what causes drop-outs?

muffinhead

My BT broadband has been a bit temperamental recently so I emailed customer care and they have suggested that I may be experiencing drop-outs on the line. In terms of resolving the problem they seem pretty slow.

I have tried all the usual unplugging other equipment, connecting to the main socket, etc but I still seem to get these moments where, when waiting for a website to load, nothing happens for roughly 30 seconds and then it finally loads. A connection log from BT shows at one stage my dsl reconnected every 5 minutes six times in a row.

Can anyone suggest any possible causes and/or solutions to these drop-outs?

dub45

muffinhead wrote:

My BT broadband has been a bit temperamental recently so I emailed customer care and they have suggested that I may be experiencing drop-outs on the line. In terms of resolving the problem they seem pretty slow.

I have tried all the usual unplugging other equipment, connecting to the main socket, etc but I still seem to get these moments where, when waiting for a website to load, nothing happens for roughly 30 seconds and then it finally loads. A connection log from BT shows at one stage my dsl reconnected every 5 minutes six times in a row.

Can anyone suggest any possible causes and/or solutions to these drop-outs?

What speed are you on? Have you checked your line stats recently?

muffinhead

I'm on the 1MB broadband. My download speed is 820kbps and upload is 106kbps. I did a load of tests for BT and from these they seemed to think everything looked fine until I pressed them further and they suggested the drop-outs.

Sponge Bob

get (borrow) a different dsl modem to see if that helps.

could even be a spider nesting in a box along the line ....in other words God knows.

any crackle on the line ???

dub45

What are your line stats?

LoLth

Having the same problem.

Modem: voyager 210 (using this agian because they said they couldnt give support unless I did)
Line package: 3mb + phone

this has been going on since I got the connection put in.

BT blame the modem saying that there was a dodgy batch of voyager 210s. However, i am still (4 motnhs now!) waiting for my replacement as promised.

In the meantime I have tried:
Zyxel 650 , zyxel 600 , dlink and a wireless linksys - all continue to drop connection.

Tried bypassing the filter and going direct

Tried a different network card in the PC, then tried a laptop.

still doing it.

BT tech support keep giving me a complete runaround , even while they were having dns issues they had me doing pointless tests. I have repeatedly asked them to test the line for me but they wont do it, unless I pay 180 for an engineer to call out. As soon as the contract expires, BT are out the window. Useless shower of gits!

dub45

More than likely your line is not up to the 3Mb connection. what are your line stats?

muffinhead

dub45 wrote:

What are your line stats?

Downstream Upstream
Line Attenuation 43.0 db 26.0 db
Noise Margin 34.0 db 22.0 db

How do these stats rate ?

Sponge Bob

Seeing as dub45 is watching I have found another page for him as well as kitz

http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/index.cfm?a=wiki&tag=ADSL_Theory

The stats are ok , marginal for 3mbits I would thought until eircom upgrade to adsl2+ in around 2012 but fine for 2mbits

lucernarian

The stats look brilliant. Very good signal margin considering the attenuation of 43 dB. I don't have a clue what could be causing it... Faulty modem mabye.

The signal margin values are definetely correct?? Almost too good to be true.

muffinhead

Sponge Bob wrote:

The stats are ok , marginal for 3mbits I would thought until eircom upgrade to adsl2+ in around 2012 but fine for 2mbits

I'm on the 1MB, does this make any difference?

Sponge Bob

its perfect for 1mbit .

Drops could possibly be caused by a dodgy router or one where the cooling is blocked , can you borrow one somewhere to see it thats it ??

Another well known reason is a sky box, disconnect that for 48 hours and see if it improves matters .