Not a great start

[itsonlyme]

Two days into my switch from plusnet and ive seen a reduction in download speeds and high pings in atleast 2 online games i play. Before i moved over i was getting 62/18 and no ping issues with online gaming, now with idnet i get 60/18 most of the day until i hit 6pm then i get 45/18.

[itsonlyme]

Cant edit ....

Support is top notch tho i will give idnet that and the accounts page is well setup and easy to access ... but the connection is not what i expected it to be.

[Technical Ben]

Have you done general tests? Internet speed and ping to test sites and/or general websites?
Individual websites and/or games are routing and cache dependant. For example: (Akamai) https://www.akamai.com/uk/en/resources/web-caching.jsp

If IDNets servers are in a slightly different place UK wise, or routing through EU to EU server games, then speeds may be different.

However, unlike BT/Plusnet etc, they will have  look at it for you at times if possible. (On a side note, I noticed some lag/bugs in servers this week for some games, so sometimes lag is just coincidental, not ISP related)

However, the evening slow down is interesting. I'm not with IDNet at the moment, so don't know if there is any congestion.

[Gary]

Two days into my switch from plusnet and ive seen a reduction in download speeds and high pings in atleast 2 online games i play. Before i moved over i was getting 62/18 and no ping issues with online gaming, now with idnet i get 60/18 most of the day until i hit 6pm then i get 45/18.

Depending what cab you are on you may have to wait for G.inp to be applied if its a Huawei Cab. If its ECI cab no G.inp alas. As to 2Mbps that is hardly the end of the world or even noticeable and can even be affected by the time of day you synced as sync speeds will vary over the day and night Evening Speed test may mean congestion depending which provider you are with on IDnet as they use a few. I'm not noticing a slowdown at the moment and I'm on Zens backhaul, which is pretty good considering how many people may well be watching the football online. So talk to IDnet, that's what they are there for.

[itsonlyme]

Yes i will speak to them but i thought maybe someone could help here too.

This GEA Test was taken 2 days before i switched

Test Outcome   Pass
Test Outcome Code   GTC_FTTC_SERVICE_0000
Description   GEA service test completed and no fault found .
Main Fault Location   OK
Sync Status   In Sync
Downstream Speed   68.4 Mbps
Upstream Speed   20.0 Mbps
Appointment Required   N
Fault Report Advised   N
NTE Power Status   PowerOn
Voice Line Test Result   Pass
Bridge Tap   Not Detected
Repetitive Electrical Impulse Noise   Not Detected
Estimated Line Length In Metres   439.4
Upstream Rate Assessment   Very Good
Downstream Rate Assessment   Good
Interference Pattern   Regular Interference Observed Daily
Service Impact   No Impact Observed
Interference Duration Longest Occurrence   From 13:45 to 13:00
Interference Location   Customer Premise
Home Wiring Problem   Not Detected
Downstream Policing Discard Rate   0.0
Customer Traffic Level   Upstream and Downstream Traffic Detected
Technology   VDSL
Profile Name   0.128M-80M Downstream 3dB, Retransmission High - 0.128M-20M Upstream, Error Protection Off
Time Stamp   2018-06-13T10:00:00
Parameters   MIN   MAX   AVG
Down Stream Line Rate   72.1 Mbps   72.1 Mbps   72.1 Mbps
Up Stream Line Rate   20.0 Mbps   20.0 Mbps   20.0 Mbps
Up Time   898.0 Sec   900.0 Sec   899.9 Sec
Retrains   0.0   0.0   0.0
Current and Last 15 Minute Bin Performance
Parameters   Last Traffic Count(Upto 15 mins)   Current Traffic Count(Upto 15 mins)
Start Time Stamp   2018-06-26T08:29:12Z   2018-06-26T08:44:12Z
Ingress Code Violation   3   1
Egress Code Violation   0   0
Errored Seconds   0   0
Severely Errored Seconds   0   0
Unavailable Seconds   0   0

[Technical Ben]

Depending what cab you are on you may have to wait for G.inp to be applied if its a Huawei Cab. If its ECI cab no G.inp alas. As to 2Mbps that is hardly the end of the world or even noticeable and can even be affected by the time of day you synced as sync speeds will vary over the day and night Evening Speed test may mean congestion depending which provider you are with on IDnet as they use a few. I'm not noticing a slowdown at the moment and I'm on Zens backhaul, which is pretty good considering how many people may well be watching the football online. So talk to IDnet, that's what they are there for.

