3 years and 3500kbs less later

[Desaan]

Hey all,

Before I start off on my post (which will inevitably turn into a rant  ) please take a look at my attached file, it's basically the csv from speedtest.net over the course of 3 years, pretty much since I joined IDNET.

As you will see, my connection started off around 4500kbs average for the weeks after the MAX training period and I had absolutely no problems at all.  6 months later its dropped off a bit, down around 1000kbs.  No big deal right? Wrong.  3 months later another 500kbs is wiped off and 6 months pass and another 500kbs goes and so on.  Until I reached today and my connection is now officially twice as bad as it was with Nildram when I left.  In 3 years with IDnET my connection has gone from 4500kbs to under 2000kbs.   I even shelled out £80 on a new router 2 months ago and its had bugger all effect, gone through all the usual line test stuff and there is nothing blindingly obvious other than the fact that my so called 'Dynamic Profile' is in fact 'Dynamically cr*p'.

In 3 years I've had no complaint with IDnET's service or performance but are BT giving me the shaft here and dropping my profile to lessen some load they are carrying?  According to my knowledge, profiles should only change in times of instabilty/stability and apart from the few weeks after Christmas I really can't remember having any problems with the service, ever.  My old router even had an uptime of over 100 days before I changed to the new one, was sad to turn it off.   


I'm tech savvy more than most (bench engineer, tech support, network admin) and I'm easily infuriated by the almost seemingly scripted responses I get whenever I raise this issue.  What to do? Blame BT? Blame IDnet? Look elsewhere?  Money is not the issue but the service at the moment is, when you pay £25 a month for your net connection alone when companies like virgin are offering the same service with a phone package thrown in for £17 a month it make me wonder....

Told you it would be a rant 

[attachment deleted by admin]

[Rik]

Unfortunately, I can't offer much in the way of helpful suggestions without knowing what your profile is and was. I am aware that many lines have degraded over the past couple of years, partly because of a lack of maintenance and partly because as more people take up ADSL, crosstalk is on the increase.

Do you have any profile figures, plus your current download sync speed, noise margin and attenuation?

[psp83]

Desaan, I've had the same with my line, When i joined IDnet i had full sync for a year, but since then its gone down and down, i am now around 5000kbps from 8***kbps i used to get.

I've got nowhere with my line, i've reported it to idnet loads of times and all they get from BT is "no problems" so until the gov does something about it, we are stuck with BT controlling everything

[Desaan]

Yus, I sure do  

ADSL Link               Downstream    Upstream
Connection Speed   3264 kbps    448 kbps
Line Attenuation         51.0 db    29.5 db
Noise Margin         15.0 db    22.0 db


Modem
ADSL Firmware Version    A2pB023b.d20e
Modem Status Connected
DownStream Connection Speed 3264 kbps
UpStream Connection Speed    448 kbps
VPI    0
VCI  38


BT Speed Test

Test1 comprises of Best Effort Test: -provides background information.
Your DSL connection rate: *3264 kbps*(DOWN-STREAM),  *448kbps*(UP-STREAM)
IP profile for your line is - *2000 kbps*
Actual IP throughput achieved during the test was - *1865 kbps*


I'm aware that the Line Attenuation is on the high side but to be honest, its always been around high 40's low 50's.  I regularly backup my tests with the BT speed test, every time I perform it the IP profile for the line is *LOWER* than it was the last time I tested.  I have no sync issues or d/c issue yet it deems itself to change why?  

[uxbod]

Filtered face plate ? Internal wiring ? Business class router ? The list could go on to be honest. Please provide further details of your setup and configuration.

[Rik]

I hate to say this, but the combination of the 15db noise margin and the profile being 1.5Mbps too low for the sync speed suggests that your connection has been dropping frequently, and the BT software has set about trying to stabilise the line. That noise margin is taking 1500k or so off your sync speed, so if it were stabilised you would return to a sync of around 4800, with a profile of 4Mbps.

Have you read the wiring optimisation guide in our FAQs?

[Desaan]

Desaan, I've had the same with my line, When i joined IDnet i had full sync for a year, but since then its gone down and down, i am now around 5000kbps from 8***kbps i used to get.

