My FTTC

[zappaDPJ]

Performance Tester is unable to run the speed test for your telephone number:***********. Please check that it is the correct telephone number for your service. Did you follow all the instructions given on the website, before initiating the speed test. If not, then please follow all the instructions carefully and try to run the test again.If you believe it is the correct number for your service and you have followed all the instructions then please ask your Service Provider whether you can use Performance Tester to test your Broadband speed. If yes, then ask him for the Service ID of your broadband connection and try again with this Service ID along with your Telephone Number. If this problem persists, raise the issue with your service provider.

[Bill]

That's what I've just got too

I had some drops last night, a couple of short (~1  minute) ones not long after I posted and another of about 30 minutes in the small hours... the first one showed up in the router log, the rest didn't

BT playing around again I guess, that's really going to help seeing if your problem has cleared. Not!!!!

Can't think why your graph shows red when you just turn the PC off... it's the router that should respond to tbb's pings not the PC. Something weird there


edit- Ah, the wee small hours drop was a problem at tbb's end, everyone will see it.

[kev445]

Have you made sure on your Negear router your "idle timeout" is set to 0?

[zappaDPJ]

It was set to zero on my original router. I've just checked the loan unit and it's set to 5 minutes 

Thanks for that, it'll be interesting to see what happens 

[zappaDPJ]

The BT speed test is up and running again, at least it is for me.

Test1 comprises of two tests

1. Best Effort Test: -provides background information.

   Download Speed
   25195 Kbps
   
0 Kbps   38717 Kbps
Max Achievable Speed

> Download speedachieved during the test was - 25195 Kbps

For your connection, the acceptable range of speedsis 12000-38717 Kbps .
Additional Information:
IP Profile for your line is -38717 Kbps

2. Upstream Test: -provides background information.

   Upload Speed
   8107 Kbps
   
0 Kbps   10000 Kbps
Max Achievable Speed

>Upload speed achieved during the test was - 8107 Kbps
Additional Information:
Upstream Rate IP profile on your line is - 10000 Kbps

One thing I have noticed with this router is that I'm getting far more consistent results on download speed tests including real money tests where I'm downloading large files from my remote server. In general I'm getting around 30 Mbps. The previous router was giving me around 8 Mbps or less most of the time on sustained downloads.

Perhaps things are starting to look up. I've been using my FTTC connection for around 4 days and only once found the need to switch to ADSL. Now the idle setting is properly set (insert face-palm here) I'm cautiously optimistic 

[kev445]

Please could you tell me your current MTU on your router?

You are connecting to the internet via PPPOE, which adds a slight overhead to the connection, meaning traditionally the MTU will have to be no larger than 1492.

BT do have a workaround to allow an MTU of 1500, however I don't believe any Netgear routers support this.

Just to clarify, set the routers MTU to 1492 or lower.

[kev445]

Please could you tell me your current MTU on your router?

You are connecting to the internet via PPPOE, which adds a slight overhead to the connection, meaning traditionally the MTU will have to be no larger than 1492.

BT do have a workaround to allow an MTU of 1500, however I don't believe any Netgear routers support this.

Just to clarify, set the routers MTU to 1492 or lower.

Scrap that, I believe your router is quite happy with 1500.
I have just tried a ping at 1500 without issue.

[kev445]

Everything at this moment in time seems fine with your line.

Ping statistics for 91.135.7.215:
Packets: Sent = 1000, Received = 1000, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 36ms, Maximum = 74ms, Average = 37ms

Even with the packet size set at the largest (1500), I still don't see any packet loss on your line.

[.Griff.]

Scrap that, I believe your router is quite happy with 1500.
I have just tried a ping at 1500 without issue.

The Netgear physically wont allow you to enter a MTU above 1492 when using PPPoE.

[zappaDPJ]

The MTU on this loan router is currently set to 1492. I think it was the same on the original but I don't recall for sure.

[kev445]

The Netgear physically wont allow you to enter a MTU above 1492 when using PPPoE.

The MTU on this loan router is currently set to 1492. I think it was the same on the original but I don't recall for sure.

It seems the router will negotiate 1500 on the PPPOE (WAN) interface (hence why I can ping at 1500), however it appears the LAN is limited to 1492 (I can see why, BT are about the only people to allow an MTU of 1500).

In practice however you will not notice any difference.

[zappaDPJ]

I think I've cracked it. Over the last few days I've been systematically swapping out all my hardware including PC, cables, messing around with settings and some other stuff.

