Packet Loss – ISP Won’t Help Me!

[bigdavethehorn]

As title, I’m experiencing some packet loss at the moment which is absolutely killing my ability to browse the internet. This problem started a couple of days ago, no new software has been either installed or un-installed.

My (UK) ISP is Virginmedia, and my connection is 20Mbit/s down and 786Kbit/s up.

My PC is hardwired to my Belkin F5D8230 router, which is then connected to my cable modem. I also have OpenDNS configured within my router.

I have tried the following:

1) Removing OpenDNS and allowing the ISP to specify the DNS servers.
2) Connecting the PC directly to the cable modem.
3) Re-setting both the modem & router, by removing power and through the browser.
4) Restored my PC to a clean install image created a few weeks ago.

None of the above worked.

I finally gave in and called my ISP. They told me that the packet loss is caused by my software firewall. I told them I wasn’t running one (my packet loss ocurrs whether Vista’s firewall is on or off). They absolutely insisted my non-existent firewall was the cause.

My ISP confirmed that my IP is valid, and that there don’t appear to be any network issues in my area.

Pinging bbc.co.uk or google.com returns mixed results. The return times are horrendous, on a good day I’ll get 22ms or thereabout, at the moment I’m getting about 200ms with 75% or 100% loss.

Does anyone have any ideas?

 

[Thor]

replace your network cable, try a different nic.

i assume you have tryed simply deleating the connection and remakeing it.

you have a rounter, so i assume you have a seconed pc, dose it have the same issues?

i know you took the router out of the loop, but that dose not mean you swaped cables, eather of the 2 (pc to router or router to modem) could be bad.. it would be odd, but both could be. if the cable you swaped to was the bad one, your going to endup with the same issue. have you tryed a different jack on the router? or setting a static ip in the router for your pc?

i remember once uppon a time working a on a pc for a buissness, every thing check out as good.. wires , modem, router.. nic.. but i would get sporadic packet loss on the nic... come to find out a cockroach layed an egg on the top of the jack inside the pc and was shorting the connectors.. not saying you have a roach problem.. just dont rule anything out.. lol

 

[calebb]

Try opening up 4 command prompts.

Now continuously ping 4 different sites:

ping -t 4.2.2.2
ping -t yahoo.com
ping -t google.com
ping -t infoseek.com


Do you see timeouts in all four windows simultaneously?

 

[Nenu]

The problem is Virgin Media.
I left them in January because the service is appalling and they are f***ing bullshitters.
My connection was down to 14kbit/s at peak times and they didnt care at all.
A few local friends also signed with Virgin a couple of years ago despite my telling them they were going downhill.
Within a year, they moved to another company.
Virgin have got even worse since due to massive over-subscription which means they cut everyones bandwidth to cope.

Another friend of mine was with Blue Yonder who Virgin took over.
He now has to leave as the service is attrocious for him also and his wife is giving him ear ache.
We live about 100 miles apart so its not just local.

Virgin will lie to you until you either give up complaining or move elsewhere.
They want you to accept the god awful service they are now giving.
It will cost you a lot in phone calls or a lot of time waiting for support emails which are useless.
If I were you I'd jumpstart the whole process and just leave them.

 

[Toytown]

Im on virgin media and its been rock solid since i signed up to them many years ago, originally on the 0.5Mbit package and now the 20mbit. Except for the scheduled downtimes that are done throughout the night 1:00am +, its probably been down for a few hours each year max.

Pinging bbc.co.uk or google.com returns mixed results. The return times are horrendous, on a good day I’ll get 22ms or thereabout, at the moment I’m getting about 200ms with 75% or 100% loss

Open up a ping to your router and use the -t switch to keep it going
The ping to the router should always be within 1ms, if it goes higher than this it could be a problem between your PC and the router (Nic/Cable etc). You should never get any loss at this point, if you do, its a local problem and not VM.

Open up a ping to your cable modem (192.168.100.1) and use the -t switch to keep it going.
The ping to your cable modem should always be within 1ms, if it goes higher than this its still a local problem to you and not VM. Again no loss should happen.

Open up a ping to VM (212.250.162.12) and use the -t switch to keep it going.
Pings should average between 10ms and 50ms if it goes much higher (150+) then its a problem somewhere in VM's network. Do a tracert to 212.250.162.12 to see if you can find out where the bad router is, do it several times to be sure. The bad/overloaded router is normally the one where the pings will jump from say 10ms to 100ms, as your still in VM's network at this point, it shouldnt be the case.

Also make sure that nothing else is connected to the router at the time of doing the testing and that you dont have any torrents/spyware etc on your computer. If you are uploading due to torrents then this could well cause the higher pings/loss due to the upload being saturated.

 

[Deleted member 133315]

I would agree that the problem will probably lie with virgin media, congested network or badly implemented packet shaping/throttling, but it most probably does lie with them due to some reason or another, call them back and see if you can get another tech support dude who knows what he is doing.

Over subscription and network congestion seems very likely due to the 20mbit speeds and the so called unlimited downloads.

