Internet troubleshooting

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moonshadow
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Internet troubleshooting

Post by moonshadow »

Okay, so before I get hustled by the phone company, I thought I'd pick some of the brains of the techies here...

Internet speed through CenturyLink is the 10Mbps service. Generally speaking that's the speed it runs, however at completely random times drops to 0.02Mbps, then suddenly it's back up again. And when I say this, I mean it's like an on/off switch. I thought at one time it might have been internet congestion, however the sharp drops in speeds, and the random times it strikes suggest to me otherwise.

Jenn said she wondered if the modem/router is about to die.

I have verified the integrity of my line to the best of my ability. I do have two interface boxes which is somewhat unusual, one feeds into the other, but both are wired with what appears to be solid 24 gauge copper phone line. Between the two interface boxes is a heavy duty phone cable that looks to be something the phone company installed. I disconnected it, tied the two ends on one side together and checked continuity on the other side. My result was about 2.5 ohms. I would have liked to have seen around 0.2, but the small gauge and the distance of about 50 feet made me think this may be normal. I checked two other unused lines and received the same result. The reading was steady and not jumpy, and there seemed to be no reading to ground. Was listening to Pandora today and everything was fine, speed test and random samples were 9.5-10Mbps all day, then suddenly I noticed Pandora starting to buffer... ran a speed test... 0.03Mbps.

It's been like that ever since, and that was 6 hours ago, however every once in a while it will spike up, only to die again in a few minutes.

Very annoying, and though I like vintage stuff, I have no desire to return to the days of 24kbps speeds, which is what I'm running. Even skirt cafe which is a pretty light site all things considered takes a while to load.

CenturyLink was kind enough to give us an all week appointment (will be here sometime between now and Jan 28..), oh and by the way, be sure someone is home.

I tell ya, we've had nothing but problems ever since we moved here. I believe there is some type of pox on this place.
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crfriend
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

Post by crfriend »

How close is your router/modem to the demarc for your house? One very decent way to check is to connect your modem at the demarc and disconnect everything else inside. If there's junk somewhere in the "customer" side, that'll get it out of the equation. Of course your 'phones won't work while you're testing.
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moonshadow
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

Post by moonshadow »

crfriend wrote:How close is your router/modem to the demarc for your house? One very decent way to check is to connect your modem at the demarc and disconnect everything else inside. If there's junk somewhere in the "customer" side, that'll get it out of the equation. Of course your 'phones won't work while you're testing.
Well that's the thing, I have two [demarcs]. One is probably older than the other. There is one attached to the pole where the electric meter is located and the other is on the side of the trailer. The one on the trailer is practically right next to the modem, and there is only one jack, and I have just replaced it as of yesterday as the old one didn't work and a previous tenant just ran a cheap phone cord directly out of the lower demarc, through the window and into the building.

There are no filters anywhere on the system.

I had already tried your trick last night when it died. I connected it directly to the demarc on the pole. What's interesting is I received a speed of about 7Mbps, so I figured... bad wiring somewhere right? Well, I connected it back into the trailer with the same line I used up at the pole and I received 8Mbps. After some checking around, I figured perhaps the phone cord between the jack and the modem was faulty as it worked when I tested with the other one, however after several test even the other cord quit working.

As it stands, I can't really say for certain if my test at the pole really proved anything. Granted, it worked better, however I also had the modem off for about 15 minutes while I got everything set up.

As of this morning it's back up to 10Mbps, of course it's been resting all night.

Given the quirky nature of this thing, I'm seriously starting to consider the modem itself. It seems to be worse towards the evening, and that's after a long day of Amber streaming youtube, it's also been used heavily to stream programs on Chrome Cast. The modem is almost two years old, but by us not having any TV service that entire time, a LOT of data has passed through it. Perhaps it's just wore out.
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

Post by crfriend »

moonshadow wrote:There are no filters anywhere on the system.
If this is a DSL setup, that might be your problem -- although, that said, since it's an intermittent that's unlikely the problem. (The filters should only go on the voice telephones, NOT the modem.)
The modem is almost two years old, but by us not having any TV service that entire time, a LOT of data has passed through it. Perhaps it's just wore out.
These sorts of things don't "age" with the amount of data passing through them, they get tired from other reasons, mainly heat or assorted overvoltage conditions on the incoming wires. Any electrical storms in the vicinity recently?
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

Post by moonshadow »

crfriend wrote:These sorts of things don't "age" with the amount of data passing through them, they get tired from other reasons, mainly heat or assorted overvoltage conditions on the incoming wires. Any electrical storms in the vicinity recently?
No electrical storms to speak of, no spikes on the phone line that I'm aware of.
I know last week we had a nasty power issue that effected this whole side of town. It was flickering pretty badly between outages. I also know the lights dim more than I'm accustomed to, but I would imagine that such "dirty power" would be filtered out by the small transformer on the power cable going to the modem.

