Good news, bad news

Good news: BT are unlikely to supply any more G.INP incompatible HomeHub 5A's to their users

Bad news: They are being given to Plusnet users instead (the "Plusnet Hub One"). See http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,1456...

In reply to a post by jelv:

Good news: BT are unlikely to supply any more G.INP incompatible HomeHub 5A's to their users

What makes you think that?

Surely they're not going to send off existing stock for a respray/re-badging and firmware re-branding?

Maybe the Plusnet firmware will have the G.INP 'fix' that TP-Link put in the TD-9980 firmware (using the same Lantiq VRX-268 as the HH5A).

In reply to a post by Al1264:

Surely they're not going to send off existing stock for a respray/re-badging and firmware re-branding?

Maybe the Plusnet firmware will have the G.INP 'fix' that TP-Link put in the TD-9980 firmware (using the same Lantiq VRX-268 as the HH5A).

It's cheaper than getting new hubs... the BT HH5a has had a fix for G.INP (Downstream Only) already so just a rebranding and feature change I would think...

Unless Plusnet customers are also going to be getting access to the BT WiFi Network soon (which would make sense)

That depends perhaps on whether they actually have them in stock or whether they have a contract for a large number of units to be supplied to be called off as required. If it's the latter, re-badging them for Plusnet might be the cheapest way to deal with the situation.

The HH5 is not a great bit of kit anyway, So I am glad I have what I got

The sub-prime sister company of BT Retail is doing-it-on-the-cheap? Are we surprised?

There's a serious bug with these devices, causing them to periodically reboot. That's not normal behaviour. Especially not for an embedded device which runs exactly the same processes every day. It's not like a home PC; hammered every day with more and more applications, often from dodgy sources. Embedded devices just run a few dozen of the same, tested processes all the time.

The system log of the HH5a alludes to an Inter-Process Communication (IPC) invoking those reboots. So it's not a crash per se. Perhaps more of a workaround to return the device to a stable state. Possibly indicating 'memory leaks' in the code. Allocated buffer space not being released after use; bad stack management; that sort of thing. The hallmark of poor programming.

Since the kernel- and userspace- code of these devices is largely well-tested open source GNU/Linux - where "many eyes make all bugs shallow" - perhaps the problem is in the proprietary digital signal processing (DSP) code. The DSP code runs on the second core of the Lantiq VRX268 SoC in these devices.

That DSP code communicates using IPC - messaging via a shared memory window - with the first core. The first core runs the Linux operating system and kernel processes, and all the userspace applications, including httpd and other network servers, etc. If the DSP code running on the second core starts to run out of memory then it would presumably send an IPC using that shared memory window to the Linux kernel. The kernel then sends a warning message to syslog (which we can see) and, as gracefully as it can, it invokes the shutdown and reboot.

Although it's not clear why only the HH5a -- and time will tell whether the"Hub One" too -- suffers from this rebooting 'issue'. Whereas the Openreach-supplied ECI modem, which uses the exact same Lantiq core - and presumably runs the same DSP code - doesn't appear to suffer from the same problem.

Until the bug is resolved - if ever - it remains one device worth avoiding. Not worth the headache.

But presumably if you've got a Guangdong warehouse of these devices --and no buyers - what better place to dump them than on the subprime customers of BT Group PLC? It's telling that they didn't even fork out for another injection mould for a new case; to disguise its origins. They just re-branded the device and used a different colour plastic. More proof that BT subsidiaries Plusnet and BT Retail ISP are not independent operations; and don't operate at arm's length.

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Edited by deleted (Fri 13-Nov-15 04:43:44)

People already use the HH5A on a Plusnet connection. Do these reboot every 14 days?
(Does rebooting every 14 days matter anyway?)

Yes, the reboot is generally every 2 weeks as far as i'm aware. I've got a HH5 type B and that needs a reboot almost as often.

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

People already use the HH5A on a Plusnet connection. Do these reboot every 14 days?
(Does rebooting every 14 days matter anyway?)

Yes it would matter to me, and those using these POS don't sync at the max rate and get a slightly lower IP profile, where the connection has G.inp enabled

Also they are locked only basic line stats are available, and more importantly they will not respond to ICMP requests Which is probably what Plusnet/BT want, EU's not readily able to monitor their line quality