Loss of service reports

rireed3 · Sep 23, 2009, 16:37:06

Maybe it's time for support to start counting these. I've had one overnight outage unexplained, and another that was only explained on this forum at the end of the following day.

Whether there's an explanation seems to depend on how many people complain at the same time. Since some of these outages seem to affect parts of individual exchanges at different times and on different dates, support might maintain a list with details such as.

time sync/authentication was first lost
times sync/authentication was lost/restored subsequently
if authentication was to the wrong (usually BT) IP, how many occurrences, at what times, and were they user-initiated
time proper sync and authentication were restored for at least one hour of adequate Internet access.

With this kind of documentation, maybe we could hope for some compensation.

Richard

Rik · Sep 23, 2009, 16:44:26

I'd be happy to run a sticky thread to collect such data, Richard. We can supply IP addresses to IDNet so they can identify customers, but it would help if users could also:

1) identify their exchange where possible
2) state which service they are on, ie Max, super Max or WBC
3) indicate what status their router was showing, ie sync but no PPP, no sync etc
4) post router logs where available

Bear in mind that most packages do not come with any form of SLA, therefore compensation is unlikely.

onlynik · Sep 23, 2009, 16:52:34

Exchange: Aberdeen Denburn
Product: Home SuperPro (ADSL2+)
Status: Router not connecting, then connecting able to ping WAN IP address, unable to ping WAN gateway or DNS servers. When I was unable to connect I had PPP errors (line still synced at 24Meg(ish))
Logs: No logging yet. Will look in to that tonight.

One other thing is teh support 24x7?

Simon · Sep 23, 2009, 22:31:46

You can leave a message on 0800 710 2000 or 01462 480092, and they will usually respond to loss of service issues, but the offices are not manned (or even womanned) 24/7.

karvala · Oct 03, 2009, 12:08:37

As these seem to be continuing, I think I'll start to play as well. From my previous post, I had the following outages recorded (all times are approximate within a few minutes for clarity, multiple disconnects close to each other are logged as a single incident, and service was restored within a few minutes unless stated otherwise):-

(1) 1.00am on 14th
(2) 2.00am on 14th
(3) 11.00pm on 14th
(4) 2.00am on 15th
(5) 1.00am on 16th
(6) 7.30pm on 18th
(7) 8.30pm on 18th
(8) 9.30pm on 19th (yoyo for about an hour and a half)
(9) 2.00am on 20th
(10) 1.00am on 21st
(11) 11.30pm on 22nd
(12) 4.30am on 23rd
(13) 11.30pm on 23rd
(14) (various others unlogged about rebooting router - 24th Sept to 2nd October)
(15) 22.45pm on 2nd October
(16) 1.00am on 3rd October
(17) 1.30am on 3rd October (remained down until I rebooted my router around 11.00am on 3rd October)

It's significant that the vast majority of these occur in the middle of the night, and absolutely none during the daytime, with just a couple in the evening. Sure looks like BT messing around in the exchange at times they think don't matter to anyone. For completeness I've also attached a graph of the downstream SNR during the last 15 hours or so, which reflects how it is all of the time: around 6.9dB and absolutely rock solid, scarcely fluctuating more than 0.1dB in either direction. I have interleaving switched on by choice as well, which is partly responsible for this extra stability. The loss of sync at the outage times is in no way caused by SNR or line stability, as I think this graphs shows.

[attachment deleted by admin]

Rik · Oct 03, 2009, 12:13:14

I've seen one or two similar instances, but they seem to have introduced new DLM, either at my exchange or the MK node, because I am now running on a 3db target margin, with an observed nm range of 0.3 - 3.1db. That 'extra low' margin setting has allowed me to move to a 4.5Mb profile.

rireed3 · Oct 08, 2009, 18:34:27

Another BT ambush

Danni's outage, 8 Oct. 2009

Rik · Oct 08, 2009, 18:35:19

Thanks, Richard, so busy on the phone finding out what had happened, I forgot to write it up.

rireed3 · Oct 08, 2009, 18:41:27

I don't mind -- I just can't stand them getting away with anything

Richard

Rik · Oct 08, 2009, 18:42:06

Bill · Oct 09, 2009, 09:53:55

A bit late, but just for info:

Tuesday 6th Oct 2009

Didcot exchange, WBC

Loss of PPP at 10:07am, restored at 10:41am

Sync stayed up.

Bill · Oct 10, 2009, 19:59:38

And again- log extract:

2009.10.10 18:57:57 If(PVC1) PPP connection ok !
2009.10.10 18:57:56 PVC1 get IP:212.69.xxx.xxx
2009.10.10 18:57:41 PVC1 start PPP
2009.10.10 18:57:40 If(PVC1) PPP fail : Peer terminate
2009.10.10 18:57:24 PVC1 start PPP
2009.10.10 18:57:21 PVC1 stop PPP

No loss of sync.

At least it was brief this time!

Lance · Oct 10, 2009, 21:55:11

I wonder if this is specific to WBC and changes being made to the network.

