Dropouts, Low Sync, Hair Torn Out

Hi there, recently I moved my Nildram 8mb ADSL when I moved house. In the old house, I always had good speeds and no drop outs for the 6 month period I was there. Four weeks after waiting for BTw to activate ADSL in my new house, i'm starting to wish I could find my old 56k modem.

I can download at no more than 15k/sec, upload at 50k/sec. The line will drop out between every minute, and every 20 minutes.

Here's my Nildram control panel stats:
Maximum stable rate - 2272Kbps (Samknows + BT test show I can achieve up to 8mb...)
Line speed - 160Kbps
Fault threshold - 2272Kbps

In my router (Buffalo Airstation WBMR-G54) admin my stats:
Downstream SNR: 0-11dB (avg 6dB)
Upstream SNR: 26dB ish (from memory)
Line att Down: 32dB

I've tried plugging directly into the test socket, the main socket, extension socket, with phones, without phones, 2 different filters, 3 RJ-11 cables, 2 modems, and i've tried every possible combination of these over the last 2 days. All to no avail what so ever. Not the slightest bit of difference. All of the equipment I am currently using I used in my old house. Both my old house, and my new house are within 1km of the exchange too.

I've phoned Nildram tech support on the day of activation when I realised there was a problem. The girl was very friendly and helpful and said to try plugging into the test socket as well as testing my equipment, and to phone back if there was still a problem and they would contact BTw.

Now, the only things that seemed different from this installation to the 6+ times I've had ADSL installed in various houses (I move a lot) before was that nearly two weeks after I ordered the move, Nildram came back to me to say there was a PSTN cease due to be carried out on the line, and it would be re-ordered in another weeks time. I thought this was a bit strange, as I had the phone line activated a week before I ordered ADSL, but I waited it out. The other thing I was unsure about is that my line is coming up as Interleaved, whereas every single time in the past it's been Fast Mode. I realise this typically effects latency for gaming and such, but could it be causing problems? Can I get it switched?


(Almost done... sorry)
My main query is this, If I get Nildram to order a BT engineer are they going to come to my house, test the line and say 'The Phone Works Fine Mate...' (which it does... doesn't seem to be any noise) then leave me out of pocket, and without usable internet? Or is there something they can actually do?

I apologise for this huge post, I want to give as much information as I can.

Thanks,
Steve

Can you hear any noise on the line when ADSL is not plugged in. I think there is a quite test accessed using 17070. If there is audible noise on the line you need to get that fixed by BT before you start looking at your ADSL problems with your ISP.

Otherwise you might just have a lousy line. Post the stats (syncs, attenuations, SNR Margins) for one of your modems plugged into the test socket.

In reply to:

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My main query is this, If I get Nildram to order a BT engineer are they going to come to my house, test the line and say 'The Phone Works Fine Mate...' (which it does... doesn't seem to be any noise) then leave me out of pocket, and without usable internet? Or is there something they can actually do?

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If the engineer is ordered via Nildram, then they will be broadband trained, so can diagnose the cause of the fault.

Hi, thanks for the replies.

John, i've posted all of the stats already. I checked the line with 17070 and as I said, there's no audible noise.

A bit of an update: I phoned Nildram back with my ticket number, and they said no problem we'll pass on the information to BTw. Less than an hour later, I reboot my router and suddenly i'm now syncing at 2mbit. I called Nildram back again, and they said there was no engineer called but BTw have obviously started working on the problem, and to keep rebooting over the next 36 hours to see if the speed fluctuates and settles.

So hopefully my line can go higher, but i'll need to wait and see.

It's amazing how many times when BT is informed of a problem, the problem suddenly disappears, but they never admit to finding any faults; strange!

Edited by deleted (Fri 04-May-07 12:38:54)