I've got nowhere with my line, i've reported it to idnet loads of times and all they get from BT is "no problems" so until the gov does something about it, we are stuck with BT controlling everything

If that trend continues we'll be back on 56k in about 2.5 years  

I will not be fobbed off though, I know there is something going on, why keep dropping the profile otherwise?

[Dopamine]

If you don't already do so, I'd strongly recommend running a constant RouterStats graph and seeing what/when it is that's causing BT to give you a 15db noise margin.

I've used it helping several friends with problems. All bar one have been able to use the RouterStats data to trace problems to noisy electrical equipment in their homes. One was a faulty central heating timer, another a faulty dimmer switch, a third a faulty wireless phone base station.

http://www.vwlowen.co.uk/internet/files.htm

[Rik]

Good tip, Dopamine. 

[Desaan]

I hate to say this, but the combination of the 15db noise margin and the profile being 1.5Mbps too low for the sync speed suggests that your connection has been dropping frequently, and the BT software has set about trying to stabilise the line. That noise margin is taking 1500k or so off your sync speed, so if it were stabilised you would return to a sync of around 4800, with a profile of 4Mbps.

Have you read the wiring optimisation guide in our FAQs?

That's just it though, it hasn't been dropping.


As on the wiring front I'm non too sure, there is an NTE5 in the hallway downstairs which I've tried with filters in and out of, has no effect.  That is unused, as upstairs I have something totally different (where the PC is), I used to have ISDN back in the day an the engineer replaced that faceplate with another kind.  I have no idea what the hell it is  

[Rik]

I hear what you say, but why are you sure it hasn't been dropping? The two bits of evidence from your stats suggests it has. It might be worth asking support on Monday to see what disconnections you are showing. Is there any way you could move the router to the master socket, and connect it to the test socket revealed when you remove the faceplate. A photo of the current socket you're using would be handy too, preferably one of the front and one of the wires inside.

[Desaan]

If you don't already do so, I'd strongly recommend running a constant RouterStats graph and seeing what/when it is that's causing BT to give you a 15db noise margin.

I've used it helping several friends with problems. All bar one have been able to use the RouterStats data to trace problems to noisy electrical equipment in their homes. One was a faulty central heating timer, another a faulty dimmer switch, a third a faulty wireless phone base station.

http://www.vwlowen.co.uk/internet/files.htm

I'll work on that one, although my Netgear DGN2000 is unlisted there so not sure what I can do with it.

[Rik]

Try it, it works with quite a few routers that aren't listed - it's just may require some fiddling.

[Desaan]

Try it, it works with quite a few routers that aren't listed - it's just may require some fiddling.

How much noise am I looking to eliminate btw?  The whole lot or good reduction?  Does it fluctuate much or should it be?

I'm starting to think something is wrong somewhere, poking around downstairs and its dropped off to 13.0 now

[Rik]

The noise margin will vary over time. The significant figure is immediately after you connect or re-boot. If that's 15db, then your target margin has been increased from the normal 6db figure by BT's dynamic line management software. It does this in response to perceived instability, ie frequent losses of sync. More than about 10 an hour will cause an increase of 3db, repeating until it gets stability or reaches 15db.

Netgears are renowned for reporting NM badly, mine used to drop to -2db before re-syncing, which is technically impossible. Since I've moved to a 2700, my NM only varies by 2db and I rarely drop sync.

Thinking about it, Routerstats will probably work, 'out of the box' with your router unless Netgear have changed their interface drastically.

[Glenn]

You could try a quiet line test dial 17010 option 2, listen for any noise on the line apart from a gentle hum

[Desaan]

You could try a quiet line test dial 17010 option 2, listen for any noise on the line apart from a gentle hum

Already tried that, clean as a whistle 

Routerstats seems pretty accurate, at least its reporting what my router page also states, except now I have it handy graph form

[Rik]

If you can leave the machine running for 24 hours, you'll get a good picture of what's happening.

[Desaan]

This is the faceplate that was installed upstairs after the ISDN switchover about 5-6 years ago (roughly) 

Now I definitely think there is a huge wiring issue because for the life of me I can't find where this faceplates wire goes and its not to the NTE5 in the hallway downstairs, there is absolutely nothing connected to that one, its not been used for as long as I've had the one upstairs yet it still works but with no obvious connections to the one upstairs.