Good point! It may be the footie is affecting everyone. It may be IDNet only. So we have to check first!

[itsonlyme]

Hmm be intresting to monitor it when England play Colombia i hope england win ofc but then i hope it dont hammer my connection.

[itsonlyme]

Just took this poor again

[steve195527]

Yes i will speak to them but i thought maybe someone could help here too.

This GEA Test was taken 2 days before i switched

Test Outcome   Pass
Test Outcome Code   GTC_FTTC_SERVICE_0000
Description   GEA service test completed and no fault found .
Main Fault Location   OK
Sync Status   In Sync
Downstream Speed   68.4 Mbps
Upstream Speed   20.0 Mbps
Appointment Required   N
Fault Report Advised   N
NTE Power Status   PowerOn
Voice Line Test Result   Pass
Bridge Tap   Not Detected
Repetitive Electrical Impulse Noise   Not Detected
Estimated Line Length In Metres   439.4
Upstream Rate Assessment   Very Good
Downstream Rate Assessment   Good
Interference Pattern   Regular Interference Observed Daily
Service Impact   No Impact Observed
Interference Duration Longest Occurrence   From 13:45 to 13:00
Interference Location   Customer Premise
Home Wiring Problem   Not Detected
Downstream Policing Discard Rate   0.0
Customer Traffic Level   Upstream and Downstream Traffic Detected
Technology   VDSL
Profile Name   0.128M-80M Downstream 3dB, Retransmission High - 0.128M-20M Upstream, Error Protection Off
Time Stamp   2018-06-13T10:00:00
Parameters   MIN   MAX   AVG
Down Stream Line Rate   72.1 Mbps   72.1 Mbps   72.1 Mbps
Up Stream Line Rate   20.0 Mbps   20.0 Mbps   20.0 Mbps
Up Time   898.0 Sec   900.0 Sec   899.9 Sec
Retrains   0.0   0.0   0.0
Current and Last 15 Minute Bin Performance
Parameters   Last Traffic Count(Upto 15 mins)   Current Traffic Count(Upto 15 mins)
Start Time Stamp   2018-06-26T08:29:12Z   2018-06-26T08:44:12Z
Ingress Code Violation   3   1
Egress Code Violation   0   0
Errored Seconds   0   0
Severely Errored Seconds   0   0
Unavailable Seconds   0   0

your first port of call for issues with a new connection with any ISP should be the ISP,Idnet guarantee no congestion on their network and from what I have seen that is true as it's the only ISP I have used with no slowdowns at all at any time of day no matter what is going on,the world cup included,it may be something that needs reconfiguring or your backhaul may need switching over to one of the others they use,just phone,explain the problem and see what they do,after over 3yrs of issues with my line,daily or multiple daily disconnects, that sky and plusnet both failed to fix,idnet identified what the issue was and had it corrected via openreach in around 3 weeks

[nowster]

Have you tried pinging a game server that's not on Hertzner?

[robinc]

The only time I have had odd behaviour is Netflix dropping off for no good reason with what looked like DNS issues. 5 yr old Sony Bravia - non-android (thank heavens)

Switched the TV to use 8888 and 8844 for DNS and no problems since.

It may be just perception but I find using Google DNS is generally quicker on the laptops as well - but it could just be I'm fooling myself.

[Gary]

The only time I have had odd behaviour is Netflix dropping off for no good reason with what looked like DNS issues. 5 yr old Sony Bravia - non-android (thank heavens)

Switched the TV to use 8888 and 8844 for DNS and no problems since.

It may be just perception but I find using Google DNS is generally quicker on the laptops as well - but it could just be I'm fooling myself.

I have a Sony OLED AF8 (Android and it works well even has Google assistant now) but using third party DNS servers like Google (thats nice and private since you don't like android) means they can suffer from a failure of integration with CDN providers like Akamai, so browsing may seem faster but downloading can be slower as you may not always be downloading from the nearest server in your own country. I have to say I have not had any issues with Netflix dropping off and that's even when streaming 4K HDR with Dolby vision over wifi using IDnets DNS servers. Unless you have a modern router that has a decent QoS of some kind and 802.11.ac as well and your TV supporting 802.11.ac too I would always use Ethernet. (you may well be doing that anyway) Also IDNets DNS should always be faster for downloading really in an ideal world compared with third party DNS. Also who do you trust with your DNS lookups, Google or IDNet? For privacy you could try Cloudflares which is meant to keep DNS lookups from the prying eyes of your ISP and the likes of Google etc. but once again it will cause issues with CDN's probably.  https://blog.cloudflare.com/announcing-1111/

