Constantly dropping, almost unusable =-( [Archive]

View Full Version : Constantly dropping, almost unusable =-(

Eambo

11-11-2009, 17:59

Hi everyone,

I hope someone can help me out with this very annoying issue. A little background, I'm on the 50MB connection with a brand new tested modem as of two days ago, and the technician checked my line and said the signal is dead on.

Here's the story:

I've got three Wireless-N Routers. £150 Sitecom gaming router, £100 Belkin Wireless N1 router, and the standard netgear wireless-N provided with VM 50MB.

I have been having problems for months with ALL THREE routers. Basically they keep dropping out, and the only way I can get my internet back is by resetting the ROUTERS, not the modem.

I'm stumped as to what this could be. Amusingly, the more expensive the router, the more frequent the drops. VMs router drops out the least, however DOES still drop out.

I've tried changing the channels, putting them on manual and automatic channels, obviously tried changing routers, tried getting help from VM which was pretty useless, and now replaced the modem, and it's still happening.

It seems to be when I'm on skype more than anything. Sometimes it drops only for 5-10 seconds, and reconnects, but my games are disconnecting and my skype drops the call, and when I call back will kick back in in 5-10 seconds.

I need my wireless as my mum and brother both use the internet wirelessly as well.

Please please please, any advice or help would be much appreciated, as it's driving me insane.

Thank you!

Peter_

11-11-2009, 18:03

As a matter of interest can you post your upstream and downstream power levels just click the link to log in.

http://192.168.100.1/

Eambo

11-11-2009, 18:11

Thanks for the reply Moldova:

Downstream:
Power Level
(dBmV) 8.24 8.10 8.03 7.81

RxMER
(dB) 38.61 38.61 38.61 38.98

Upstream:

Power Level
(dBmV) 48.50 N/A N/A N/A

It just dropped without skype, although with torrents and a game open... >.<

Peter_

11-11-2009, 18:55

Your downstream is rather high so a call to 50Mb Support team is in order 0800 052 0431

Eambo

11-11-2009, 18:59

Your downstream is rather high so a call to 50Mb Support team is in order 0800 052 0431

Does it matter that I'm actively downloading at the minute?

If I call up what do you recommend I say? I have a nightmare getting through, I tried an hour or so ago and couldn't even get put on hold it's so busy.

Do you think this could be the reason it keeps dropping out? It's dropped literally 5+ times since my last response, most of them for again 5-10 seconds, but still annoying >.<

Peter_

11-11-2009, 19:01

The 0800 number should get through fairly quickly do not ring any other number, but if you are downloading leave it to after 0800 tomorrow morning and call ASAP.

Eambo

11-11-2009, 19:37

Moldova,

Thanks again for your response. I have wiped my event log to record what happened next time it properly disconnects (eg my wireless says no internet available) and I found the following:

No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-

What does this indicate?

Peter_

11-11-2009, 19:41

Be careful of reading modem logs, because what happens when you reboot your modem is that every single update for that modem is received at the same time giving you those worrying logs.

Virgin also disable most of the updates as they are not required so making it look even worse.

Eambo

11-11-2009, 19:44

Well I didn't reset the modem, it just gave that error when it disconnected, I assumed it would be helpful - I guess not.

I'll give them a call tomorrow and see how things go I guess >.<

Peter_

11-11-2009, 19:48

I have 3 of them in my modem and I am on 20Mb not 50Mb.

Ignitionnet

11-11-2009, 20:19

I have 3 of them in my modem and I am on 20Mb not 50Mb.

Bleh amateur I have 17 in one day. :p:

Eambo

11-11-2009, 20:59

I'm going to call VM now because it's getting out of hand. It's dropping every 5-10 minutes, and every hour or so dropping permanently so I have to reset the router. I've noticed that when I reset the router the modem had a constantly blinking downstream but no upstream X.x I dunno if that actually means anything.

