Router losing sync when telephone used

[spring88]

Since I joined IDnet and up until a couple of weeks ago my sync speed was always 6500-7500 with a downstream noise margin of 6-9dB and an upstream noise margin of around 20db+. The downstream noise margin often varied +4 to -4.

A couple of weeks ago I noticed that my sync speed had dropped to 5,200 with the downstream noise margin being higher than normal at 15db. Rebooting the router and switching to another one (from netgear dg834v3 to previously unused dg834v4, both plugged direct into adsl nation faceplate) made little difference. Since then my router has synced at between 4800 and 6000 with an initial noise margin of 15db and there have been a handful of occasions when it has resynced with a sync speed of 3000-3300 and an initial d'stream noise margin of 28db and a halved upstream margin of 8-10db. My pings have remained low at about 27ms (this was one of my main motivations for moving to IDnet) and I fortunately still seem to be on fastpath.

Observing the downstream noise margin graphs in Router Stats show a significant diference from how they used to be. For years the noise margin has fluctuated a lot but never with huge drops or rises. Now with the margin raised much higher (15db+) there is hardly any fluctuation at all  interspersed with very occasional sharp drops and sudden drops to zero. Yesterday evening when running Routerstats I noticed that my line lost sync at the time a phone call was made and then lost sync a second time when the phone call terminated. Around this point i read that if you dialed "1" on your phone you shouldn't hear any noise on your line. I dialled "1" and there was definite background noise on the line. When I returned to my computer I noticed that there had been a sudden drop from 14db to 10db when the call was made. I dialed "1" again 5 minutes later and the same thing happened. Again I waited 5 minutes, dialed "1" and this time the margin dropped to zero and my router lost sync. Running router stats from 8pm-10pm sync was lost again at the precise time a call was made with margin dropping from 14db to zero. However there were also 3 other losses of sync over the course of this hour with the same sudden drop to zero but when no phone calls were made (although two occurred shortly after the loss of sync due to the call). There are also losses of sync overnight when obviously phone calls aren't being made. It is worth noting that there have been a couple of times in the past few weeks when crackling has been heard on our phones.

This morning I have made several more phone calls and the margin has remained completley stable at between 15db and 15.5db with no loss of sync. I also dialed 1 on my phone and this time there was complete silence and my margin was unaffected.

This afternoon I started running routerstats again and once again there was little fluctuation. I then dialed "1" on the telephone and there was definite albeit faint background noise. When I returned to my computer the margin had droppd from 14db to 4db and then to zero and lost sync. Repeating this on another phone plugged into a different socket produced an instant drop of sync.

At this point I removed the adsl faceplate and plugged a telephone direct into the test socket and did the "quiet line test" (17070 option 2). When holding the phone against the ear there was definite fuzzy crackling sound in the background. I repeated this with the phone plugged into the test socket via the phone socket on an adsl filter and adsl nation faceplate with the same result. I also used a different telephone.

I then observed the line stats with the router plugged into an adsl filter at the test socket rather than the adsl faceplate. The first two calls caused a sudden drop from 14db to 10db but no loss of sync. The third producded very little fluctuation but less than a minute later my margin dropped to -1.5 and sync was lost. Throughout the day there has been virtually no fluctuations in the margin and absolutely no losses of sync when phone calls weren't made.

Based on all this would you say that I have an intermittent line fault?. I have read that if you mention broadband when ringing BT they just pass you over to your ISP so should I register a Voice fault?

I'd be grateful for any help.

[Rik]

Register a voice fault, you're right - mention ADSL and BT will bounce you straight back to IDNet.

[spring88]

Thanks for replying Rik.

After calling BT they rang back to say they had found a line fault and would be sending out an engineer- hopefully this will fix the problem.

[Rik]

 

[spring88]

The engineer came this morning. For the first 20 minutes he didn't find any problem and couldn't pick up any noise/faults but eventually picked up noise briefly from a junction box about 1 metre from the test socket. After fiddling about with the box he still seemed confused as to what the problem was. He also replaced my Adsl Nation faceplate with BT Openworld v1.0 one. In a confusing development when I turned my router back on the internet light didn't come on and the router wouldn't sync. However, when he replaced my old adsl cable with a spare one he had with him the router synced and now my connection seems back to normal.

The phone noise has also gone away now and using the telephone doesnt cause loss of sync.