[itsonlyme]

Think i need to raise a fault this is the speed this morning

[Gary]

Think i need to raise a fault this is the speed this morning

You can run a line test from the IDNet app, worth trying and even call them with support issues directly from it. I imagine its available on Android but its definitely available on iOS

[andrue]

My download speeds dropped quite markedly when I moved in from Plusnet. From 67/19 to 55/19. Support didn't see anything they could report to openreach. Stayed that way for six months then recovered under what I consider to be unusual circumstances:

I wanted to upload about 500GB to Google drive (never wanted to upload anything like that amount before). So I kicked off the upload on Saturday lunch time then went to play golf. Came back to find that my HG612 had dropped the connection after 15 minutes. That was very odd - it's never dropped the connection before other than the occasional early hours bounce when the DSLAM is presumably adjusting things. Not only had it dropped in the middle of the afternoon but it hadn't reestablished the connection. I had to power-cycle the modem and when it came back I discovered that so had my old speeds.

That was many months ago and I still have my original speeds. Maybe the DSLAM just took that long to activate G.INP. Or else it had been 'thinking about it' for some time and my massive upload triggered it into acting. Whatever. At least you've only lost 2Mb/s and whilst that's annoying you should try knowing that you've lost 10Mb/s

[Gary]

At least you've only lost 2Mb/s and whilst that's annoying you should try knowing that you've lost 10Mb/s

I think people need to have real world expectations as to throughput and sync rate and 2Mbps is not noticeable at all in actual daily use at the higher end of FTTC speeds, though like you I lost a large amount in one hit. I lost 7Mbps due to a pair swap and that's it now, nothing can be down because the pair I am now on probably has a disturber on the bundle I'm on in the cable causing crosstalk, or my line now goes around the houses further or has Aluminium in it...

Pair swapping is a dumb idea as eventually the cab runs out of decent pairs. Now I am paying full price for 55Mbps down and 16Mbps up, I only stay because of how good support is and how reliable the network is and I like IDnet and the things like the new iDNet app shows them moving forward still, it's is very useful, being able to start a line test from your smartphone/tablet for trouble shooting for instance without having to ask support to do this. Still I would love to get my 7Mbps back but on an ECI cab that's not going to happen since there is no G.inp and it appears there never will be at this rate as for a third year in a row the testing was cancelled due to a small number of modems having issues. 

[itsonlyme]

Well overall ive lost more than 2mb

Two year ago i was on 74/19 with plusnet then after 12 months its dropped to 68/18 then 6 months after it dropped to 64/15 and now with Idnet its around 60/19

I reported this to plusnet not so long ago and i was told it might be down to crosstalk, its a pretty big drop and for whatever reason moving isp its dropped again i dont understand it all.

If it keeps dropping i be better off on 55/10 rather than 80/20.

[Gary]

There are many reasons your transmission rate can drop. You can have REIN or SHINE effecting your line, the line itself is just deteriorating over time, it is a post war copper network that was never meant to be used this way after all... You have routing issues, the backhaul provider can effect what you end up with (see TBB AAISP and Talk Talk backhaul issues which have just been sorted https://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/8104-aaisp-gets-talktalk-to-fix-overhead-issue-affecting-vdsl2 ) you are lose on average maybe 6-10Mbps for each new disturber causing crosstalk depending on how close it is to other cables, how long they run side by side etc.

Also the cab you are on and even what modem you are using. If you are on an ECI cab you wont have G.inp so in that cause you are on the poor cousin to the Huawei which has G.inp and if you are on a BDUK cab vectoring as well. Some lines on ECI cabs prefer Lantiq chipsets which match the cab chipset, if on a Huawei Broadcom chipsets are better and work better on longer lines too no matter what the cab. Finally what router you are using can effect things too. There are so many things that can effect a line be amazed it even works. Until we get pure FTTP this will just continue. G.fast is just a stop gap for those closest to the cabs anything over 300m (that's pushing the limit but people at that distance have seen improvements) wont see an improvement anyway.

[andrue]

Until we get pure FTTP this will just continue.

FTTP will resolve the connection speed issues but the observed throughput will always be unpredictable. That's just the nature of a global WAN.

G.fast is just a stop gap for those closest to the cabs anything over 300m (that's pushing the limit but people at that distance have seen improvements) wont see an improvement anyway.