You pay £10 or £20 a month for 20mbit, what else can you expect ? no ISP in the country can supply a decent 20mbit service for 10-20 quid a month with so called unlimited downloads, NO ISP in the UK can afford to hand out 20mbit lines with unlimited downloads and have a great service, it is totally economically unviable

I would certainly blame virgin and if they keep refusing to pull the finger out to fix it then pull them up for breach of contract and get as far away from them as possible.

If you ever think of changing isp's, seriously think about Zen, magic service best ISP i have ever been with, bit pricey and only upto 8mbit but they must be the most honest ISP out there, and the service is second to none, but it comes at a price, but the way the UK broadband market is just now, I was glad to pay extra to get a good isp that actually did what they said they could do 24/7

 

[Toytown]

call them back and see if you can get another tech support dude who knows what he is doing

Make sure you have some evidence first as to where the fault lies or at least something. If not they will just try to give you the run around again and again and again.

 

[bigdavethehorn]

Open up a ping to your router and use the -t switch to keep it going
The ping to the router should always be within 1ms, if it goes higher than this it could be a problem between your PC and the router (Nic/Cable etc). You should never get any loss at this point, if you do, its a local problem and not VM.

Open up a ping to your cable modem (192.168.100.1) and use the -t switch to keep it going.
The ping to your cable modem should always be within 1ms, if it goes higher than this its still a local problem to you and not VM. Again no loss should happen.

Open up a ping to VM (212.250.162.12) and use the -t switch to keep it going.
Pings should average between 10ms and 50ms if it goes much higher (150+) then its a problem somewhere in VM's network. Do a tracert to 212.250.162.12 to see if you can find out where the bad router is, do it several times to be sure. The bad/overloaded router is normally the one where the pings will jump from say 10ms to 100ms, as your still in VM's network at this point, it shouldnt be the case.

Also make sure that nothing else is connected to the router at the time of doing the testing and that you dont have any torrents/spyware etc on your computer. If you are uploading due to torrents then this could well cause the higher pings/loss due to the upload being saturated.

Thanks for the detailed response. I'll give all of these suggestions a shot when I get home.
I'm as certain as I can be that there is nothing uploading, and I don't have any torrent software. Also, my PC is the only connection to my router (whilst this issue is ongoing).

 

[bigdavethehorn]

replace your network cable, try a different nic.

i assume you have tryed simply deleating the connection and remakeing it.

you have a rounter, so i assume you have a seconed pc, dose it have the same issues?

i know you took the router out of the loop, but that dose not mean you swaped cables, eather of the 2 (pc to router or router to modem) could be bad.. it would be odd, but both could be. if the cable you swaped to was the bad one, your going to endup with the same issue. have you tryed a different jack on the router? or setting a static ip in the router for your pc?

i remember once uppon a time working a on a pc for a buissness, every thing check out as good.. wires , modem, router.. nic.. but i would get sporadic packet loss on the nic... come to find out a cockroach layed an egg on the top of the jack inside the pc and was shorting the connectors.. not saying you have a roach problem.. just dont rule anything out.. lol

Thanks for your suggestions too! I have two NICs on this mobo, so easy enough to swap out. I'm just puzzled as to the sudden appearance of this problem.

 

[bigdavethehorn]

You pay £10 or £20 a month for 20mbit, what else can you expect ? no ISP in the country can supply a decent 20mbit service for 10-20 quid a month with so called unlimited downloads, NO ISP in the UK can afford to hand out 20mbit lines with unlimited downloads and have a great service, it is totally economically unviable

I actually pay £37 per month for broadband alone. The service has been top notch for the past 4 years or so. However in the past few months, browsing speed has continued to slow, and now this issue.

I am looking into alternative ISPs, however I'm quite a distance from the local exchange, and the last time I used ADSL it was awful. Mind you, that was some time ago.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

In troubleshooting a lot of cable internet connections....I've found over the years..that 99.9% of issues with cable internet...is due to an old/faulty/dying coax splitter in the mix. Cheap enough part that takes but a few minutes to replace yourself...no ISP support needed.

And don't have your cable modem connected through multiple splitters..have it connected as the first device off of the first splitter if you need multiples.

 

[goodcooper]

In troubleshooting a lot of cable internet connections....I've found over the years..that 99.9% of issues with cable internet...is due to an old/faulty/dying coax splitter in the mix. Cheap enough part that takes but a few minutes to replace yourself...no ISP support needed.

And don't have your cable modem connected through multiple splitters..have it connected as the first device off of the first splitter if you need multiples.

i thought they were pretty expensive...

and i think my cable company locks the box outside... i mean if you have the screw driver you can get in there....

but a splitter that is like 6 way and has the passthrough for the cable modems were > $100 i thought...

 

[da sponge]

You don't want a 6 way splitter. 2 way splitter only - cable modem hooked directly off that first splitter. The more splits, the weaker the signal to the modem. If the modem is way down in the chain, it's screwed. Put the 2 way right after the wall, then one cable to the modem, one cable to another splitter for your televisions. Splitters compatible with cable modems are not $100. They're cheap - < $20.

