strip to clear out a plug to use.

So you know that this time-saving simple plug move cascaded into a 1-1/2 hour Internet outage, right?

Yes indeed. It turns out that what I unplugged was my router. That seemed to knock out my DSL connection. I unplugged the DSL modem to let it reset. I've done that before with power outages for my entire home, so why wouldn't it work with a power outage to just the device?

Well, it didn't work. I rebooted after plugging in the modem. I actually found the installation disk and went through that and it kept telling me that the connection was bad. So I rechecked every connection. Three calls to automated tech support kept getting me the same conclusion.

I even added a DSL phone filter to a phone line that I recently plugged in upstairs (but which isn't connected, so it shouldn't have mattered one way or another). Heck, I'd have to do that anyway and I had the filter.

This was puzzling. Like I said, I've lost power before and only needed to unplug the modem to reset everything. Sure, my set up is now different from the diagrams because I have a router inserted into the signal flow. But I have lost power before so this isn't any different.

Still, the signal flow is non-standard.

So I rewire the tangle to just my modem. Success! Internet connection! That means the router is the problem. But while that is fine for me, my son's computer requires wireless and my daughter and son (and me for that matter) would miss Netflix through the Wii.

And speaking of Netflix, darn them to heck for their massive planned fee increase. I got them for the disks and learned to love the streaming, first on my computer monitor and then on my TV through the Wii. But I will either monitor Amazon's streaming and see if getting their Amazon Prime membership along with included streaming video is better. Or perhaps just drop the disks and use the local Blockbuster where I still have an ancient but unused membership for the occasional movie. It's nice to have the stream of disks coming in off my list--sometimes at a surprise because I'm not paying attention to the list--but I may just accept that loss. We'll see. They have every right to charge what they think they need to so as to make a profit, mind you. But a low-cost entertainment option is going up steeply so I have every right to consider my options.

But I digress. Although it was a signal flow issue, I suppose.

So, risking my reestablished connection, I unplug the router and let it sit while I get some more coffee. I plug it in and the lights are behaving more normally.

So I reconfigure the wires to put the router back into the flow. I click on a web site and ... success! I have Internet connection and the router is looking all normal on the dash lights.

Woo hoo!

And note to self: Never, ever touch the power strip that prompted this cascade of time waste.