Line Fault

My phone has been out for nearly a week now but my Infinity is running along but at a reduced rate, the maximum rates have dropped from 110Mbut down 33Mbit up to 50Mbit down and 6Mbit up.

I am just wondering where on earth the fault is, i guess it has to be somewhere in the last bit of copper but if that's the case wouldn't the infinity pack in totally as well if the fault is enough to take out voice calls?

Sounds like you may have only one wire of the pair from the cabinet to your master socket connected.

As BatBoy says.

The phone needs both wires connected. Broadband can run crippled with just one.

Not necessarily. It could be anywhere on the line even before the cabinet as that would present an out of balance and incorrect impedance at the point where voice and data a combined onto the same line.

Without knowing the before and after figures it is not easy to make a guess at where the fault lies.

BT will, however, know to within a few metres where the problem is.

Can you (and others) phone IN to your Land Line, getting right through to having a conversation?


It may be worth trying a Quiet Line Test also, to get more information about the condition of the line.

17070

Option 2

And post the results here, so that we all benefit from the information.

Thanks

Edited by deleted (Mon 31-Mar-14 16:03:24)

In reply to a post by eckiedoo:

Can you (and others) phone IN to your Land Line, getting right through to having a conversation?


It may be worth trying a Quiet Line Test also, to get more information about the condition of the line.

17070

Option 2

And post the results here, so that we all benefit from the information.

Thanks

Rather difficult to do that if the phone line is out!

But that is precisely why I have asked the question - to confirm or otherwise, the condition from the Exchange end.

To quote yourself with my added emphasis-

"Rather difficult to do that IF the phone line is out!"


In degree to the extent that he has provided evidence, the phone line does not appear to be cut totally over the length used for ADSL, as he is still getting Broadband in varying degrees; but there is the short distance between the DSLAM (?) and the conventional phone equipment in the Exchange itself.

Is the Exchange equipment working and actually making connection to the (faulty) line;

or is the Exchange equipment faulty in itself?

Having that knowledge puts the OP in a stronger position in any discussions with BT etc.

And such a call or calls take very little time (plus little or no cost), especially as he apparently has a mobile phone to do it with.

The quiet line test has to be initiated from the line being tested not a mobile, and if the line is dead he's not going to be able to make a call either

Although I think what you also want to know is what happens when the op phones in from his mobile.

Edited by R0NSKI (Tue 01-Apr-14 06:25:19)

Agreed 100% (or more, if possible) that the QLT has to be done on the Land Line concerned - and for all the time it takes, it is worth attempting to find out if there is any response/reaction within his conventional Land Line connections.

And in using the QLT, he is using a Test, supplied and used by BT; and thus recognised by BT.

The results that he gets from the QLT will help to clarify what he means by "My phone has been out for nearly a week".

Is that "dead", as in being cut or disconnected; or does it mean some lesser variant?



I have looked back; and whilst I have not stated explicitly to use his mobile to call IN - surely that is implicit - and could also be done from other land-lines (friends, relatives, neighbours etc); and of course, from his and other mobiles

Hence my emphasis on "IN".

"Can you (and others) phone IN to your Land Line, getting right through to having a conversation?"


I am trying to help him resolve the problem, by methods readily available to him (and others who may read the various posts on this forum), so that he is better prepared in any dealings with BT - and avoids unnecessary costs.

Oh, look at the date

Thanks for the reminder - how did you know it is my 53rd Wedding Anniversary?

In reply to a post by eckiedoo:

... how did you know it is my 53rd Wedding Anniversary?

Because you're getting irate?

(And if it's true, congratulations ).

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

Because you're getting irate?

Is that what comes after gold? I thought it was emerald.

(And if it's true, congratulations ).

Hear hear

Still no repair, in fact apart from the initial contact from BT i have heard nothing since.

What did you report? A voice fault or a broadband fault? The response to a voice fault is usually quicker, and would in 99.999% of cases solve the broadband issue.

It's TRUE!

Met on 3rd April 1959.

Engaged on 3rd April 1960.

Married 1st April 1961, as 3rd was Easter Monday.

===========================

From long experience of trouble-shooting, it is all too frequently the apparently irrelevant that often holds the clue to resolving the situation.



And as the effort and costs required in this case are almost negligible, why post comments that are likely to dissuade the OP from trying such simple tests?



In one case that I particularly remember and was called in after a team of 6 had wasted 3 months and several expensive components trying to resolve, the youngest team member started to tell me something "Well it works on the first "

The team leader interrupted to say "That's got nothing to do with it!" or similar..

I asked the young lad to tell me the full story - and it was the one bit of evidence that led directly to solving the problem.

Prior to that, all I had been told was that "the circuit didn't work (FULL STOP)"

It reminded me of two cases, one being when teaching radar 40 years previously; and the other I had read an article about 18 months previously.


From having that little bit of extra information, I was able to advise the team to check certain items; and two days later, they had established the actual cause.

Edited by deleted (Tue 01-Apr-14 15:46:27)

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

What did you report? A voice fault or a broadband fault? The response to a voice fault is usually quicker, and would in 99.999% of cases solve the broadband issue.

I reported a dead phone line (which it was) but it still took 7 days including the weekend to sort it out.

Its fixed now, one of the pair in the cab had come out, at least i know my line length to the cab is 94 meters now.

This is sodding annoying though:

Download speedachieved during the test was - 62.97 Mbps
For your connection, the acceptable range of speedsis 40 Mbps-54.6 Mbps .
Additional Information:
IP Profile for your line is - 54.6 Mbps

HH5 is reporting:

6. Data rate: 7198 / 67000
7. Maximum data rate: 33587 / 110268
8. Noise margin: 25.9 / 18.1
9. Line attenuation: 0.0 / 5.8

So fixed this afternoon?