Aside from that there is heat, which is a possibility. I had also considered I may have damaged the modem by where I placed it when we moved, which was basically between the computer tower (CPU), and a straight talk wireless landline box, of course the CPU's power supply is right under it. Perhaps I created a crap sandwich of electromagnetic interference?

Modem placement is as it is in the photo below. It's the little box behind the purple cloth between the CPU and the straight talk landline box.
Maybe it doesn't matter, I'm just grasping for straws....

Image

Regardless I'm trying to decide if it's worth it to have a tech come out, charge us a couple hundred dollars to tell us its the modem and then spend a hundred dollars extra on the modem, take a stab at it and just try another modem, cancel and switch to cable net which uses leased equipment, but at a higher cost per month (faster speed though), or since we don't plan on living here very long, just canceling the internet all together and tethering my phone when I need to get online for business. (signing this lease might have been the biggest housing mistake I've ever made, I thank my lucky stars I didn't BUY a place like this).

I'll give all this a tick this week. It's really not a good time of year to be throwing a lot of money at random problems.

If it turns out to be a bad modem, do you think this placement may have damaged it? Because if so, if I replace it I'll make sure to find a better place to set it.
-Andrea
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

Post by crfriend »

moonshadow wrote:No electrical storms to speak of, no spikes on the phone line that I'm aware of.
A strike 20 miles away may get onto the wires and enter that way. The Phone Company ("We don't care, we don't need to." [0]) is usually quite good at maintaining its suppression gear because they take damage from that, too -- and their stuff is more expensive than your stuff (I can guarantee that).
Aside from that there is heat, which is a possibility.
When I speak of "heat" in this context, the test is to see if you can keep your hand on it for more than five or six seconds. If you can, it's likely not a problem. If you can't, the it likely is. If the thing is so hot that you instantly recoil from it -- or can't touch it -- it's definitely a problem and needs to be unplugged from the mains ASAP.
Perhaps I created a crap sandwich of electromagnetic interference?
Likely not. The only problem may come into play if you have two wireless access points (WAPs) in close proximity. I ran into that when I set up the uplink from my apartment to the main network box in the house. I had originally put my local WAP on top of the 'fridge next to the uplink, and even though they were operating on separate channels got crud performance. I eventually put the local WAP on top of another computer which sits on its side on the floor next to the 'fridge and things got vastly better. The only thing that runs hot in my place is my temper, and that's calmed down a whole lot in the last 18 months.
Modem placement is as it is in the photo below. It's the little box behind the purple cloth between the CPU and the straight talk landline box.
That's a nice homey looking little nook!
Regardless I'm trying to decide if it's worth it to have a tech come out, charge us a couple hundred dollars to tell us its the modem and then spend a hundred dollars extra on the modem [...]
Work with the 'phone company on the matter and see how it goes. Open up a ticket and have them run some diagnostics on the modem when it's working normally, and then try to contact them when it's bad. If they wrote the results down from when it was OK and then analyse what they see when it's bad they'll be able to get a better clue. Make sure they know it's an intermittent problem. Intermittents are the very worst sort of problems to deal with, as any tech who's ever worked on one can tell you.

If it's not a large expense, having another modem/router/WAP never hurts to have around as a spare.
(signing this lease might have been the biggest housing mistake I've ever made, I thank my lucky stars I didn't BUY a place like this).
Live and learn.

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Re: Internet troubleshooting

Post by hoborob »

What this really sounds like is that the Phone line cables that are between you and the local switching station may have gotten to the point where they have started to dry rot a bit and rain water is getting into the cables and making the connections get corroded and start losing a good solid connection. It may be getting time for the phone service to start replacing the cables in your area to get the signal strength back to where it should be. Problem is that this is very hard to find and correct without replacing all the system wiring.
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

Post by moonshadow »

hoborob wrote:What this really sounds like is that the Phone line cables that are between you and the local switching station may have gotten to the point where they have started to dry rot a bit and rain water is getting into the cables and making the connections get corroded and start losing a good solid connection. It may be getting time for the phone service to start replacing the cables in your area to get the signal strength back to where it should be. Problem is that this is very hard to find and correct without replacing all the system wiring.
Certainly possible, and I'm really hoping it's something on their end so I don't have to worry about being charged for the call.

