Possible connection problems

Hi All,

I am running an application which depends on its connection to the software producer's server online and with their latest upgrade I started getting continual connection problems with the software.

As far as I can tell, my internet connection with BT is behaving itself - there are no DSL errors on the modem, no other websites or emails fail to load, the speed test is good etc.

I asked the application support people whether their error logs contained anything related, and they said

4. Check the connectivity by clicking on Start->Run..., type in cmd and hit ok. In the upcoming black window, please type in: 'tracert 208.245.107.9' and hit the enter key to activate the test.

As you can see the words Trace complete, please check the following 3 questions:

a) Do you have more than 15 lines in this test?
b) Do you have request timed out in this test?
c) Do you have ms amounts above 200 in this test?

If you answer one of those questions with yes, please contact your ISP and tell them that you have made a Trace route Test to the market data Server in US and discovered for example that you have 18 instead of the recommended 15 lines, timed out requests in line 4,9,12 and ms amounts above 200 in line 11.
The 3 questions are the maximum test results for a proper connection, so less than15 lines, 0 request timed out and no ms amounts above 200 guarantee a proper connection.

Is that for real? I wouldn't have thought that BT guarantee 15 hops or less to any server. Is it some kind of unwritten rule? Here's my tracert - not v good if this support guy is right!

C:\Documents and Settings\Adam>tracert 208.245.107.9

Tracing route to mktgw1.ibllc.com [208.245.107.9]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms isengard.localdomain [192.168.0.2]
2 4 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.1
3 7 ms 6 ms 6 ms 217.32.146.161
4 8 ms 6 ms 7 ms 217.32.146.190
5 6 ms 7 ms 6 ms 213.120.177.58
6 * 22 ms 7 ms 213.120.176.58
7 7 ms 7 ms 6 ms 213.120.176.182
8 7 ms 6 ms 7 ms 213.120.176.137
9 6 ms 6 ms 6 ms core2-ge8-0-0.faraday.ukcore.bt.net [194.72.4.18
9]
10 * * 9 ms 62.172.103.45
11 8 ms 7 ms 8 ms transit2-xe1-1-0.ealing.ukcore.bt.net [62.6.200.
142]
12 7 ms 7 ms 7 ms t2c2-ge11-0-0.uk-eal.eu.bt.net [166.49.168.61]
13 8 ms 8 ms 8 ms 195.50.91.161
14 15 ms 17 ms 17 ms ae-32-54.ebr2.London2.Level3.net [4.68.117.126]

15 20 ms 17 ms 8 ms ae-3-3.ebr1.London1.Level3.net [4.69.141.189]
16 8 ms 9 ms 8 ms ae-100-100.ebr2.London1.Level3.net [4.69.141.166
]
17 9 ms 77 ms 8 ms ae-100-100.ebr2.London1.Level3.net [4.69.141.166
]
18 77 ms 77 ms 76 ms ae-4-4.ebr1.NewYork2.Level3.net [4.69.141.18]
19 77 ms 77 ms 76 ms ae-1-51.edge2.NewYork2.Level3.net [4.69.138.195]

20 77 ms 77 ms 76 ms mci-level3-oc48-washington1.level3.net [4.68.127
.22]
21 76 ms 77 ms 76 ms mci-level3-oc48-washington1.level3.net [4.68.127
.22]
22 76 ms 85 ms 137 ms 0.ae3.XL4.NYC4.ALTER.NET [152.63.16.186]
23 90 ms 90 ms 85 ms 0.so-7-1-0.XL4.BOS4.ALTER.NET [152.63.0.221]
24 89 ms 110 ms 97 ms interactivebrokers-gw.customer.alter.net [208.19
2.181.62]
25 97 ms 91 ms 97 ms interactivebrokers-gw.customer.alter.net [208.19
2.181.62]
26 91 ms 91 ms 91 ms mktgw1.ibllc.com [208.245.107.9]

Trace complete.

Would BT really do anything if I told them about this?

Thanks
Adam

No! Ask yourself, how can a US server have any knowledge or control over how many hops it takes to reach them from overseas? After all, it took 17 hops to just leave the UK.

