Can you get the yahoo or SBC DSL in St. Joe? They are supposed to be offering it for $14.95/mo. If you do a self install, just don't install the stupid software, which is useless. I actually had to reload a winders PC for someone after their fine software hosed the system. All you have to do is call em when the self install kit arroves and read off the MAC of the DSL "modem" so the provisioning can happen and set everything for DHCP and you're golden.
If you know enough, you can work around the fact that you don't have winders connected when you troubleshoot. Hell, I had Knoppix on my laptop that I whipped out during my last Comcast install. I just verified that I got an IP and pulled up the current Slashdot. Done. The guy didn't even blink at me about it. A lot of it is attitude, as in an "air of knowledge", that you present yourself with on the tech support line. I always go into it with, "I have tried this, this and this, and I think this is the problem, can you please verify from your end." But don't be an ass on the phone. Treat them how you want to be treated.
Later, Brian
-----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Kelsay, Brian - Kansas City, MO Sent: Wednesday, June 29, 2005 6:41 PM To: Kelsay, Brian - Kansas City, MO Subject: Fwd: Re: GTE and a potential fix