Hurrah, I managed to catch it in a ping while it happened. Check out this ping log:

Pinging google.com [74.125.67.100] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=1749ms TTL=52
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=117ms TTL=52
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=118ms TTL=52
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=124ms TTL=52
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=119ms TTL=52
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=119ms TTL=52
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=116ms TTL=52
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=117ms TTL=52
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=114ms TTL=52
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=116ms TTL=52
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=116ms TTL=52
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=120ms TTL=52
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=121ms TTL=52
Reply from 74.125.67.100: bytes=32 time=110ms TTL=52

Ping statistics for 74.125.67.100:
Packets: Sent = 24, Received = 14, Lost = 10 (41% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 110ms, Maximum = 1749ms, Average = 234ms

As you can see it's kicking in and out, and I've no idea what's causing this to happen.

Edit: Okay this is weird. Right now my pings are dropping, my game is dropping off and on, yet I'm still talking to people on MSN. EVERYTHING is dropping except for MSN. Anyone know what's so special about MSN?

Peter_

11-11-2009, 21:27

In the modem how many downstreams are actually working.

Eambo

11-11-2009, 21:30

Moldova:

DS-1 DS-2 DS-3 DS-4

I know VM are probably going to tell me it's my router, but I've had this router I'm using right now (£150 WL-308 Gaming Router, Sitecom) replaced once, and I've tried with a Belkin and the original Netgear. The Netgear is more stable however it runs like crap compared to my other routers, and it's still not 100% stable >.<

Thanks for helping me out, Moldova.

Edit: Moldova, thanks for giving me that number, I've been using 150 and waiting 30 mins to get to tech support, who then tell me they're not qualified and send me to this team. Got through pretty quickly! ^_^

They're saying they can't find an issue on the line so they're sending out an engineer. I'm not really sure what they hope to achieve by doing this, I used to work in Broadband tech support so I know myself intermittent faults are a nightmare to sort out - especially with an engineer call.

Maybe give him a cup of tea and let him use my PC for ten minutes? =-P Of course chances are when he uses it it'll work 100% fine until he leaves, the way of the world eh?

If anyone can think of anything else I can try in the meantime, or any way I can try and prove to the engineer that this issue is happening, please feel free to let me know! =-)

Peter_

11-11-2009, 21:37

As I said earlier it is probably the high downstream power levels check the 50Mb sticky here http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/12/26006-cable-modem-signal-levels.html

Call tomorrow morning as soon after 0800 as possible to the 50Mb Support Team on 0800 052 0431.

squirrel1970

11-11-2009, 22:47

In relation to the OP, we've had a similar issue with our 10mb connection... 2 engineers (including new attenuator and brand new cat5s allover) and a new modem later and we're still getting random disconnects from the modem.. signal levels all check out as being ok... so far (new modem only arrived yesterday too... on top of our windows issues, we've had a heck of a 24 hours so far :-p)

Our router is absolutely fine - we gave that a hard reset a couple of weeks back when our problems first happened and firstly assumed (and wrongly) it was the router....

So... we're at a loss as to why the connection is being temperamental....

Eambo

11-11-2009, 22:51

Hi cj and thanks for the reply,

Yeah right now my skype is disconnecting every few seconds, audio quality is terrible, it's like being on dialup.

I'm getting so, so annoyed at this - I can't remember perfectly but I'm pretty sure this started when I upgraded from 20MB to 50MB...great upgrade >.<

Peter_

12-11-2009, 06:33

bomber_g

12-11-2009, 11:18

have you tried plugging your pc straight into the modem to see if you get the same problem? this is the easiest way to see if your connection is flaky or not.

with a single machine plugged in - run an MTR ( http://winmtr.sourceforge.net/ ) to your DNS (194.168.4.100) servers and see if there is packet loss to the first hop (10. ip address - this is your UBR's internal IP )

if you see packet loss there - it means the link from your modem to the UBR may not be working properly - ie damaged or loose coax / splitters / tap port etc - which needs a tech visit

If you don't see packet loss - you might be saturating your upstream. I only say this as you have said you have multiple machines running several applications all at the same time - check logs on your router and see how much bandwidth you are using

Eambo

12-11-2009, 13:19

Hm, sitting wired at the minute, and I got this:

Maybe didn't keep it going long enough? Doing a ping to google right now and still getting request timed out...

What do you reckon?

If it helps any I'm using Skype and Limewire uploading at 31kb/s - that's all I've got uploading. So I don't think I'm using all my upload X.x