Line Behaving Badly - Indian Call Centre Barking!

Grateful for your views - my setup is as follows:

BT Home Hub, BT Total Broeadband Option 3.
3 x Connected PCs (mixed Vista/XP), two wired, one wireless.

Problem.

Broardband Performance is eratic. Best performance is approx 3,500 kbs down, 250 kbs up 40 ms ping. I often only get 2,500 kbs down, 50 kbs up and 110 ms ping. There does not appear to be any varaince here - either the line is in the 'good' mode or its is 'slow' as described above. Problem was initially curable by rebooting home hub but this is now no longer working.

Call to tech assistance was bizzare, suggesting that because I had 64 processes running on my PC, that there was "definately a software problem". I think the guy was offeneded when I tiold him he was barking mad. (for the record I run fully patched XP, NIS 2009, and routinely scan my PC for malware with a number of packages).

Detail from BT Home Hub (whilst in 'poor' state):

ADSL line status
Connection information
Line state Connected
Connection time 0 days, 17:55:09
Downstream 4,896 Kbps
Upstream 64 Kbps

ADSL settings
VPI/VCI 0/38
Type PPPoA
Modulation ITU-T G.992.1
Latency type Interleave
Noise margin (Down/Up) 7.3 dB / 8.0 dB
Line attenuation (Down/Up) 52.0 dB / 31.0 dB
Output power (Down/Up) 19.8 dBm / 11.1 dBm
Loss of Framing (Local) 0
Loss of Signal (Local) 0
Loss of Power (Local) 0
FEC Errors (Down/Up) 451767 / 8
CRC Errors (Down/Up) 254 / 2147480001
HEC Errors (Down/Up) 226 / 1
Error Seconds (Local) 113

Software version 8.1.F.4 (Type A)

64kbps on the upstream! Thats no software problem I can tell that for certain! 64 processes whilst a little on the high side is not unusual to have now.

I suggest you get back on the phone to BT, if the initial agent doesn't deal with the case ask for his line manager. If that fails don't bother with India just drop an e-mail to the BT CEO. Not an ideal situation for a while now THD in India seem to have issues recognising complicated faults, especially upstream ones! Frustrating I know, I was experiencing a similar issue a year or so ago.

PM me for the e-mail address if you want it.

Edited by deleted (Wed 20-May-09 09:23:01)

Thanks for your reply. The number of processes is high but I run punkbuster, have a logitech G15, have FRAPS and speendfan running etc etc.

I am currently waiting for a BT engineer to call back as I managed to get India to log its as a fault. Are my noise levels normal? Could it be the Home Hub?

Last time I had a problem with the upstream speed there was an audible crackle on the phone line. Do you have any similar problems on voice calls?

Make sure when you test for audible noise, try not to use a cordless/wireless telephone these can introduce their own noise into the audio. But if you do find a fault with the voice, it's great news!

Regretatbly the phone line is as clear as a bell to my ears

You're making a mistake by disclosing anything confusing to the people in India. You're also making a mistake by being abusive to them. Just insist that there is a problem (seen at the hub) and you need it escalated to an engineer. Log the performance so you can counter their 'a fault was fixed at the exchange this morning' with a 'and it's still exactly the same'.

Do you get any improvement with the phone off-hook?

Whats not normal is for upstream to be not 448k. Even when my line was struggling to sync at 700k down, I was getting 448 up, with 16db noise margin.
Typical for a longer line than you have is:
Connection Speed 2432 kbps 448 kbps
Line Attenuation 60.0 db 31.5 db
Noise Margin 6.6 db 19.0 db

The thing that leaps out at me is the staggering number of CRC errors upstream - if that's due to software, I'm a Martian!

That has to be a line or equipment fault, or interference. If as you say it has good and bad states, is there a pattern? Is it bad when it's raining, for example? Could be water getting in somewhere and bridging the line, then drying out again.

Incidentally, why did the number of processes come up in the chat with the call centre?

Good Luck!

The thing that leaps out at me is the staggering number of CRC errors upstream

It's a reporting bug in the firmware. Do a search in this forum for all posts with it in.

When I was with virgin media, I could reboot to get another IPaddress and be on another central. Was a good way of boosting my speed. Really doesn't matter what operating system you are on as that is just the device connected to your home gateway (router) could be a ipod for all they cared! ps3, xbox e.t.c.

4,896 Kbps suggests you should be getting 4mbps
64kbps upload suggests that... theres a problem. shouldn't be that low if your getting such a high down sync. You got a good down sync for your attenuration too.

BT are just shapping you, they don't like adding bandwidth, and their call centres don't like people.