It seems weird that my adsl cable that has worked fine for 2 years would suddenly stop working during the 30 minutes he was here unless it is incompatible with the BT Openreach faceplate which seems unlikely. Is there any reason why this might have happened?- as far as i can see the Adsl Nation and Bt Openreach faceplates are practically identical and surely the two adsl cables are as well? 

If my connection remains stable for the next 24 hours i was planing on putting back my ADSL nation filter and old cable just to confirm that neither of these weren't actually causing/contributing to the original problem (although i don't see how they could be since the phone was noisy plugged direct into the test socket with everything else removed and BT had earlier found a line fault ).
Presumably the source of the line fault was the junction box and whatever he did to it solved the problem.
.

[Rik]

I can only think that the old cable didn't make good contact with the new faceplate.

[spring88]

About an hour after the BT engineer left we got an automated message from BT saying the problem had been fixed. 2 minutes later the router lost sync, there was once again audible noise on the telephone and the problem was back. 

Later in the day we phoned the engineer who had earlier given us his mobile number. He suggested removing the adsl and telephone plugs from the faceplate for 5 minutes whilst he did some sort of test. He then rang back to say that he had found that when both the adsl and telephone plugs were in the faceplate there was noise on the line but when they were removed from the faceplate there was no noise on the line.

He basically said that the line was perfect across the 3km that seperate us from the exchange when nothing is plugged in the faceplate yet when the plugs are put in a fault is detected at some currently unidentified point across the same area of line (!).

Not only does this make little sense to me it doesn't explain why the phone is noisy plugged directly into the test socket nor why he briefly detected noise 1 metre away from the test socket when he was here. This also implies that if i had removed the telephone/adsl plugs from the faceplate after ringing BT to report a fault last week they wouldn't have actually detected a fault in the first place. In fact the engineer suggested doing precisely this when i next report a fault, perhaps so no fault is detected and I stop bothering them.   


Basically I'm back to square one and will have to ring BT up to report a line fault, hope they pick it up again and wait for another engineer.

I need to have the adsl/phone leads plugged in to use the internet/phone (obvously ) so I am confused as to a) what is the problem and b) how to solve it.

I'd be grateful if anyone had any ideas as to what is the problem.

[Glenn]

Do you have access to another router that you could try?

[Rik]

Normally, your problem is a classic symptom of a faulty filter. Clearly that isn't the case, so we have to assume an intermittent faulty joint or maybe a failing router.

[spring88]

Thanks for replying.

Glenn>
I have tried switching to another router just in case. At the moment the line is pretty stable when no phone calls are made although it was also stable for the past hour with my other router. A phone call sent the margin plummeting 7db (slightly worse than my other router over the previous hour). Noise on all telephones in the house same as with other router.

However, I'm pretty sure it can't be the router since there is noise on the phones when they are plugged directly into the test socket with the router unplugged. On a couple of occasions the line has become so unstable (resyncs ever 2-3 mins) that I now leave my router powered off when my computer isn't on and I can't monitor it.- during these periods there is no difference to the noise on the telephones. Multiple filters/phones/cables also used and switched around with no change.

When the BT engineer was here he couldn't pick up any noise/faults from the test socket box although I had been suffering lots of noise on the phones and several resyncs on the adsl line all morning. I don't know if he actually plugged something into the socket or just used the clips that I saw him using at one point. It almost seems that plugging something into the test socket or faceplate causes the noise and line fault outside but this makes no sense. :-(

[Glenn]

I wonder if there is there a problem between where the cable enters the house and the master socket?

[spring88]

Just had a phone call from yesterdays engineer saying that according to BT the problem was still unresolved and that he is going to change some wiring. Fingers crossed (again).

[Glenn]

 

[spring88]

Update:

The internet has improved in in the sense that phone calls have not caused any losses of sync recently and most of the time have only produced small noise spikes. My line usually holds sync at around 6,000kbs and 15db which I am not too unhappy with but I do still get very occasional sharp drops in margin with subsequent losses of sync. From  last Thursday morning I had 3 days of the line holding sync at 6,100 with the noise margin  stable at 13-15db and little to no noise on the phone- On Sunday afternoon the telephone line became extremley noisy and during this period the router lost sync and resynced at 4,100kbs.

