Verizon Fios Teased Us for Months

We watched for months as Verizon installed the lines for Verizon Fios in our neighborhood about 5 years ago. We knew it was coming, but we had to wait. Such a tease! I had read about Verizon Fios in other areas of the country and we couldn’t wait to get it installed. Finally after watching them dig holes and lay cables, we got a notice on our door telling us we could call and order Verizon Fios. What a happy day that was in the McGraw household.

We had Verizon install everything including Fios TV and Fios Internet. Then the fun began. We have had Verizon Fios for over 5 years and we have been very happy with it. We have had very few problems or outages. It doesn’t go out when we get a big storm (and we’ve had a hurricane and 2 snow storms with at least 2 feet of snow each.) When we have had issues, we can call the Verizon support 24/7 and most of the time they can fix the problem by resetting our account.

Verizon Fios has added many new features since we first got it. A few are:

• Add widgets to your screen like Facebook
• Control your DVR from your smart phone
• Flex View – Start watching a show in your Living Room and switch to watching it on your laptop (so you can grab some popcorn and never miss a beat.)
• Use your smart phone as a remote control.

Verizon Fios Smartphone Remote

At first, I wasn’t really sure why I would need to use my iPhone as a remote control for my TV (unless I lose the remote.) I decided to try it anyways. I fired it up and this is what I saw:

I signed in using my account username and password. Then there were step-by-step instructions leading me through the set-up of my iPhone as a remote control. In a few minutes, I was all synced up.

As you can see, all the buttons that are on the Verizon Fios remote are here on the iPhone remote. There wasn’t any delay either. When I press a button, the changes were made on my TV. I discovered a few really cool features.

Verizon Fios iPhone Remote Picture Show

If you click on the “Back” button on the top left, you get a few choices. I pressed Photos and then chose a photo from my iPhone. This is what I saw on my iPhone:

Press on the “Play on TV” in the lower right and this is what appeared on my TV.

How cool is that? It plays through all the pictures on my iPhone in a slide show format. That feature made the whole app worth it.

Verizon Fios Widgets on Remote Control

Click on the TV Widgets buttons and you’ll see a list of available widgets. I clicked on the Twitter widget and this came up on the TV.

Those tweets are about #NCIS because that is the show that I am watching. So cool!!! When you try to type something in on the iPhone remote, you get to use a real keyboard instead of the regular Verizon input tool.

I like that you see what channel and show you are watching. When you click on the arrow to the right of the channel, you get this screen.

Click on any of those icons and you will see more information about the show you are watching. Having the smart phone remote makes the TV viewing experience very interactive.

I did run into a few problems when I was trying to set this up. We have two DVR units in our house. The remote control on my iPhone did not work with the first one I tried. I had no problems setting up the remote on the second DVR unit. I’m not sure what the difference is between the two. The first unit I tried we have had much longer than the second one.

Want to learn how to see the Twitter stream on your Verizon FiOS TV during your favorite shows?

Verizon Fios Availability

Verizon Fios is not available everywhere, so please check the availability in your area.

Disclosure: I wrote this review while participating in a brand team campaign by Mom Central on behalf of Verizon FiOS.Verizon will send me a gift card to thank me for taking the time to participate. All opinion are 100% my own.

Let’s Talk About Verizon Fios!

Do you have Verizon Fios? Have you tried any of the new Verizon Fios features?

Related articles

• Why I Love My Verizon Fios (shortpumppreppy.com)
• Verizon FiOS – making life more entertaining (thedomesticbuzz.com)