Bill · Oct 14, 2009, 16:41:54

Again:

2009.10.14 16:35:21 If(PVC1) PPP connection ok !
2009.10.14 16:35:20 PVC1 get IP:212.69.xxx.xxx
2009.10.14 16:34:48 PVC1 start PPP
2009.10.14 16:34:48 ADSL Media Up !
2009.10.14 16:34:03 PVC1 stop PPP
2009.10.14 16:34:03 ADSL Media Down !

Didcot exchange, WBC, no loss of sync.

Lance · Oct 14, 2009, 19:03:11

I wonder if they are picking on you Bill?!

Bill · Oct 14, 2009, 19:12:47

It seems odd that the outages are so brief... not really long enough for BT to be doing any thing useful, but enough to screw up a download if it happened at the wrong moment

karvala · Oct 14, 2009, 22:18:12

Mine remains somewhat erratic. Outages still happen during the evening or night exclusively, but it's getting harder to log. The router is on 24/7 of course, but increasingly I'm needing to reboot the router (=lost log) to get the PPP layer back after it goes down. Had bizarre experience just a few moments ago where I came back from work, found the router on but disconnected, gave it a couple of minutes to find it's own back, which it didn't, actually unplugged the router entirely for 10 minutes, then powered up, still couldn't get a PPP connection, then rebooted the router through the console, and it was fine.

Could be a coincidence, but I think I've had to reboot it about half a dozen times this week now. Leaves me wondering whether it's really BT, or whether the router is slowly falling apart. Don't have another one to test with at the moment, but we'll see how it goes anyway.

Simon · Oct 14, 2009, 22:24:20

If you think you have a router problem, IDNet could probably lend you a pre-configured one to test with.

Bill · Oct 14, 2009, 22:33:18

Quote from: karvala on Oct 14, 2009, 22:18:12Could be a coincidence

Some time back when I had a Linksys instead of the 3Com, it would lose PPP occasionally, usually on a Saturday morning... I'd give it 20 minutes or so then ring the out of hours number. After a couple of rings, PPP would come back up.

Three times that happened... go figure

Seriously I'm inclined to agree with Simon- time to try another router. Get one off eBay and configure it as a straight swap for the one you've got (IP address, open ports etc) and keep it as a spare, doing that has saved my backside a couple of times!

karvala · Oct 14, 2009, 22:34:42

Thanks Simon, that's a good idea. I'll give it until the end of the weekend, when I can monitor it properly during the day, and then give them a call on Monday if it looks like it could be the router.

Meanwhile, just went down again! Noise margins were fine each time it came up, but it just fell over again each time. I've changed the filter and unplugged the phone, which made no difference, and there are no other phone sockets, so I'm quite sure it's not that at least.

Wed, 2009-10-14 21:26:46 - LCP down.
Wed, 2009-10-14 21:27:02 - Initialize LCP.
Wed, 2009-10-14 21:27:02 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Wed, 2009-10-14 21:28:02 - Initialize LCP.
Wed, 2009-10-14 21:28:02 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Wed, 2009-10-14 21:29:02 - Initialize LCP.
Wed, 2009-10-14 21:29:02 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Wed, 2009-10-14 21:30:03 - Initialize LCP.
Wed, 2009-10-14 21:30:03 - LCP is allowed to come up.
Wed, 2009-10-14 21:30:07 - CHAP authentication success

karvala · Oct 14, 2009, 22:37:43

Quote from: Bill on Oct 14, 2009, 22:33:18
Some time back when I had a Linksys instead of the 3Com, it would lose PPP occasionally, usually on a Saturday morning... I'd give it 20 minutes or so then ring the out of hours number. After a couple of rings, PPP would come back up.

Three times that happened... go figure

Seriously I'm inclined to agree with Simon- time to try another router. Get one off eBay and configure it as a straight swap for the one you've got (IP address, open ports etc) and keep it as a spare, doing that has saved my backside a couple of times!

Yeah, I have a spare of most computer bits these days (often several), so I should add a decent ADSL router to the spares list. I do have an old one somewhere, I think, but it was pretty poor (Safecom IIRC; super-cheap and acted like it; didn't even support UPnP), so I wouldn't trust it too much for testing purposes, but I guess I could dig it out if I can face rummaging through 5000 boxes of junk. $:-\$

Bill · Oct 14, 2009, 22:43:42

Quote from: karvala on Oct 14, 2009, 22:37:43I guess I could dig it out if I can face rummaging through 5000 boxes of junk. $:-\$

Quicker and easier to get one off eBay for about fifteen quid! I think that's what I paid for a Tiscali coded Speedtouch about a year ago... and the reflashing to civilise it was free

Lance · Oct 14, 2009, 22:45:28

Oi Bill, we don't use the T word round here! It brings back bad memories for too many people!

Bill · Oct 14, 2009, 22:47:28

Sorry Sir

Simon · Oct 14, 2009, 23:30:23

Some of us have found the 2700 to be very good, and you can pick them up off eBay for less than 20 quid delivered.