Failed Gateway Upgrade to XB7

Xfinity had been pestering me for over a year to upgrade my Gateway from old Arris to the XB7.  Everything had been working fine for many years and I usually try to avoid making any changes if not absolutely necessary.  Anyway for some reason I decided to give it a try.

 It should have been an easy activation but never worked.  Had 3 different online tech support reps trying to get it activated.  Then had to schedule a tech visit to the house.  Although he got it activated the Internet connection kept dropping.  He spent over an hour calling tech support then finally they decided to change to the XB6 box and for some reason that worked.

Then I wanted to split the Bands so my equipment could lock in to a separate 2.4Ghz band, but for some reason my account was showing that I had an Extender that needed to be activated.  Never had an extender and never received one when I had picked up the XB7.  So after much discussion with tech support they said to delete the non existent Extender.  That solved that problem.

Another issue is that when I picked up the XB7 at the store I signed up for a 5 year deal.  But somehow my speed got lowered to 300Mbps from 400Mbps.  Not sure why that happened.  And oddly when I was doing the troubleshooting with chat tech support the guy said I could get 500Mbps for the same price plan!!!!  How is that possible.  Of course I declined since it sounded a bit odd that tech support was giving me a deal.  Things are not always as they seem.

So the question is—what exactly was the problem that the XB7 couldn’t hold the signal???  The cable wire coming into the house is a vey old thin cable.  The on-site tech thought that was odd.  He cut off a piece than then connected a thicker wire from the end of the thin wire to the new Gateway.  Of course in the process he kept putting his tools on my end table top so now I have some ugly marring on my end table that will be a constant reminder of this incredibly ridiculous experience!!!!