However if that is the case, then others would certainly be dealing with the same issues. I'd say they better fix it fast in that case because I can certainly see them loosing quite a bit of market share if they allow their lines to degrade to the point where 32kbps is about as good as it will do.

My boss and I ran some calculations today and we concluded that 2.5 ohms on a 24 gauge line running 100 feet (50 to and 50 from) would be about right. My jack is brand new, the box is grounded, and everything seems pretty tight. I believe it's either a) my modem, or b) something on their end.

I haven't taken my walk around the streets to observe and photograph the area utility poles yet. I don't know if the lines are buried or above ground. Something tells me they are probably above ground. Perhaps I will do that while I'm waiting on my appointment this Saturday.

I'm surprised I haven't heard from Darrel, our MacGuyver of I.T. on this one! :wink:
-Andrea
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

Post by Darryl »

Only ting you haven't done that I'd do is try another modem/router.

I've had DSL for about 10 years and still have 2 DSL modem/router boxes sitting in the computer room. Since they shut down the old BellSouth DSL network mid-2016 I've been on cable as they are the only choice in my area. :)

So...I'd try another modem/router - if you know someone with the same service, you could try yours on their line or borrow theirs to try on your line. Else a refurbished one or new one if they aren't too expensive considering that once you've tested from the demarc it is likely on the ISP's side. You just have to 'prove' it to the ISP. ACTUALLY my old ISP on the DSL connection allowed me to come by and 'check out' a DSL modem once the help desk agreed we needed to do so for troubleshooting and not be charged unless I kept it. No charge if I brought it back within a week. I ended up with two because I thought the old one was dying and it helped for a while but it turned out the problem was an intermittent on the phone company/ISP side. Almost exactly like your problem come to think of it. Drop from 1.5 mbps to 372 kbps or thereabouts. It almost seemed heat related when the outside temps got higher. The tech who came out listed, said 'I know what it is' and fixed it.

OTOH - I always put my my computer stuff on a good APC UPS since I had some...interesting....lightning strikes a few years ago. I can now continue working on the internet on my computer and watch TV for at least 1.5 hours without worrying about equipment damage (mostly) and brownouts. [He says, crossing fingers....] I've never had any issues since setting that up. That takes care of the power and my gigabit Ethernet. The WiFi transmitter/cablemodem may blow ... but that's on lease and I'm not sure if the cable lines are 'protected' but mostly irrelevant as I don't watch that much cable-TV and the internet from the cable is WiFI. I still use the house gigabit Ethernet when hurling around large audio mixes and doing backups to the home server.
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

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moonshadow wrote:Internet speed through CenturyLink is the 10Mbps service. Generally speaking that's the speed it runs, however at completely random times drops to 0.02Mbps, then suddenly it's back up again. And when I say this, I mean it's like an on/off switch....
Have you checked for bursts of interference? Slow running can be caused by a poor signal-to-noise ratio because the system keeps stopping to do re-sends. If the signal alone were failing, it would not always drop to the same marginal level, sometimes it might run just a bit slow and sometimes it might stop altogether; but if there were bursts of interference it would nearly always be reduced to the same very low speed as it struggled to get the data through.

Try leaving an A.M. radio running near the incoming wires, preferably tuned between stations at the low frequency end of the medium wave band. It might show an increased noise level during periods of low speed.
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

Post by r.m.anderson »

I would guess that you have ruled out HEAT as being the factor for the reduction in speed ?
But However what about a modem with an internal fan or a small fan blowing across or into the modem.
Electronics don't appreciate HEAT and definitely like the CHILL that's why the guts of a computer
like being in an air condition chamber vault what-have-you.
Also having your modem on top of a stacked array of other HEAT generating gear should be avoided.

Posted previously about trying another modem - good call - if your present modem has been to the
edge of space (think Star Wars) just maybe it has been on warp speed way beyond its manufacturers
specs. Time for an upgrade perhaps ?

But what do I know - just an 800 pound gorilla smashing electrons around with random abandon !
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

Post by moonshadow »

Guess what....

The telephone man comes on Saturday...

You all know what happens on SATURDAY don't ya??

Yep...

Moonshadow dresses in his weekend attire!