The noise on the telephone has not improved apart from the 3 days over last weekened and the improvement with the internet doesn't coincide with any of the engineers work.

The last but one BT engineer that was sent found a fault at 28 metres from the house, went up a pole and did something, but the problem remained. The last engineer found a fault 30m away and also said he'd resolved it. He also said the new faceplate that the first BT engineer put in to replace my ADSL Nation one was faulty so i've been given another one.

Before leaving the last engineer said that if the noise problem remains he thinks there might be a problem with the broadband equipment at the exchange and that this could be causing the problems with the telephone and the broadband. He said that I should contact IDNET and mention that I have a problem with the broadband line. He also said I shouldn't say anythign about noise on the line or telephone problems as they'll just pass me over to BT. He suggested my ISP would then send out an engineer to the exchange to fix the problem.

At the moment the internet is stable and the phone is ok but as the problem is/was intermittent I can't guarantee this will last. In case it turns out the problem hasn't been fixed I have a couple of questions>

1) If there was fault with the broadband equipment at the exchange would this be causing noise on the telephone line as well?
2) If there is a fault with the broadband equipment at the telephone exchange is it up to IDNET to fix it? As far as I know all of the equipment at the exchange belongs to BT. Surely it doesn't have anythign to do with IDNET? 

[Steve]

I can only answer the second question it's all down to BT , IDNet can advise  you regarding  the possibility of there being a fault and request an engineer.

[Rik]

As to 1, it's possible that the jumpering at the exchange is faulty (it's just another joint, after all). For 2, IDNet won't fix it themselves, but they will get BT to do so. Caveat: If BT don't find a fault on their side of your master socket, you'll end up with a large bill, so before IDNet book an engineer, they will ask you to do a series of tests, eg remove the faceplate and connect to the test socket revealed etc.

[spring88]

As to 1, it's possible that the jumpering at the exchange is faulty (it's just another joint, after all). For 2, IDNet won't fix it themselves, but they will get BT to do so. Caveat: If BT don't find a fault on their side of your master socket, you'll end up with a large bill, so before IDNet book an engineer, they will ask you to do a series of tests, eg remove the faceplate and connect to the test socket revealed etc.

Previously we have rung BT to ask them to test our line followed by them ringing us back 5 minutes later to tell us that they have detected a fault on the line and will send out an engineer.

If BT runs a line test and finds a fault does this rule out the possibilty of the fault being on our side of the master socket? I always assumed that if an engineer was sent out as a result of line fault being detected the problem was on their side of the socket and we wouldn't run the risk of getting charged.

[Steve]

As you say if BT detect a fault their side of the master socket it's cost free.

[Niall]

My sisters line is doing this. BT replaced something outside and it was fine for ages, but now the problem had returned. BT suck as does thier knowledge and engineers.

Hope you get it sorted, and if so I'd be intrigued to know what the issue is so I can pass the info on!

[gyruss]

You've got a high resistance disconnection fault on your line and its very likely on BT's side of the demarcation point.

I had pretty much exactly what you described and i'm fine now.

Getting the right BT engineer to your house is key to fixing this.. they are not all created equal and the crazy thing in the past has been none of the engineers that called on the fridays helped much at all, but the FIRST one that came to the house on a wednesday cured it within half an hour. amazing.

[spring88]

Thanks for the replies. 

Today BT came and changed the wire between the outside of our house and the telegraph pole in an effort to solve the problem. At first the telephone line was not noisy but later in the day the crackling started again whilst I was using the phone. By late evening the noise and crackling on the phones was as bad as its ever been to the point where it would be extremly difficult to have a phone conversation. At this point as an experiment I tried unplugging my router. The crackling stopped. I plugged it back in again. Crackling back. I unplugged it again. No crackling. Feeling confused I got out my old router and plugged it in. The phones were now crackling again. I don't know if simply pulling the broadband cable out of the wall would have had the same effect on the crackling- I suspect it would have. This morning when I came down I picked up the phones and they were crackling loudly again, I unplugged the router and the crackling stopped. . I plugged in my old router and the crackling started again. I then plugged in the router whilst listening to the phone. With just the router power lights on there was no noise but as soon as the little green DSL light started to flash on my router there were bursts of crackling on the phone followed by a continuous crackling after it had synced.  I also observed my broadband noise margin in Router Stats this morning and using the telephone did not cause any change whatsoever in the noise margin despite the loud crackling ((in the past it would have produced massive spikes and lost sync)

