Loss Of Sync

[philnorton]

For some time now, my Netgear DG834G has been losing sync quite often. This wasn't something that had happened a lot before, and I put it down to the fact that I'd moved the router to a different room in the house, and that quite possibly, there was something wrong with the extension box I'd fitted myself (loose cables etc). So, at the start of October, I moved the router back downstairs where it has traditionally been.

And 'til the 16th October, it didn't lose sync once. But, checking my logs this morning, it's lost sync quite a lot in the past 4 days (30 times in 3 days, to be precise):

Thu, 2008-10-16 13:16:48 - LCP down.
Thu, 2008-10-16 13:16:49 - Initialize LCP.
Thu, 2008-10-16 13:16:49 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Thu, 2008-10-16 13:16:57 - Loss of synchronization :1
Thu, 2008-10-16 13:17:09 - CHAP authentication success
Thu, 2008-10-16 14:21:59 - Loss of synchronization :2
Thu, 2008-10-16 14:22:07 - LCP down.
Thu, 2008-10-16 14:22:08 - Initialize LCP.
Thu, 2008-10-16 14:22:08 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Thu, 2008-10-16 14:22:28 - CHAP authentication success
Fri, 2008-10-17 07:51:50 - Loss of synchronization :3
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:17:07 - LCP down.
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:17:08 - Initialize LCP.
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:17:08 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:17:20 - Loss of synchronization :4
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:17:28 - CHAP authentication success
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:20:50 - Loss of synchronization :5
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:21:50 - Loss of synchronization :6
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:21:56 - LCP down.
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:21:57 - Initialize LCP.
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:21:57 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:22:16 - CHAP authentication success
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:26:20 - Loss of synchronization :7
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:26:25 - LCP down.
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:26:26 - Initialize LCP.
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:26:26 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Fri, 2008-10-17 08:26:45 - CHAP authentication success
Fri, 2008-10-17 10:15:04 - LCP down.
Fri, 2008-10-17 10:15:05 - Initialize LCP.
Fri, 2008-10-17 10:15:05 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Fri, 2008-10-17 10:15:25 - CHAP authentication success
Fri, 2008-10-17 11:38:04 - LCP down.
Fri, 2008-10-17 11:38:05 - Initialize LCP.
Fri, 2008-10-17 11:38:05 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Fri, 2008-10-17 11:38:23 - CHAP authentication success
Fri, 2008-10-17 11:38:24 - Loss of synchronization :8
Fri, 2008-10-17 11:41:53 - LCP down.
Fri, 2008-10-17 11:41:54 - Initialize LCP.
Fri, 2008-10-17 11:41:54 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Fri, 2008-10-17 11:41:54 - Loss of synchronization :9
Fri, 2008-10-17 11:42:13 - CHAP authentication success
Fri, 2008-10-17 17:13:31 - Loss of synchronization :10
Fri, 2008-10-17 17:14:01 - Loss of synchronization :11
Fri, 2008-10-17 17:50:32 - LCP down.
Fri, 2008-10-17 17:50:39 - Initialize LCP.
Fri, 2008-10-17 17:50:39 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Fri, 2008-10-17 17:50:42 - CHAP authentication success
Fri, 2008-10-17 17:51:02 - Loss of synchronization :12
Fri, 2008-10-17 17:56:32 - Loss of synchronization :13
Fri, 2008-10-17 23:30:22 - LCP down.
Fri, 2008-10-17 23:30:23 - Initialize LCP.
Fri, 2008-10-17 23:30:23 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Fri, 2008-10-17 23:30:38 - Loss of synchronization :14
Fri, 2008-10-17 23:30:43 - CHAP authentication success
Fri, 2008-10-17 23:32:38 - Loss of synchronization :15
Sat, 2008-10-18 04:56:31 - Send out NTP request to time-g.netgear.com
Sat, 2008-10-18 04:56:32 - Receive NTP Reply from time-g.netgear.com
Sat, 2008-10-18 07:43:49 - Loss of synchronization :16
Sat, 2008-10-18 07:53:49 - Loss of synchronization :17
Sat, 2008-10-18 11:31:54 - Loss of synchronization :18
Sat, 2008-10-18 11:33:24 - Loss of synchronization :19
Sat, 2008-10-18 11:39:23 - LCP down.
Sat, 2008-10-18 11:39:24 - Initialize LCP.
Sat, 2008-10-18 11:39:24 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Sat, 2008-10-18 11:39:24 - Loss of synchronization :20
Sat, 2008-10-18 11:39:43 - CHAP authentication success
Sat, 2008-10-18 11:40:54 - Loss of synchronization :21
Sat, 2008-10-18 13:27:42 - LCP down.
Sat, 2008-10-18 13:27:50 - Initialize LCP.
Sat, 2008-10-18 13:27:50 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Sat, 2008-10-18 13:27:53 - CHAP authentication success
Sat, 2008-10-18 13:27:56 - Loss of synchronization :22
Sat, 2008-10-18 18:12:53 - LCP down.
Sat, 2008-10-18 18:13:00 - Initialize LCP.
Sat, 2008-10-18 18:13:00 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Sat, 2008-10-18 18:14:01 - Initialize LCP.
Sat, 2008-10-18 18:14:01 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Sat, 2008-10-18 18:15:01 - Initialize LCP.
Sat, 2008-10-18 18:15:01 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Sat, 2008-10-18 18:15:06 - CHAP authentication success
Sat, 2008-10-18 18:22:14 - LCP down.
Sat, 2008-10-18 18:22:16 - Initialize LCP.
Sat, 2008-10-18 18:22:16 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Sat, 2008-10-18 18:22:35 - CHAP authentication success
Sun, 2008-10-19 07:27:18 - Loss of synchronization :23
Sun, 2008-10-19 07:27:48 - Loss of synchronization :24
Sun, 2008-10-19 07:39:18 - Loss of synchronization :25
Sun, 2008-10-19 07:42:18 - Loss of synchronization :26
Sun, 2008-10-19 07:47:04 - LCP down.
Sun, 2008-10-19 07:47:09 - Initialize LCP.
Sun, 2008-10-19 07:47:09 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Sun, 2008-10-19 07:47:18 - Loss of synchronization :27
Sun, 2008-10-19 07:47:48 - Loss of synchronization :28
Sun, 2008-10-19 07:48:10 - Initialize LCP.
Sun, 2008-10-19 07:48:10 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Sun, 2008-10-19 07:48:14 - CHAP authentication success
Sun, 2008-10-19 16:07:58 - Loss of synchronization :29
Sun, 2008-10-19 16:09:53 - LCP down.
Sun, 2008-10-19 16:09:54 - Initialize LCP.
Sun, 2008-10-19 16:09:54 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Sun, 2008-10-19 16:09:58 - Loss of synchronization :30
Sun, 2008-10-19 16:10:13 - CHAP authentication success