Confused? 

Yes

[EDIT] Just to add, both downstairs and up are both wired through terminals 2 and 5, nothing on 3 on either

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[Sebby]

So what is your wiring like at the moment? The line comes into the house and goes where?

[LesD]

I have just downloaded RouterStats 4.8 and am finding it difficult to configure for my 2Wire 2700 HGV

At the Configure - Router Search Text tab when I click the Get Page button

A message stating:

To use this page to customize the features of your BT2700HGV, you must
have JavaScript enabled     JavaScript is currently disabled in your browser..........

As far as I can determine I have JavaScript enabled in IE7
I have checked as below and it is enabled!

Click the Tools menu.
Select Internet Options.
Click the Security tab.
Click the Custom Level button.
Scroll down until you see the 'Scripting' section. Select the 'Enable' radio button for 'Active Scripting.'
Click the OK button.
Click the Yes button in the confirmation window.

The Rx Noise margin (dB) graph is currently showing a blue line stepping up to 780 dB and then staying constant
while there is a pink one that looks to be rising exponentially to possibly meet the blue one! this is really weird as my Router Stas page is currently showing this:

DSL                             Down  Up
Current Rate:           3456 kbs   448 kbs 
Max Rate:                3456 kbs   1060 kbs 
Current Connection:
Current Noise Margin:   12.0 dB   25.0 dB 
Current Attenuation:     40.2 dB   26.0 dB 
Current Output Power:  18.9 dBm   11.9 dBm 

Does anyone have any ideas?

[Desaan]

So what is your wiring like at the moment? The line comes into the house and goes where?

Comes in over the front door and goes out of line of site again into the wall, nothing changed there though it's been like that for almost forever.  Nothing to explain the steady 500kbs drops in profile I get every few months at least.  No work has been carried out either so can scratch that one off.

[LesD]

About eleven or so months ago in discussion with Sebby I bit the bullet with my wiring and swapped my NE5 face plate for an
ADSLNation filtered one.

With the one I got you can connect through sockets in the front or to IDC push in connectors on the back.

I chose to run a separate twisted pair of wires in a length of CAT 5 cable from the ADSL IDC terminals on the back of my ADSLNation socket to my Router. I did this as a single run of cable with no other joints in it. The rest of the existing extension wiring, of which my house has quite a bit, I reconnected to the filtered IDC terminals on the back of my ADSLNation socket in more or less the same way that they were connected to my original NE5 socket. With this done I found that I could reconnect the bell wires in the existing telephone extension socket that I had previously lifted in forlorn attempt to improve the noise that affected my ADSL signal. After doing all this the improvement for me was marginal.

In the event using the transistor radio approach that is well documented on this forum I tracked the biggest source of my noise problem to a recently replaced PSU in my PC! There is chapter and verse elsewhere on the forum if you think that there might be any mileage in this for you. 

[Desaan]

Yeah, I've considered the faceplate approach before but to be honest my line stats have always been pretty much exactly the same over the years.  The only problems that occur is when my profile gets dropped, but my stats are the same and I genuinely don't have sync or dc issues (being an avid online gamer I'd be in uproar if that was happening) 

I've pretty much exhausted what I can do and can't do, I'll keep trying whatever I can but I'm pretty sure this is out of my control 

[Steve]

Don't know Les whether this is any help,as you seem have a java problem? How about using FF?

http://www.idnetters.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=7137.msg142708#msg142708

[Desaan]

UPDATE

I'm gonna call faulty/broken wires somewhere, whilst rambling about the house poking things for 20 mins it dropped as low as 10 on a number of occassions (from 15).  The dog thought it was great me running up and down the stairs checking things, shame he couldn't of been of more use 

[Lance]

At least you are geting nearer to the cause! It sounds like you may ust have a loose connection, although you would normally hear this more on the voice. If you are going to be poking about with cables, make sure that if you haven't got a filtered faceplate that you remove the ring wire which is on terminal 3 in the sockets and usually orange/white.