"Honey... I had the strangest call today... I spent the morning troubleshooting a bad speed at this strange little trailer in Marion where a man greeted me and he was dressed like a girl, only he looked like a dude!?"


... Four months later...

INTRODUCTIONS:
Hi, my name is suchandsuch and I'm a little new at this. I work for a phone company in Virginia and I got this crazy idea about trying on a skirt from one of our customers who was wearing one on a service calls of mine. I just can't believe the freedom that these clothes afford!

moonshadow:
Hi suchandsuch, that customer was me, glad to meet you again!

suchandsuch:
Get out! Small world! How's your connection?

moonshadow:
Yeah, about that, I'm actually glad you're here, it still sucks and they sent me a $300 bill. I need to you to come back, I got into a fight with the call center in India about this.

suchandsuch:
Oh... man I hate to hear that... I'll see what I can do..

moonshadow:
Uh-huh...

Fred in skirts:
:welcome: :kiltdance:
-Andrea
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moonshadow
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

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Well, I had to cancel the phone repair man's visit today as I was to meet with the landlady to discuss other matters.

She mentioned she had a place coming up this month that she said thought might suit us better. We haven't looked inside yet as she is still in the eviction process, however if it was left in pretty decent shape we may be able to take possession in the next week or two. The rent is a little higher, it's what we were paying in Damascus actually but it has a much better driveway, the lot is 100% level and is literally right downtown.

It's a 1300sq foot brick house 1 and 1/2 story, 4 bedroom 1 1/2 bath. We'd be just as close to the train, although on the other side of the rails.

It seems like a cute little house. It has no direct residential neighbors, there is a salvage/repair/recovery auto shop right next door, some type of warehouse building across the street and a pretty well kept house catty-cornered with two awesome classic Cadillacs that I might just approach him in maybe taking one off his hands. :D If not I'd at least like to photograph them as those are some sexy automobiles...

The brick should make it a little easier to heat I believe. She said it has good windows. Really the only thing I can see potential issue it's probably in a flood plain as it sits pretty even with the banks of the creek that runs through town. But it has no basement and looks to sit about three or four feet off the ground so it would have to get pretty high to actually enter the house.

All that said, we're just going to table the internet thing right now, if we do move again, we'll probably just switch over to cable.

This will be the first time in my life I've ever moved somewhere so close, it's just a few blocks away.
-Andrea
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

Post by Kirbstone »

Moon,
Here it's only the townies have cable/fibre. Out in the Styx where we live a line of poles bring a little wire fourthousandmiles to supply all of us and when it gets to us there's not much horse power in the signal! :blue:

Beware flood planes! Lots of developers buiid on them now. We live on a former Liffey flood plain, but the Electric Dam upstream has sorted all that out since the 30s.....or so it seemed! We joked about our ski resort named Barretstown 83, the number being our altitude in meters. Pic. taken in Dec. 2010 and we haven't hardly had a flake of snow since then.
Rs Cross-country skis at Resort 'Barretstown 83' Dec. 2010. Btw. We haven't had a flake of snow since then.jpg
In 2007 November we had a few drops of rain and consequent run-off from higher areas near us. The Council had wantonly failed to keep the culverts clear so we had a (fortunately) brief flooding of our lower fields, lake, orchard, hen-run and lawn. There was hell to pay and some councillors' heads rolled. The culverts have all since been enlarged. I got a pretty picture, though!

Hope your move goes well.

Tom
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Re: Internet troubleshooting

Post by stevelous »

When we moved into our home back in 2004 all we had was the BT master socket in the front bedroom. Other phone jacks were present wired up but not connected to the service. BT wanted £130 per socket to connect two wires, but I found it was easy to do it myself as the wires connected to the faceplate assembly. A £3 punch down tool solved the issue. The broadband modem was supplies with micro filters and these were fitted at all used phone sockets as per instructions.

Then my broadband issues started, dropped lines, slow performance, loss of data etc. New micro filters did not help, but plugging a micro filter directly into the test socket, after removing the front plate, restored my broadband.

Some research revealed the real problem was the aluminium wiring used in the house telephone wiring. Seems that Aluminium has a nasty tenancy to pick up stray electrical signals that swamped the broadband signal. All I has to do was either replace the wiring or find a way to isolate the bad wires. I did the latter by providing a separate phone circuit fed through a micro filter using copper wires for about a foot before connecting up the Aluminium wiring.

Seems to work well and thanks to fibre to the box at the end of our street I get up to 77Mbit all for £20 per month.
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