EE Dropping connectivity every 30 seconds to 2 minutes

Not sure where I should put this, but I thought this may have been the right place.

I live in what is considered a student house and have been here for 3 years. We were with Orange until they merged and became EE.

For the whole 3 years I have been living here there have been problems with connectivity and speeds amongst other things. However whenever anything has needed to be sorted the landlady has to ring up because she set up the account with Orange/EE and I'm just a tenant.

After 6 months of living here we got the new Brightbox router from Orange and it seemed fine at first. Then about a month or so into having it we started getting disconnects every 30 seconds to 2 minutes, this could last for days or even weeks at a time then go as if it had never happened. We have since had 2 Orange Brightbox routers and a "new" EE branded Brightbox router, because when ever the landlady rings up the router being the problem is the conclusion they come down to.

We've been using this "new" EE Brightbox router for about 9 months now and these disconnects keep happening, but now for some reason we also get little micro disconnects. These are literally split second disconnects every couple of minutes that you normally wouldn't notice, but if you are watching youtube, downloading on chrome or uploading to youtube these micro disconnects stop what you are doing and you have to start again from scratch. It's also noticeable when playing online games, either through disconnects from servers or tiny lag spikes.

I'm hoping there is some way of sorting this out without having to contact EE because I have no way of doing that myself and the landlady (although bless her for trying) just goes along with the terrible excuses they give to her.

I have a Windows 7 and Mac OSX 10.6.8 partition and the same problem occurs on both, it can be seen on multiple mobile devices, my xbox and other computers/laptops in the house.

Thank you for reading through this, and thank you for any advice you may be able to give

Connar

Has anyone logged into the router to find out the adsl stats? It may be that these are the problem.

Is there a test socket in the house? If things are more stable using that then the issue is extension wiring in the house

Thank you for your quick reply. What information would you need to see from within the router settings, I can get all that for you

We were told to use the test socket a while back whilst they ran test and as far as I know it all was fine (our test socket is directly below our regular socket, not sure if this is the norm, to access it we take the casing off the front of the regular socket)

Taking the casing off is normal, if it is fine when using that, then its not the router that is the issue but you telephone wiring.

As for information
Connection Speed
Attenuation
Noise margin
For both download and upload

Login to BrightBox: Advanced Settings / Accept / System / ADSL Status and see such:

Status
Configured Current
Line Status --- SHOWTIME
Link Type --- Fast Path
Operation Mode Automatic G992.5(ADSL2+)

Data Rate Information
Stream Type Actual Data Rate
Upstream 1163 (Kbps.)
Downstream 20011 (Kbps.)

Defect/Failure Indication
Operation Data Upstream Downstream
Noise Margin 6.2 dB 2.9 dB
Line Attenuation 13.1 dB 26.0 dB

Indicator Name Near End Indicator Far End Indicator
Output Power 12.0 dBm 0.0 dBm
Fast Path FEC Correction 0 0
Interleaved Path FEC Correction NA NA
Fast Path CRC Error 810 8
Interleaved Path CRC Error NA NA
Loss of Signal Defect 0 0
Fast Path HEC Error STR 3103 4
Interleaved Path HEC Error NA NA
Error Seconds 395 6

Statistics
Received Cells 11694778
Transmitted Cells 830357

Also, as a guess, try disabling UPnP.

http://gyazo.com/c3357a687275081c0f9ac5762d8ca064

that's a screencap of my settings, I also disabled upnp. Will i now have to port forward a lot of extra stuff when using it in the future?

To be honest there wasn't much of a change from what I saw, things calmed down once we started testing and stayed like that for a few days after we went back to the regular socket

http://gyazo.com/c3357a687275081c0f9ac5762d8ca064 there's a screencap of my settings

In reply to a post by Connarhea:

Downstream 11175 (Kbps.)

You're getting a v. low speed. You should be getting over 20 Meg. You see I get that from longer, 26dB attn., line? I would say you were being capped by Orange but your NM is too normally low for that.

Your errors look high. The

Loss of Signal Defect 17

are the discons you are experiencing.

What is the 'Time Connected:' on top Status page?

Time Connected: 01:47:31but that is the longest it has been up all day. It normally calms down at night as you'd expect. The most I get mid day is maybe 12 minutes

Monitor that time connected like a hawk, if it's resetting during the 'micro' disconnects you discuss then it's the line dropping.

It could quite easily just be the router struggling to keep up though especially if there's a lot of you. I know a student house I rent out often has over 20 devices connected to their Sky Hub and there's only 5 of them there. That said the router handles it surprisingly... They have laptops, some have desktop (iMac) and a netbook for instance, phones (some have 2 phones), wireless printers, wireless TVs etc. It all racks up quickly and a lot of home routers aren't designed to cope with it all.

In reply to a post by ukhardy07:

Monitor that time connected like a hawk

along with Loss of Signal & Error Secs.

I have noticed it is usually when one of two different computers are online. Sometimes it's fine but when they are on there seems to be a higher chance of all this occurring. We do also have a high amount of devices connecting to the network on a regular basis. What can be done about that?

UP DOWN

Loss of Signal Defect 0 0
Error Seconds 13859 493

Time Connected: 06:02:06

Current time is 3:28 pm

so it would have reset last at about 9 am, which makes sense because most of my housemates either went to uni or work around that time. At the minute just my imac and phone connected

How many devices are we talking about at once being on the wifi, including phones, wifi printers, tvs, sky boxes, xboxes, play stations, wii's etc? That would be a good indicator.

Is the connection uptime dropping or is that staying up?