The IP Profile used and reported appear to be at different points in the BTW system. Your actual speed looks correct for the IP Profile of 64.84Mbps you should have, so I expect that will self-correct soon.

Edited by RobertoS (Tue 01-Apr-14 16:13:09)

yeah but i am not sure a week is very good is it.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

The IP Profile used and reported appear to be at different points in the BTW system. Your actual speed looks correct for the IP Profile of 64.84Mbps you should have, so I expect that will self-correct soon.

Id like my 75/18 back soon please lol http://www.thinkbroadband.com/speedtest/button/13963...

You low upstream looks odd, as though it is a hangover from banding.

Your 67,000kbps could be banding, but more likely I think to be because interleaving has been applied. If the latter, that too will self-correct after a while. It's a suspiciously round number however.

When the fault was on the noise margin was at 6db for near enough 6Mbit up and 50Mbit down, at the time the IP profiles were at there maximum. Now the faults been fixed the noise margins have recovered but the speeds haven't so i am guessing thats why the upstream is like it is, the speed you see is what it was for a 6db noise margin.

Ill give it a week and see what happens.

The way it looks to me is that DLM had intervened, and put you on a banded profile. It may, or may not, come with interleaving and FEC turned on - I suspect we could only tell if you could see the error counts (FEC, CRC and maybe ES values)

At the time of the fault, your line reached the target 6dB SNR with a speed of 50Mbps, which was less than the top-speed of the band.

When the fault was fixed, your speed jumped to the top end of the band, for downstream at least. There is still plenty of room to go higher, as seen in the max attainable. The presence of FEC+Interleaving shouldn't matter, as you have plenty of headroom to cope with those, and still get a full 80Mbps.

So where does that get us...

Ordinarily, DLM will reduce its intervention in 3 to 4 weeks, by either reducing or removing the FEC+Interleaving setting.

However, I don't think we've seen evidence that the banding gets removed quite so easily. The whole point of banding is to cope with errors that come and go... so it might take longer for DLM to decide that it really has gone.

If you don't mind being a guinea pig, it'd certainly be interesting to see what happens to your line. However, if you want it back to normal sooner rather than later, you might need to contact your broadband supplier, and ask for an Openreach appointment for a DLM reset.

If you point out that a physical line fault has been fixed, they ought to be able to organise this without requiring you to be present.

(I agree with RobertoS that your upstream isn't quite what I'd expect with banding, so my analysis might be off a little)

Just for the record then today its saying

6. Data rate: 7198 / 67000
7. Maximum data rate: 32233 / 110249
8. Noise margin: 24.9 / 18.2
9. Line attenuation: 0.0 / 5.7
10. Signal attenuation: 0.0 / 5.7

Download speed achieved during the test was - 61.84 Mbps
For your connection, the acceptable range of speedsis 40 Mbps-64.85 Mbps .
Additional Information:
IP Profile for your line is - 64.85 Mbps

Upload speed achieved during the test was - 6.25Mbps
Additional Information:
Upstream Rate IP profile on your line is - 20 Mbps

This is what i used to get all the time http://www.speedtest.net/result/3247930106.png

HH5 rebooted over night

6. Data rate: 16994 / 79995
7. Maximum data rate: 33154 / 110102
8. Noise margin: 16.3 / 14.3
9. Line attenuation: 0.0 / 5.7

Download speedachieved during the test was - 75.05 Mbps
For your connection, the acceptable range of speeds is 40 Mbps-64.85 Mbps .
Additional Information:
IP Profile for your line is - 64.85 Mbps

Upload speed achieved during the test was - 10.88Mbps
Additional Information:
Upstream Rate IP profile on your line is - 20 Mbps

http://www.speedtest.net/result/3417012135.png

this seems a bit squiffy though http://www.thinkbroadband.com/speedtest/button/13966...

Apart from the upload being a couple of Mbit down that all happened a lot, lot quicker than i expected.

That was a pretty fast response from DLM - I'm surprised too.

Interesting to see that the IP Profile value is wrong, yet your speedtests can still work at above that value. And a strange result from the TBB tester too.

I wonder how long it will take for the upstream to jump the next step?

It did another reboot in the night and my speeds are now fully recovered.

5. VDSL uptime: 0 days, 07:15:10
6. Data rate: 20000 / 79995
7. Maximum data rate: 33476 / 109333
8. Noise margin: 15.4 / 14.2
9. Line attenuation: 0.0 / 5.7

http://www.speedtest.net/result/3421268947.png

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/speedtest/button/13967...

Download speedachieved during the test was - 75.05 Mbps
For your connection, the acceptable range of speedsis 40 Mbps-77.43 Mbps .
Additional Information:
IP Profile for your line is - 77.43 Mbps


Upload speed achieved during the test was - 13.74Mbps
Additional Information:
Upstream Rate IP profile on your line is - 20 Mbps

What AV/firewall software is running, the spike in the httpx6 is not unlike what you can see with some av checkers putting themselves in the way.

Be interesting to see the ookla graph

I wonder if it could be anything to do with the latest firmware on the modems because I remember interleaving was removed from my line the day after the update. Prior to the update the interleaving depth was somewhere around the 1300 mark and had been like that for over 6 months.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

What AV/firewall software is running, the spike in the httpx6 is not unlike what you can see with some av checkers putting themselves in the way.

Be interesting to see the ookla graph

I use KIS 2014, this is with it disabled and everthing seems smoothed out (Every result you have seen in on wireless BTW so that might have something to do with it)

http://www.speedtest.net/result/3423045360.png
http://www.thinkbroadband.com/speedtest/button/13968...