Having said that, it only took me 12 hops on Orange to reach your site:

C:\>tracert 208.245.107.9

Tracing route to mktgw1.ibllc.com [208.245.107.9]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms SiemensRouter [192.168.1.1]
2 21 ms 20 ms 20 ms 87.237.21.182
3 21 ms 20 ms 20 ms 87.237.20.21
4 26 ms 26 ms 26 ms 87.237.20.23
5 42 ms 27 ms 32 ms ae1-0.loncr4.London.opentransit.net [193.251.254.33]
6 99 ms 108 ms 100 ms xe-4-0-2-0.ashtr1.Ashburn.opentransit.net [193.251.129.61]
7 101 ms 101 ms 101 ms GigabitEtherne0-0-0.GW8.IAD8.ALTER.NET [63.66.38.33]
8 106 ms 106 ms 110 ms 0.ge-4-2-0.XL3.IAD8.ALTER.NET [152.63.33.14]
9 117 ms 127 ms 121 ms 0.so-7-1-0.XL3.BOS4.ALTER.NET [152.63.0.209]
10 118 ms 117 ms 116 ms POS6-0-0.GW12.BOS4.ALTER.NET [152.63.22.177]
11 122 ms 128 ms 129 ms interactivebrokers-gw.customer.alter.net [208.192.181.62]
12 124 ms 123 ms 124 ms mktgw1.ibllc.com [208.245.107.9]

Trace complete.

but it took longer overall.

Edited by XRaySpeX (Wed 21-Jul-10 13:23:21)

More than 15 hops using the lo1.ptn-ag03.plus.net gateway on the maaf/PN network

Tracing route to mktgw1.ibllc.com [208.245.107.9]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.0.1
2 51 ms 51 ms 51 ms lo1.ptn-ag03.plus.net [195.166.128.43]
3 51 ms 51 ms 52 ms gi2-6.ptn-gw01.plus.net [84.92.3.45]
4 74 ms 199 ms 104 ms te2-2.thn-gw1.plus.net [212.159.1.54]
5 51 ms 51 ms 51 ms te2-3.thn-gw2.plus.net [212.159.1.58]
6 52 ms 198 ms 199 ms te2-2.pcl-gw02.plus.net [212.159.0.189]
7 51 ms 51 ms 51 ms 195.50.122.129
8 52 ms 52 ms 52 ms ae-34-52.ebr2.London1.Level3.net [4.69.139.97]
9 120 ms 121 ms 123 ms ae-43-43.ebr1.NewYork1.Level3.net [4.69.137.74]
10 121 ms 121 ms 120 ms ae-4-4.ebr1.NewYork2.Level3.net [4.69.141.18]
11 120 ms 120 ms 121 ms ae-1-51.edge2.NewYork2.Level3.net [4.69.138.195]
12 120 ms 120 ms 121 ms mci-level3-xe.newyork2.Level3.net [4.68.110.234]
13 221 ms 121 ms 121 ms 0.ae2.XL3.NYC4.ALTER.NET [152.63.3.109]
14 128 ms 126 ms 127 ms 0.so-7-1-0.XL3.BOS4.ALTER.NET [152.63.0.209]
15 128 ms 128 ms 126 ms POS6-0-0.GW12.BOS4.ALTER.NET [152.63.22.177]
16 135 ms 135 ms 135 ms interactivebrokers-gw.customer.alter.net [208.192.181.62]
17 136 ms 135 ms 135 ms mktgw1.ibllc.com [208.245.107.9]

Trace complete.

(Sync is 2880 kbps at the moment and the longish line is interleaved with trellis on).

Sounds lilke utter tosh to me.

a) Do you have more than 15 lines in this test?

It's the ,er, Internet. The number of hops from one device to another is variable, can change from minute to minute, and certainly is not guaranteed to be 15 or less by any ISP.

(Incidentally, 28 hops and just over 100ms for me)

b) Do you have request timed out in this test?

So what if you do? Many devices out there will be configured to ignore or low-priority tracert requests, concentrating on routing traffic instead.

c) Do you have ms amounts above 200 in this test?

There's no way that can ever be guaranteed during a tracert. Much more important is how quickly the server responds to a ping.

What response time do you get to pings to the same IP?

I would have a read of the other ssections of

http://www.interactivebrokers.com/en/general/educati...

But I don't agree with their analysis of how tracert works...

Sounds like a fob off. Is there a user group to ask if anyone else has similar problems since the server "upgrade"?

I can ping at 95ms per ping.

Thanks for all the input everyone. It does sound like I'm not being taken seriously! I have contacted the user group but I haven't seen anyone else complain yet and I'm not usually the first to start using the latest version.

I actually just downgraded to the previous version and it resolved the issue - for now.

To make matters worse, their online support interface is giving me connection errors too, lots of javascript pop-ups with 'retrying' messages and then a PHP xml format error message.

This is meant to be robust stuff. I suppose being cheap has its price though - being an online stock trading platform, you don't want connectivity problems but perhaps they don't look at it that way.