Slow broadband - incoming line wired directly to faceplate?

Hi, I've recently moved in to a property built 2 years ago and am trying to solve slow broadband (with Origin).

I believe that there has been dodgy wiring done when the property was first built to add an extension socket. Please can you guys take a look and advise what options I might have here?

The property is rated to get 4mb but the router is achieving less that half this.
The property has been built with a master socket at the front and an extension socket in an upstairs room, with wiring is embedded in the walls.

I've connected a router & phone via a single microfilter at the master socket only. There are no other devices connected and I do not use the extension socket.

I thought the poor speeds would be due to the extension, so I decided to test speeds through the test socket. When I removed the faceplate, there appears to be multiple sets of wires directly connected to it

I cannot get a dial tone or BB connection in the test socket.

What concerns me is that when the face plate is removed from the master socket, I still get a dial-tone and BB connection through the faceplate!

This is a picture of the socket with face plate removed:

http://i883.photobucket.com/albums/ac38/taziir/Socke...

Neither of the two thicker white cables at the back of the master socket seem to be directly wired in to anything except the faceplate.

I intended to disconnect the extension cable but I feel something is very wrong with the wiring and my knowledge it too limited to manage this.

Questions:
Is this setup normal for a recent build with an extension, or am I correct that this is a dodge job?
Has the incoming line been rewired directly in to the faceplate, making any DIY fix risky?
Would BT engineers likely charge to re-wire the incoming cabling back to how it should be?

Many thanks for your help

Looking at the picture it appears that the incoming line is wired directly to the faceplate, and that would be the case if the faceplate still works with a telephone in it.

Who is your telephone provider? I would imagine there may or may not be a charge to put that mess right and a lot depends on who you ask, ISP or telephone provider.

My ISP got me a new underground feed and master socket but I was lucky I had a good engineer and they dug my drive up without cost because BT had put an overhead wire underground and I was losing about 13m sync. due to the cable.

Hopefully, one of our resident forum Engineers will come along and advise further on which path to take.

I agree that is a master socket, but strongly suspect there is another somewhere. Possibly in the loft or a utility cupboard. None of those wires are from an incoming BT cable.

Thinking further, is there one of these on an external wall? If so, that's an external NTE and some clot has installed the one you are looking at. Probably so they had a test socket to test through. Wrong move!

In the short term, I suggest if that middle terminal with the two orange wires is terminal 3, which I'm sure it will be, (but!), gently lift them out of the connectors, and separate them. Be very careful not to disturb the wires on T2 and T5! Do not cut the orange wires.

One orange wire will be going to the external NTE if there is one, or another somewhere as above, and the other to the extension. It is an unnecessary wire for nearly all installation these days, but still fitted as standard in case it is needed. In your case it is not needed as long as you have a decent modern phone or decent microfilter. It is a ring wire, to make old-fashioned or the occasional junk modern one ring.

The orange wires are notorious for costing up to 2Mbps on ADSL 2+ and a lot more on FTTC. They need to be disconnected from each other to shorten the length from your master to the one that the incoming wire from BT is connected to. Ideally they are disconnected at the first master.

When you put the faceplate back on, be careful no exposed copper wire touches any other or any other metal. As things are you can test the speed with the faceplate off through its front before putting it on.

Edited by RobertoS (Sun 14-May-17 09:52:33)

Seconded I started writing the same

What you have is fairly common in new build properties where the line installs were done by contractors prior to there being dial tone to work with .....

It is easily fixed with the correct tools and some savvy .... however this involves working on the rear of the NTE which is strictly Openreach territory .

Will Origin not raise an SFI fault for Openreach to attend ?

Do not diturb the wires on 2 and 5 surely Bob ?

Yowee!

Fixed thanks. The usual "brain reading what it knows it typed", rather than what the eyes see.

But I expect you agree the OP can do what I suggest in the short term. It could give him quite a bit more speed while he gets it sorted out properly.

The builders really fit two masters wired like that? There must surely be another as the incoming line doesn't have those colours does it?

Edited by RobertoS (Sun 14-May-17 09:58:23)

The original link now seems bust so can't check again.

I bet one of the two pictured IS the feed .

I'm more leaning towards external NTE based on the cables in the pic.

Is it common to connect to the faceplate then?

In reply to a post by Taziir1:

http://i883.photobucket.com/albums/ac38/taziir/Socke...

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