Intermittent Connectivity on hardwired connection

I was having the same problem (intermittent connection that drops several times an hour for only about a minute, but long enough to completely disconnect from the internet) for about 2 weeks, but now it has been resolved with the help of Telus tech support. It was a faulty/dying ONT (Optical Network Terminal), which was replaced. 

Background:

I started having issues ever since I moved the Telus hardware (ONT and WiFi router) and installed a new switch. After trying everything I could myself (removing the router, connecting directly to the Telus WiFi router with an ethernet cable, verifying the ethernet cables are working, and then unplugging everything for 5 minutes and turning everything back on) but still the problem persisted. I then called Telus tech support and they ran a through diagnostic on my system using an app I installed on my phone which allowed them to thoroughly test the system. At that time they said the hardware worked fine and that the only issue might be that I had too many devices connected at once (only 29 devices). I then tried my system for another day with only a small number of devices connected but still experienced issues. I then installed a chrome extension that monitors the network connection and generates a log report (called "Internet Connection Monitor", found on the chrome web store). From that report it was evident there was still a problem; the internet was still dropping several time an hour, no change from when the problem was first experienced. I called TELUS back and they detected a hardware problem (which didn't show up before, I suspect because of the intermittent nature of the problem). They sent a tech out who replaced the ONT and that solved the problem.

Hopefully this helps others experiencing the same frustrating problem.