Sometimes dealing with Comcast makes me want to pull my hair out. Unfortunately, it's the only game in town -- or at least my neck of the woods -- for high-speed Internet connectivity.

I've already ditched Comcast's cable TV service and went with Dish Network as the Big C kept jacking the television portion of my bill up month after month. But I still have Internet and phone service through Comcast.

Recently, the company contacted me, telling me that my current modem/router wasn't allowing me to access my Internet connection at its fastest speed. "Would I like to receive a self-installable, new high speed modem and new router?" they asked.

Naturally, I said yes. The hardware arrived, I connected everything and activated the new set-up. Or tried to activate it. Comcast's online set-up never "took" despite my repeated attempts to make it work. It would accept my account info, then simply stall out when the activation process started. I was offered the opportunity to chat with a Comcast representative, so I choose to do so.

I was on and off the chat with "Monica" for about two hours -- usually left twiddling my thumbs as she disappeared to "do the set-up again." Finally, Monica closed the chat and left me hanging.

I called 1-800-COMCAST and spoke with a rep, who walked me through the process. I also found that an inconvenience regarding the fact that I have my telephone through Comcast as well as Internet. On my old modem (an Arris) there was a place to plug in my telephone handset. With the new Ubee D3.0 modem, there is no place to plug in the telephone.

With the "new improved" set-up, you have to have a separate digital voice modem for the phone as well as the high-speed Internet modem. Now I have two modems connected via a cable splitter, taking up more real estate in my home office. And, for what it's worth, the improved Internet speed I'm supposed to experience is barely noticeable.

Perhaps when I finally get that Verizon iPhone (I'm waiting for the iPhone 5), I'll drop Comcast's telephone service. And if there's ever another Internet provider option available to me, I may just bid adieu to Comcast altogether.

-- Dennis Sellers