The routers are connected to the faceplate via a short cable. The cable is brand new and supplied by one of the recent BT engineers as is the faceplate (its the third one we've used). I don't see how 2 separate routers could cause intermittent crackling noise on all the telephones in our house not to mention the fact two BT engineers picked up noise at 30m with the router unplugged, multiple line tests have come back faulty and that originally the phones crackled plugged direct into the test socket.. In fact is it even physically possible for a faulty router connected to a faceplate (which presumably is meant to completly separate it from the phones) to cause telephones to be noisy?

Therefore I assume that the problem is not my side of the master socket? Which begs the question why did unplugging my router cause the noise on the telephones to go? This also reminds me of a phone call from an earlier engineer who picked up a fault on the line when the telephone and broadband cables were plugged into the faceplate but could detect no fault after he asked us to pull them out. He didn't seem to have an explantion for this. Also all the engineers have picked up a fault on our line before they come out to our house but then usually struggle to pick up the fault when they start testing at the faceplate/master socket. It's as if unplugging the router or simply pulling the ADSL cable out of the socket reduces or makes the fault go away.

As I have mentioned earlier, whilst the noise on the telephones has remained the same the Internet has improved in the sense that phone calls do not cause loss of sync anymore and rarely cause major dips in noise margin. The last time I tried using the phones with the router unplugged was probably before this improvement and back then unplugging the router made absolutely no difference to the noise and crackling on the telephone. I don't know if this improvement with broadband connection has some sort of link to what I discovered this evening about unplugging the router now causing the crackling to stop.


I don't really know what to do now. I am not bothered about the broadband connection- although my speeds are about 2/3rds of what they used to be its acceptable to me so the noise on the phone line is now the primary problem. I also imagine that if the phone line problem is fixed the broadband one will be as well- I'm not sure that if I mention all of the above to BT I am not just going to get told to try a new router/cable/faceplate and once I've done that get told to call my ISP.

Can anyone offer any explanation as to why the crackling on the phone now starts when my router syncs but stops when its unplugged? Its as if the telephone line and the broadband line are interfering with each other- originally the main problem was the use of the phone causing big spikes in noise margin and resyncs and as of yesterday it seems to be the broadband connection causing the noise on the phone. Does this sound like the sort of thing a high resistance disconnection fault that gyruss mentioned would cause?

Thanks in advance.

[spring88]

I have just been googling and it does seem that my router causing phone noise is a symptom of a high resisitance line fault. .

[Steve]

What adsl filtering are you using?

[spring88]

At the moment we are using a faceplate with "adsl v1.0" on it supplied by a BT engineer about a week ago. This replaced another identical faceplate fitted by an earlier engineer a few weeks previously who said it was "the latest model". This in turn replaced my own ADSL Nation faceplate. The router is connected directly to the adsl socket on the latest BT faceplate via a short (approx 2m) cable supplied by a BT engineer that replaced an identical 2m cable.

[Steve]

Probably academic but do you still get the noise when using  the test socket with the adslnation filter.

[spring88]

We were using the adsl nation faceplate when the crackling/noise problem on the phones started so I imagine it will still be the same. I could give the adsl faceplate another try later on today- i don't want to do it right now since i've done a lot of unplugging/plugging in routers and connecting/disconecting cables this morning and I'm not sure what impact doing more will have on my internet performance.

At no point previously has changing faceplates/cables/routers affected the level of noise on the phones at the time.

[cavillas]

Are you using a wirelss phone? and is the base near the router/ phone socket?  It could be interference from that.

[spring88]

We have no wireless phones. The 2 phones are both corded and nowhere near the router or phone socket. A 3rd corded phone has also been used and the noise was the same. Noise also the same when phones are plugged directly into the phone socket on the faceplate.

[spring88]

Just thought i'd post an update:
The 5th (6th?) BT engineer came about 5 weeks ago and suggested switching us over to another line, something a previous engineer said couldn't be done. Since switching us to a different line there is no noise on the phones, the internet syncs higher and the noise margin is stable.
The problem appears to be solved. 

[Lance]

Great stuff. Thanks for the update

[Rik]

There's good engineers and there's "can't be bothered" engineers. Good result.