[Desaan]

Do you think's it possible the actual jack (the test socket one) is faulty is some way?  When I move the wire and head around slightly the noise drops levels drops off to around 6-7 but as soon as I let go of it it jumps back up again.

The thing hasn't seen the light of day for about 5 years so it's never even been touched/knocked.

[Sebby]

It's possible. What I was really getting at earlier is what's the wiring like given that you had an ISDN conversion? Does the line come into the house and straight to an NTE5?

[Desaan]

I wish I could see, I trace the wire out of the room, along the wall then it disappears into a hole near the stairs.  So I'm guessing as nothing is connected to the NTE5 downstairs it must be a secondary master as above the front door there is two wires that disappear into the abyss.  It also looks like the builders decided to plaster over some of the wires (about 4-5 years ago) which is hardly helping things. 


[EDIT] Would also appear that constantly messing about has dropped my profile further (now 1600kbs) Guess this may become a bigger problem seeing as my profile never seems to achieve anything near what my throughput says (3400kbs)

[Sebby]

Hmm, I suspect the line comes into the house, goes into some box, and is then routed to an NTE5. It's not ideal, but I wouldn't have thought it would make that much difference. Have you tried the test socket?

[Rik]

My hunch, Seb, is that when the ISDN was removed, BT wired a filtered faceplate in as the master, but it's difficult to be certain.

[Sebby]

It is.

[Desaan]

I'm gonna get an adsl nation faceplate and few new cables on Monday, it is not good karma that I can actually manipulate the downstream noise margin by purely moving the wire and the RJ45 head around whilst using the test socket.  I actually got the noise level to drop as low as 7 and got it to a steady 12.

Only problem now is waiting for the blip technology to kick in because all the messing about yesterday dropped my profile down to 1650kbs and its not tried to readjust yet.

[Rik]

You need to get some stability before it's really going to get you back to where you should be, unfortunately.

[4Way]

I have just downloaded RouterStats 4.8 and am finding it difficult to configure for my 2Wire 2700 HGV

At the Configure - Router Search Text tab when I click the Get Page button

A message stating:

To use this page to customize the features of your BT2700HGV, you must
have JavaScript enabled     JavaScript is currently disabled in your browser..........

As far as I can determine I have JavaScript enabled in IE7
I have checked as below and it is enabled!

Click the Tools menu.
Select Internet Options.
Click the Security tab.
Click the Custom Level button.
Scroll down until you see the 'Scripting' section. Select the 'Enable' radio button for 'Active Scripting.'
Click the OK button.
Click the Yes button in the confirmation window.

The Rx Noise margin (dB) graph is currently showing a blue line stepping up to 780 dB and then staying constant
while there is a pink one that looks to be rising exponentially to possibly meet the blue one! this is really weird as my Router Stas page is currently showing this:

DSL                             Down  Up
Current Rate:           3456 kbs   448 kbs 
Max Rate:                3456 kbs   1060 kbs 
Current Connection:
Current Noise Margin:   12.0 dB   25.0 dB 
Current Attenuation:     40.2 dB   26.0 dB 
Current Output Power:  18.9 dBm   11.9 dBm 

Does anyone have any ideas?

Don't use RouterStats as it is not directly supported. Use Routerstats lite as this does support your router and will give you the graphs you want.

[Rik]

Thanks for that, 4Way. 

[LesD]

Don't know Les whether this is any help,as you seem have a java problem? How about using FF?

http://www.idnetters.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=7137.msg142708#msg142708

Didn't get on with FF when I tried Ubuntu!  So many tabs they were coming out of my ears! 

The link, however, was a great help.   

[Desaan]

ADSL Link                Downstream     Upstream
Connection Speed         4224 kbps     448 kbps
Line Attenuation            54.0 db        29.5 db
Noise Margin                  10.8 db        19.0 db

Go BT profile, change! GO!

2500kbs, still slow 

[EDIT] 30hrs up time for the record, which would be x1000 hrs more if I didn't move/turn off the router, just trying to debunk the losing sync theory also.

[Desaan]

Back on the mend 

Thanks for all tips and suggestions.

[Rik]

Getting there.