My connection status is as follows:


So, I guess what I'm looking for are opinions and advice: how come the router worked perfectly for 16 days, and since then, has roughly lost sync 10 times per day (somtimes within minutes of each one)? Is it likely to be a router problem (in which case, I don't mind getting a newer/different router)? Or a line/BT problem?

Any advice greatly welcomed!!

Ta
Phil

[Simon]

Hi Phil, and 

Someone will be along soon to help you, but meanwhile, have a welcome Karma! 

[Gary]

You may be getting large amounts of noise on your line, possibly as your attenuation is great but your SNR has gone up to compensate for the loss of sync, what is near your router? Also what cable did you use, and is the cable run near a source of electrical noise, like a fridge, or even a wireless phone anything that could interfere with the signal, even mains cable.

[Rik]

Hi Phil

Welcome to the forum. You have incredibly low attenuation at 8db, which is allowing you to sync at the full 8128 with an extra 6db of noise margin. That line should be perfect. That it isn't suggests that there is some major noise source in the vicinity, ie about 14db worth.

Can you tell me a bit about your phone wiring please. How many sockets do you have, what's connected to them?

[philnorton]

Can you tell me a bit about your phone wiring please. How many sockets do you have, what's connected to them?

Hi Rik

Thanks for taking the time to answer! We've got 3 telephone sockets in the house: 1 master (which, unfortunately, is nowhere near to a power supply, so running the router from it isn't possible) with a basic BT phone attached. 1 extension which uses no more than around 4-5m of extension cable has a Panasonic DECT wireless phone attached, and the other extension (which is the one I thought was causing the drops) currently has nothing plugged into it, tho it is sited near to my office equipment (ie Mac Pro, monitors, printers, iPhone etc etc etc).

The router is situated in the living room, and I have an Apple Airport Extreme, Mac Mini (for a file server) and Iomega MiniMax HD (for wireless Time Machine backups) all sitting nearby. I've checked the logs again today, and the router lost sync at 11:31 and 12:04...

Ta
Phil

[Rik]

Have a read of this, Phil, and check that you have disconnected the ring wires at each socket. Also, make sure that the extension you have the router on is correctly wired with a pair, eg white/blue and blue/white.

[Sebby]

Hi Phil, and

As others have said, your line is perfect (although I'm often sceptical about the Netgear's reporting!). The noise margin is good, so there must be some surges of noise. As Rik says, removing the ring wire may help prevent this. You could also try to plug the router into the test socket (behind the faceplate on the master socket) and seeing what the stats look like, just to see if the extension wiring is picking up general noise.