Sounds like the DLM just increased interleaving, when this happens you'll usually see a big red spike, followed by the green stepping up.

Perhaps post a link to your ping graph.

No problem Kasg.

These are my ping graphs, my service was installed last Tuesday at around 1PM, and graphs started on Thursday.

Thursday:
http://www.thinkbroadband.com/ping/share/8db0b14078d...

Friday:
http://www.thinkbroadband.com/ping/share/5e4a68274b1...

Saturday:
http://www.thinkbroadband.com/ping/share/f5c8ebb0110...

Today:
http://www.thinkbroadband.com/ping/share/c123a2ef5b8...

As you can see there was pretty much constant packet loss, a few ping spikes here and there. The packet loss start to subside, and then there was the increase in ping times, and packet loss has got even less (but is still slightly present)

Is it normal to have any packet loss at all?

I am still in the 10 day 'training' period, so I'm sure DLM is still messing around with my line. The only other strange thing is that Plusnet have told me I'm synced at 49.9/12, but I'm only seeing 37/11 on any speed tests I do.

Cheers.

Edited by deleted (Sun 15-Jun-14 11:50:34)

In reply to a post by kasg:

Indeed, one of the variables I was referring to.

Basically leicester's traffic to london on the BT wholesale network goes north to derby and then west towards liverpool before going down to london.

A good ping time for my area is on the easynet(sky) network, 9ms to bbc.

On BT retail it gets even stranger, they round robin packets over multiple routers, and these routers are in different locations so get permanent jitter on the connection, granted its not noticeable unless looking for it, but its still the oddest thing I have seen on a isp.

Edited by Chrysalis (Sun 15-Jun-14 11:58:42)

The DLM took action on Saturday morning, the red spike from the top is when the modem reconnected, with more interleaving. The increased interleaving is correcting the errors, hence less red packet loss at the top.

There is no 10 day training period, basically with FTTC you get two days grace, then the DLM starts taking action depending on how many errors you have. The DLM constantly monitors the line from then onwards. It can increase or decrease interleaving, and in severe cases actually band you to a lower speed to counteract errors.

I suggest if you don't have a HG612 modem then you get one off of Ebay unlock it and monitor your connection using either HG612 Stats, or DSLStats. All information you require can be found on the Kitz forums

Thanks Ronski.

I do have a HG612 so I'll take a look at unlocking it. Can they be reverted back to normal, should anyone kick up a fuss? Or should I buy a spare.

Is that kind of packet loss I'm getting normal?

I'm pinging bbc at 32ms, where as from my parents around the corner, on their normal ADSL2+ sky connection, I can ping it at 17ms.

Edited by deleted (Sun 15-Jun-14 13:36:10)

I'm in Broadstairs kent and get 23ms ping to BBC.co.uk

I also have some level of interleaving. I've seen a splattering of packet loss like you have before, normally interleaving along with error correction cures the majority of it. Looking at my current ping graph I do still have a few odd ping packets lost, which is nothing to be overly concerned about.

I've had FTTC for almost two years and have been active on these forums for just over two years and am not aware of any one having any problems because they unlocked their modem. It is possible to revert back to standard with a long reset should the need arise. If you wish to revert to the original firmware then you need to flash a copy of the original firmware which can be downloaded.

It would be worth unlocking and monitoring for a while, and posting the results on here or better still on Kitz, as you can post pictures. My connection is logged 24/7 ever since my connection went live back in August 2012.

A word of warning, don't constantly reboot or disconnect the modem, the DLM can interpret this as disconnection errors and take action, I have turned mine off a few times and never had problems, but if you do it in quick succession it can cause the DLM to take action.

If your only means of accessing the internet is via the HG612 then make sure you've downloaded the unlocking guide and understand it, to be honest it is pretty straightforward. Use the latest firmware from this post, if you follow the link in that post, then go into the experimental folders and use one of the two firmwares in there. The one with no BT Agent will stop all future over the air firmware updates from BT, the other one still allows BT to update the modem. Whichever one you want to use is up to you, but both use the latest firmware which was rolled out by BT last October.

Edited by R0NSKI (Sun 15-Jun-14 20:24:19)

The best ping I have heard of is 5ms to bbc (as one of the posters here has).
I agree with comments that 10ms is good.
I get 20ms ~ quite a bit more than the 11ms I got on BE ADSL2.

Several factors
1 - Do you have interleaving? If so add typically 8 to 10ms. (I don't. When I did my bbc ping was 28 to 30 ms)

2 - Where you relative to the local point of presence (not sure if that is the correct name)?
That will show up in the second hop time, 6ms already for me.

3 - Where you are in the country? It seems all BT traffic is routed out via London.
That can add a few extra ms.

4 - How sensible is the internal routing TO London.
We are in Winchester, 55 miles or so from London,
But BT routes all our traffic via Sheffield, adding around 4ms extra each hop north and back south.

Thanks for your help Ronski.

I'm in Southport, near Liverpool, before interleaving appears to be enabled I was getting 22-23ms. Now with interleaving enable it's 30-32ms.

I'll unlock my HG612 this afternoon and see what I can see. I'll feel better seeing the line statistics for myself.

I'll post back here when I've unlocked it, as I may need help seeing all the statistics correctly.

Thanks guys.

Well, I thought I had the HG612, but it looks like I have one of the ECI modems.

Is there anyway that this can be unlocked?

ECI modems can be unlocked if you know how to use a TTL Serial Cable and use a Terminal app like Tera Term Pro to get in and unlock it. I myself have an ECI/r Rev B that is unlocked and can see stats via DMT app. If you would like the ECI unlocking then I or others can offer to do it for you. But you would lose it for a few days abviously.


Easiest option is to get the HG612 though! If you are not a tinkerer then get one from ebay. They can be unlocked with ease without taking the thing apart.

One con of the HG612 can be higer error rates.

Edited by deleted (Sun 15-Jun-14 17:19:12)