Daily dropouts on broadband connection

Ush1

At the end of my tether. I switched from Virgin Media fibre BB which has always been flawless to Eir BB to save money. Since I switched I've had connection drops twice a day, sometimes once a day for 5 minutes at a time. Had engineers out at least three times, not really knowing what the problem was but then saying it was fixed only for it to happen again. I then switched to Pure Telecom thinking it was possibly an issue with the Eir router but now the same issue happening with them!

They sent out an engineer(same guy Eir had out, obviously same crowd maintain the network) and he still couldn't figure it out. Said to my wife it might be because of the electric car charger we installed which is horsesh*te because it was happening long before that was put in.

Is there anything I can do here? I'm presuming ComReg can't help.

Ush1

Anybody any ideas on this? Can I request the copper cable to ran again through the duct to my house?

advertsfox

Honestly, paying that little extra for Virgin is worth it - I'd highly recommend going back. Its most likely an internal wiring issue you have that Eircom won't fix and the cost of you getting that fixed will offset the "savings" from switching over to Eir. How much were you paying Virgin btw?

Ush1

advertsfox wrote: »

Honestly, paying that little extra for Virgin is worth it - I'd highly recommend going back. Its most likely an internal wiring issue you have that Eircom won't fix and the cost of you getting that fixed will offset the "savings" from switching over to Eir. How much were you paying Virgin btw?

I'm thinking of going back to Virgin now but it's over double the cost and that's with a discount for 6 months.

Don't think it can be internal wiring in my house as the cable literally comes up from the duct in the driveway, straight through the gable wall and the connection box is attached there. It doesn't branch off or anything.

Just thinking though, for a while the cable had been pulled out and tape round the top of it, would have been exposed to the elements a bit, would it be worth stripping and reconnecting it I wonder? Not sure if there is much slack anyway.

advertsfox

Virgin do Broadband only for €44 a month (€59 after 6 months) - thats a solid price for the reliable service.

I would imagine that is a good start since it's the same with 2 DSL providers and 2 routers, internal cabling is quite prone to easy interference esp. with weathering at pay. Can you post the DSL Line Statistics off the router too?

SeanaciousD

It sounds like there is a problem with the copper line between your house and the cabinet outside. There is too much "noise" on the line and it keeps resetting the DSL handshake. I had a similar issue.

Unfortunately it's hard to tell where the interference is coming from without extensive measurement, it could be inside or outside the house. If outside, the onus is usually on Eir to repair. If inside, you may have to foot the bill. Most times the technician isn't going to bother doing the measurements and will just just suggest to replace your internal wiring if anything. The copper wire may be running past things generating a lot of EMI in the walls/attic, a mouse may have frayed a small piece over the years etc. It's hard to know for sure

Your router/modem should be keeping a log of each time the connection drops and restarts, try submitting that if you make another complaint.

If the problem persists you should try and end the contract with your provider early and without penalty citing the service not being fit for purpose. They'll either let you go or actually take your complaint more seriously I also ended up going back to Virgin myself.

Ush1

SeanaciousD wrote: »

It sounds like there is a problem with the copper line between your house and the cabinet outside. There is too much "noise" on the line and it keeps resetting the DSL handshake. I had a similar issue.

Unfortunately it's hard to tell where the interference is coming from without extensive measurement, it could be inside or outside the house. If outside, the onus is usually on Eir to repair. If inside, you may have to foot the bill. Most times the technician isn't going to bother doing the measurements and will just just suggest to replace your internal wiring if anything. The copper wire may be running past things generating a lot of EMI in the walls/attic, a mouse may have frayed a small piece over the years etc. It's hard to know for sure

Your router/modem should be keeping a log of each time the connection drops and restarts, try submitting that if you make another complaint.

If the problem persists you should try and end the contract with your provider early and without penalty citing the service not being fit for purpose. They'll either let you go or actually take your complaint more seriously I also ended up going back to Virgin myself.

Don't think the interference is from within the house as I detailed it just comes in through a hole from outside and doesn't continue on anywhere else but yeah, it sounds exactly what you're describing. I think the logs on the router actually say DSL down or something and I know when they turned the profile speed down on the Eir side it stopped happening but they had to turn it down to 10 megs which was too slow for me.

Virgin might be the only game in town so until FTTH urban gets rolled out.