Test1 comprises of Best Effort Test:  -provides background information.

   Download  Speed
   35464 Kbps
   
0 Kbps   7150 Kbps
Max Achievable Speed

Download speedachieved during the test was - 35464 Kbps
For your connection, the acceptable range of speeds is 600-7150 Kbps.
Additional Information:
Your DSL Connection Rate :7776 Kbps(DOWN-STREAM), 448 Kbps(UP-STREAM)
IP Profile for your line is - 6500 Kbps


If you wish to discuss these results please contact your ISP.

If you are experiencing problems with specific applications, servers or websites please contact your ISP for assistance.

Your test has completed please close this window to exit the performance tester.

Leaving aside the fact that the BT speed test seems to pull stuff out of thin air, 35464 Kbps download seems to be in keeping with the results below.





I've also reduced my ping.

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7600]
Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.

C:\Users\zappaDPJ>ping idnet.com

Pinging idnet.com [212.69.36.10] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 212.69.36.10: bytes=32 time=7ms TTL=59
Reply from 212.69.36.10: bytes=32 time=7ms TTL=59
Reply from 212.69.36.10: bytes=32 time=7ms TTL=59
Reply from 212.69.36.10: bytes=32 time=7ms TTL=59

Ping statistics for 212.69.36.10:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 7ms, Maximum = 7ms, Average = 7ms

C:\Users\zappaDPJ>

Here's a snapshot of my current tbb broadband quality monitor. Ignore what happened yesterday morning, I was pulling stuff apart.



Although I can't say categorically what was causing all the problems, I don't think there was much wrong my side of the BT faceplate.

[Bill]

That's excellent news

that it stays that way!

Interesting that you get full speed from the tbb tester- I can't get more than about 28Mbps from it, though all the others I've tried (and real life downloads) give the expected 35Mbps or more

[zappaDPJ]

Cheers The tbb tests often under-performs for me as well Bill. It's probably taken pity on me today 

[Bill]

Cheers The tbb tests often under-performs for me as well Bill. It's probably taken pity on me today 

I've had a few full-speed tests from tbb, they seemed to occur for a day or so after IDNet had been playing around with their core routers or some other network "event", then they went back to slow again. Most odd.

I know tbb were getting slow speed test results with Virgin cable a while ago, but iirc that was consistent and turned out to be a peering problem. Wouldn't have thought it was the same with IDNet but

[.Griff.]

It's weird how the TBB test works ok for you and gives an accurate result but it simply doesn't play ball for me -

[Steve]

Something has to work for Zappa.

[sof2er]

Here's a snapshot of my current tbb broadband quality monitor. Ignore what happened yesterday morning, I was pulling stuff apart.

I've noticed our "packetloss" is almost the same after 12 till 1am (I did notice 4-7% packetloss in gameservers as well, normally have none). Possibly related somehow with IDNet? (Can't be exchange as I live in scotland)

[zappaDPJ]

That is interesting, about the same amount at the same time.

[Bill]

I get the same.

It's no coincidence that midnight is when most ISPs' off-peak period starts- it's all the big downloads hitting the system, it can't cope.

Same sort of thing happened during the Olympics, you should have seen some of the comments in tbb about ISPs who didn't book extra capacity in advance

Even those who did (like IDNet) took a hit from congestion on the rest of the system.

[psp83]

I also see the same packet lose at the same time.

ADSL2+ Wiltshire, Devizes.

[sof2er]

Yeah I see all 3 graphs showing the same packetloss, is it worth informing IDNet as I'm getting packetloss right now as we speak while playing FPS, about 3 to 5 %.

[zappaDPJ]

Something has to work for Zappa.

It's definitely working Steve and long may it last. I've had no video caching, web page time-outs and downloads are super-fast. I also played World of Warcraft tonight without a single lag spike.

Yeah I see all 3 graphs showing the same packetloss, is it worth informing IDNet as I'm getting packetloss right now as we speak while playing FPS, about 3 to 5 %.

I don't really know if it's worth reporting or not. I'm sure Bill is right, it's the Internet being hit hard at off-peak. I'm not sure if it's a capacity issue within IDNet's control though.

[zappaDPJ]

Looking through my router log I've not had a single disconnect since I pulled things around at the weekend so it looks as if the problem is fixed 

[Bill]

Not only that, you've got pings that most gamers would kill for

Glad it all turned out OK.