Up to about 12 at peak times, the majority being phones, but there are some computers/laptops and an ipod in there, if that makes any difference.

It drops more when there are more people on, but can happen without that, like just now. I have my mac, an android phone and there is an ipod connected and the router restarted 10 minutes ago, so far it has stayed up though

Currently:

Data Rate Information
Stream Type Actual Data Rate
Upstream 708 (Kbps.)
Downstream 13331 (Kbps.)

Defect/Failure Indication
Operation Data Upstream Downstream
Noise Margin 6.2 dB 6.8 dB
Line Attenuation 12.3 dB 22.0 dB

Indicator Name Near End Indicator Far End Indicator
Output Power 12.2 dBm 21.0 dBm
Fast Path FEC Correction NA NA
Interleaved Path FEC Correction 37007183 958736
Fast Path CRC Error NA NA
Interleaved Path CRC Error 723428 3795
Loss of Signal Defect 0 0
Fast Path HEC Error STR NA NA
Interleaved Path HEC Error 40863307 10884
Error Seconds 14803 913
Statistics
Received Cells 11167490
Transmitted Cells 1177928

Sorry for posting all the info, not sure what might be needed here

The downstream speed is well below the 17800-19000 kbit/s predicted by MrSaffron's calculator. That alone implies there might be an internal wiring issue.

A good starting point would be to expose the test socket, check every extension socket has gone dead using a phone (sometimes there's extension wiring that isn't connected via the NTE5 faceplate), connect the router to the test socket and post the statistics. To ensure all the counters reset, it might be a good idea to switch the router off before connecting it to the test socket, then switch it back on after connecting it to the test socket.


Whilst it's hard to judge the number of error seconds without an uptime, there are many more upstream error seconds than downstream.

Dropped again after 18 minutes up, still no new devices connected

The landlord tested all the wiring to see which was actually live, and the one we are using was supposedly the only one in the house. He idd this shortly after I moved in (the house was newly bought and listed when I moved in)

Should I get him round to do another check?

I have a feeling that the net seems to be even more unpredictable when one of two computers connect, both belonging to other housemates. Could something on their end be making the problem worse?

In reply to a post by Connarhea:

The landlord tested all the wiring to see which was actually live, and the one we are using was supposedly the only one in the house. He idd this shortly after I moved in (the house was newly bought and listed when I moved in)

Should I get him round to do another check?

Any live extension wiring has the potential to affect DSL performance, especially if the wiring uses non-twisted pair cable, the pairings on twisted pair cable are wrong or the bell wire is connected. If you move the router to the master socket and disconnect the faceplate to expose the test socket, you will likely isolate all the internal wiring, though you should verify that every extension socket is dead rather than assuming it is.


By testing in the test socket, you can tell whether the issue is in internal wiring (the landlord's responsibility) or external wiring (which is a fault that needs reporting to the voice provider if it affects voice calls, and to EE if it does not).

Having the statistics from the test socket compared to the usual location is the only way to figure out where the issue lies and whose responsibility it is. Without the test socket statistics as a comparison, we're just guessing. I'm not suggesting you start rewiring the place, just exposing the test socket, testing, then carefully replacing the faceplate afterwards. If an internal wiring issue becomes apparent, it's then up to the landlord to get it fixed.

In reply to a post by Connarhea:

I have a feeling that the net seems to be even more unpredictable when one of two computers connect, both belonging to other housemates. Could something on their end be making the problem worse?

More than likely, the additional load they add to the connection causes errors to happen more often.

Sorry to keep posting but checking the error seconds by refreshing the ADSL status page, it seems to be (for the time being) going up at 1 error second per second, or at least very close to that.

There's no need to apologise. One error second per second indicates constant errors, which could well be responsible for all the stutters, stalls and drop outs you report.

Hopefully you can test in the test socket as I previously described to figure out whether the problem is with the internal wiring or not.

In reply to a post by Connarhea:

it seems to be (for the time being) going up at 1 error second per second, or at least very close to that.

Good observation!

Tallies with 13859 ES in 6 hours in readings two back or 1 ES per 1.6 sec.

I generally reckon that on Interleaved you should not have more than about 1 ES per 5 mins.

You really need to get these stats from the test socket and also confirm no extensions have a dial tone when you remove the master faceplate.

EDIT: At least you have had no discons since you last rebooted router.

Edited by XRaySpeX (Fri 25-Oct-13 19:31:07)

Find this socket http://www.bttorj45.com/images/openreachbrandednte5.JPG
You see it has a line down the middle.

Then unscrew the two front screws, so it ends up like this.

http://beusergroup.co.uk/technotes/images/thumb/b/b4...

Plug the router into the new socket behind the plate like in the picture above.

Hmm, slow sync rate for the attenuation and steady errors. I noticed also that on the first set of stats posted the downstream SNR looked low, but then recovered to the expected 6db after it retrained.

I wonder if this is a REIN issue ? Have you asked any neighbours if they have similar issues ?

Is the phone noise and/or hiss free when used ?

In reply to a post by Zarjaz:

SNR looked low, but then recovered to the expected 6db after it retrained

Depends! 3dB is to be expected on Orange on a stable enough line. So either may be expected.

But if it were 3db, then the resync would have shown 3db, it didn't, it showed 6db. Any way how could DLM see this as a stable line ?????

I'm having exactly the same problem as the original poster and I can't think of a way to fix it and I was wondering whether the problem was solved or not?

Start a new thread and post your router stats (Login to BrightBox: Advanced Settings / Accept / System / ADSL Status).

I have started the new thread here:

http://forums.thinkbroadband.com/technical/f/4347572...

thanks for the help!