Packet loss

Bill · Jul 01, 2011, 17:17:49

Beginning to see quite a lot of packet loss, starting mid-afternoon. Been happening for a few weeks, anyone else?

Glenn · Jul 01, 2011, 17:34:00

I'm seeing the same as your graph, Bill

Steve · Jul 01, 2011, 17:50:46

Mine's even worse but back to Bill's point it is Wimbledon second week.

Bill · Jul 01, 2011, 17:54:14

Quote from: Steve on Jul 01, 2011, 17:50:46
Mine's even worse but back to Bill's point it is Wimbledon second week.

A very good point, I'd forgotten that. And it's the men's semi's this afternoon!

I'll postpone judgement until Monday

Simon · Jul 01, 2011, 22:43:15

If you were one of my neighbours, it would have been a lot worse this afternoon, as some road workers dug through the TV cables!

.Griff. · Jul 01, 2011, 22:48:54

I get packetloss all day every day Bill so I'd happily swap my TBB graph for yours! (Also see my sig)

Here's mine today -

Note - I'm out of the country and everything is turned off except the router and modem.

zappaDPJ · Jul 02, 2011, 00:05:35

I've had a couple of days where it's been quite noticeable during the afternoon and early evening. I think the 28th June and today has been the worst which could tie in with Wimbledon?

Bill · Jul 02, 2011, 08:03:43

The irony is that Wimbledon was on the TV at the time I was typing the OP... for some reason I just didn't make the connection

cavillas · Jul 02, 2011, 12:28:45

Quote from: Bill on Jul 02, 2011, 08:03:43
The irony is that Wimbledon was on the TV at the time I was typing the OP... for some reason I just didn't make the connection

Neither did your router.

Fox · Jul 03, 2011, 00:14:41

you think you have problems....

Bill · Jul 03, 2011, 00:31:34

Quote from: Fox on Jul 03, 2011, 00:14:41
you think you have problems....

Unless you've been maxing out your router since early evening, I'd risk a reasonable sum that that's exchange congestion

jameshurrell · Jul 03, 2011, 07:24:40

Quote from: Fox on Jul 03, 2011, 00:14:41
you think you have problems....

To me that looks like heavy use up or down...

.Griff. · Jul 03, 2011, 10:29:06

Quote from: Fox on Jul 03, 2011, 00:14:41
you think you have problems....

That looks like heavy P2P use to me.

Fox · Jul 03, 2011, 12:05:37

Its congestion as far as I am aware. My connection has been like this since the 12th of June. Idnet are aware of the problem and have said it should be fixed by the 7th of July. I have a couple of weeks worth of ping graphs and they all look the same even if my PC is turned off.

.Griff. · Jul 03, 2011, 14:18:21

Quote from: Fox on Jul 03, 2011, 12:05:37
I have a couple of weeks worth of ping graphs and they all look the same even if my PC is turned off.

Wireless activated on the router? 100% sure your connection isn't being used by another machine?

Fox · Jul 03, 2011, 16:06:54

The wireless is on but secured with WPA2. The only thing that uses the wireless is my wife's laptop and she was away on a course all week so unless my wireless has a 100mile range I doubt its that. I have checked what devices are attached and there is only my PC. It is a congested VP at a guess so I will have to wait for the guy in the BT van to put down his pie and newspaper and do something.

Gary · Jul 03, 2011, 17:37:49

Quote from: Fox on Jul 03, 2011, 16:06:54
Twill have to wait for the guy in the BT van to put down his pie and newspaper and do something.

That could take a while...

pctech · Jul 03, 2011, 17:51:32

Particularly as his main course is cod and chips.

zappaDPJ · Jul 05, 2011, 03:10:13

As some of you already know, I sometimes wear a pointy hat and a Harry potter wand of an evening aka play World of Warcraft

I play at quite a competitive level and this evening/morning we've been attempting to defeat new content that was added to the game this week. We normally stick to three hour sessions but this evening we agreed to play until we'd achieved our objective.

Around midnight I started to suffer from horrendous lag spikes (measured in seconds), something I've hardly ever had on my IDNet connection. I've just checked my BQM and I think it goes along way to explain the lag spikes.

Interestingly, prior to this, there's virtually no packet loss at all shown for the last few days so I don't know happened tonight.

Bill · Jul 05, 2011, 12:39:01

That's the usual post-midnight off-peak problem kicking in... though it was much worse than normal last night.

Technical Ben · Jul 05, 2011, 15:46:19

Oooh. Per chance, could it be an unforeseen result of off peak allowances? Not sure if anyone has suggested this yet, but it may be because of "helpful" customers.
IE, people like me, who think "I'll download that £12GB game I got off of Steam* at midnight, as it's off peak". This normally would help other users, as it's quiet.
However, if everyone also thinks the same, then your in some big trouble. As you get nearly all of IDNets customers connecting at exactly the same time (midnight) and even if they are only doing 30mb-300mb for a windows update, it's still an awfully congested system until 1-2am.

This will not change unless the users change their habits, or there is some sort of staggered/optional off peak times. Even then, you'd need around half of the customers taking the offer up.

Perhaps, if the problem is over usage at exactly 12am, IDNet could offer some other time periods for those customers using the internet at this time. Perhaps 3am-9am but a little more allowance? Or 1am to 10am for the same allowance, but the benefit of that extra hour in the peak time?

_{* for the bargain price of £7.50!}

Lance · Jul 05, 2011, 16:00:47

I think a good solution, if it is a problem within idnets control, would be to increase off-peak hours for those on more expensive packages, maybe so it starts at 11pm instead of midnight.

zappaDPJ · Jul 05, 2011, 17:46:47

I've not really found it to be a problem since the capacity increase in terms of throughput which is only slightly reduced at peak. It was the lag spikes that came as a surprise last night.

I also noticed that my ping has doubled again during the last few days, I guess interleaving is back on.

psp83 · Jul 05, 2011, 18:50:03

I've said several times on this forum that since IDnet has given more off peak bandwidth there's been a lot of packet loss.

I used to watch justin.tv streams around midnight but I can no longer stream anything between midnight - 2am because of this and that includes iplayer & youtube.

Technical Ben · Jul 05, 2011, 20:42:16

But as I said Psp83. It seems, as the problem only applies to a very narrow band, "total" bandwidth is not the problem. It's the time of day that everyone uses it that is. IDNet do massively better than Sky or O2 on their BT reseller packages. We don't have any congestion during the day, not even at peak times (5pm-12pm) for example.

So as the problem happens, when customers would not normally do it, it is something that they could possible be encouraged to change. If the customers are only doing it because it's the off peak time, then IDNet could have the ability to stagger the peak time cut off, thus the congestion. If this is not already part of BT wholesale that is. How you would manage a staggered cut off I have no idea though.