Yup. The more I hear about G.FAST the more I think there are better things for BT to be spending its money on. Originally there was a suggestion that small pods could be hung off lamp posts to help fill in not-spots for less cost. But now it seems G.FAST is just being used as a marketing exercise to boost BT's averages in cable areas.

[itsonlyme]

Yes gary i understand what you are saying

So here is tonights speeds again they have dropped off, nothing is downloading while taking this test over wired connection.



Should i report this as a fault ?

[Gary]

Yes gary i understand what you are saying

So here is tonights speeds again they have dropped off, nothing is downloading while taking this test over wired connection.



Should i report this as a fault ?

How are you doing the tests? They should be via Ethernet, if its wifi then all bets are off really as so many things can interfere. I would set a TBB Quality monitor, that shows more clearly what' going on than the speed tests, I imagine support would agree. Its free you just have to enable pings on your router. Take snapshots over a week to build up enough evidence of your issue and then send it to support.

https://www.thinkbroadband.com/broadband/monitoring/quality

[Gary]

FTTP will resolve the connection speed issues but the observed throughput will always be unpredictable. That's just the nature of a global WAN.Yup. The more I hear about G.FAST the more I think there are better things for BT to be spending its money on. Originally there was a suggestion that small pods could be hung off lamp posts to help fill in not-spots for less cost. But now it seems G.FAST is just being used as a marketing exercise to boost BT's averages in cable areas.

I could not agree more, I belive originally G.fast was meant to be at the DP so providing a huge increase in transmission rates for many users but BT then pulled it back to the cab, like you said pods was another idea, both of these options would have been better than pods on cabs for the benefit really of those within 100m range at 300m you pay way more to get not that much back. BT Wholesale/Openreach are myopic and should have pushed FTTP rather than G.fast as I see it.

Then again its a quick fix for a network groaning under its own weight, with an estate of cabs that are really subpar (ECI) with no fx for G.inp in site and also the need to satisfy the Governments "every one gets 10Mbps by 2020" which will be way way to slow by 2020. The 4K TV market for instance will be the norm, you can get 4K TV's for £400-700 now and they need for 15Mbps for 4K HDR on Netflix for instance. People are not told that and if you live in the countryside away from big cities good luck seeing those speeds...

[itsonlyme]

Gary you quoted me saying i tested over wired connection eg Ethernet and then asked me if i had done it over wifi

I have TBB running for the last 6 months from last isp and now with idnet all logs saved.

TBB shows no issues, no packet loss .... but im still getting odd evenings where i speeds drop.

Ive spoken to idnet via e-mail and they told me its most likely to be contention at peak times which openreach monitor and should apply updates to stop it.

But on the front of idnet page is states the following

( We guarantee no contention on our network, no throttling, no traffic shaping & no port blocking. No contention on our network is achieved by not oversubscribing our broadband services and ensuring that bandwidth investment exceeds customer demand. This means that we can guarantee the maximum throughput that your line can support at all times. )

Idnet told me in e-mail that my speed drops were most likely to be contention but they guarantee non on their network... im confused.

[nowster]

It depends on which bits are their network, and which bits are Openreach's.

If the path from your DSLAM (ie. cabinet for FTTC) back to Openreach's next router is overloaded, that's not something iDNet can control, and would affect all ISPs using that class of connection on that DSLAM. Were you on an LLU product from your previous ISP?

[itsonlyme]

Tbh i don't think i was but i'm not 100% sure, im told i was on btwholesale.

If Openreach's router is overloaded is there anything i can do ?

[nowster]

BT Wholesale is Openreach. One hopes that they've got it on their list for backhaul upgrades.

[Gary]

BT Wholesale is Openreach. One hopes that they've got it on their list for backhaul upgrades.

Yet oddly no they have separate numbers... and websites  https://www.btwholesale.com/pages/static/home.htm

https://www.openreach.co.uk/orpg/home/index.do

[nowster]

Yet oddly no they have separate numbers...

Openreach is a part of BT Group, but they're very much supposed to be an arm's length relationship with Wholesale nowadays. (Supposed to be.)

[Gary]

Openreach is a part of BT Group, but they're very much supposed to be an arm's length relationship with Wholesale nowadays. (Supposed to be.)

The 'supposed' to be seperated is just another lie from the BT group. My Openreach engineer friend was saying they still carry homehubs, now that's not exactly being free from BT is it. Interesting to see what happens to BT after all the mistakes and legal wrangles, like over spending on the champions league, buying EE and finally the pension plan <ahem> borrowing they did to patch the holes from the legal wrangles in Italy and all the cock ups by Gavin Patterson...