 

[goodcooper]

i'm talking about the one coming from the street, the one on the side of your house

 

[marley1]

In troubleshooting a lot of cable internet connections....I've found over the years..that 99.9% of issues with cable internet...is due to an old/faulty/dying coax splitter in the mix. Cheap enough part that takes but a few minutes to replace yourself...no ISP support needed.

And don't have your cable modem connected through multiple splitters..have it connected as the first device off of the first splitter if you need multiples.

exactly gotta love those houses with like 8 tvs and a single 8 way splitter. i always gotta go trace which line is going to the cable modem. throw in a new 2 way splitter and get the cable modem line on the first split. fixes a bunch of hte problems.

but if your isp isn't even helping you, just find a new one. im lucky where i am to have the best cable ISP in the USA.

call the ISP have them run a signal test on your modem, that will tell you a few things. if its low go check the splits and see how many you got, fix it call em back, if its not working its their end.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

i'm talking about the one coming from the street, the one on the side of your house

You don't want a splitter outside...due to being exposed to the elements..you'll be having issues with it and replacing it at least once a year. If your octopus of coax cables in dangling outside the house with some splitter mess...club whoever wired that upside the head..and have someone else run the cable inside....do your splitting in the drier environment of the basement, crawlspace, attic, whatever.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

exactly gotta love those houses with like 8 tvs and a single 8 way splitter. i always gotta go trace which line is going to the cable modem. throw in a new 2 way splitter and get the cable modem line on the first split. fixes a bunch of hte problems./QUOTE]

Yup...that's the way to do it if you need multiple splits.

Also a note..if you have 4-ish TVs or more...esp hi def....you may need a booster. There's no magic number for if you need one or not...such as.."If you have more than 4x TV's", etc..but that's the common number.

 

[Nate7311]

In troubleshooting a lot of cable internet connections....I've found over the years..that 99.9% of issues with cable internet...is due to an old/faulty/dying coax splitter in the mix. Cheap enough part that takes but a few minutes to replace yourself...no ISP support needed.

And don't have your cable modem connected through multiple splitters..have it connected as the first device off of the first splitter if you need multiples.

Again, right on the money. But lets take this a step further.

Where does the cable come in from outside? Does it make it's 1st split or is there a grounding connector outside?
Another thing that I've seen over the years is faulty insulation rings on the outside of buildings at a splitter or grounding connector. The rubber ring protecting the connections breaks down and rain/snow/etc gets into the connection itself and plays packetloss games with you.

Inside, double check the location of your cable modem on your home coaxial cable network. As others have said is it far down the path of splitters? Have you added any new TV's/Cable boxes around the time that you began to have issues? Tuners in newer TV's/Cable Boxes are notoriously signal hungry. Especially cheap low-end TV's/VCR's and Hi-Def Cable Boxes. Multiple times, I've seen cable modem issues pop up when some one turns on their new TV in the bedroom/Rec room/Kitchen/etc. There's just not enough signal strength to go around. This is why it's most important for the sake of stability to have you modem split off the main feed first. So it has the highest signal levels possible.

Let us know how it goes! We've all had internet issues and it's DAMN frustrating when you are used to a stable connection!

 

[Deleted member 133315]

I actually pay £37 per month for broadband alone. The service has been top notch for the past 4 years or so. However in the past few months, browsing speed has continued to slow, and now this issue.

I am looking into alternative ISPs, however I'm quite a distance from the local exchange, and the last time I used ADSL it was awful. Mind you, that was some time ago.

Hmm, well it seems that virgin are over charging you I think ?, unless you are on a different package, the XL 20 mbit package is £10 for the first 3 months and £20 thereafter for an " Unlimited" line, If you are on the XL package which I think is the largest then I would call them and ask them to adjust your price, Thats just for broadband but their is bundles with phones and other stuff, but for just broadband they are charging £20 and they should adjust all customers prices to those prices, as I had that happen to me a few times where I was paying more with some isps and they changed their pricing and I ended up paying like £5 less a month but the service eventually suffered, but realistically, in the UK no ISP can give out unlimited 20mbit lines for even £37 a month and expect it to last.

I pay £92 for 8mbit truly unlimited, no caps no throttles nothing and I doubt that my isp is making any money from that due to the cost of bandwidth, so I really cant see how virgin or any other isp can have 20mbit service for half what I pay or even quarter and have a great service to boot, the cost of bandwidth is just too much and in the end the isp suffers either from over subscription or from degradation of service due to whatever reasons.

ADSL can now reach a good 5k + from the exchange, so you may now be able to get a somewhat decent radsl service if virgin cant get your problem fixed, personally I would rather stay with the cable option but if your going to suffer for it then it isnt worth it.

The entire UK BB infrastructure is in a right mess, isps are falling over there feet to keep customers, so maybe you will be able to wrangle a good deal from them if you threaten to leave, as they like their longtime customers, and since something like 98% of UK isp's are all traffic shaping/throttling/port blocking bastards then it really is a gamble on what ISP you end up with, it maybe better staying with the devil you know than going with the devil you dont unless you are willing to pay a fair bit for a top notch line, which is sickening at times, but I got sick with the majority of isps available in my area as they were all lieing shites.

I hope you get your problem figured out anyway

Just a thought, have you tried taking the router out of the equation for a few minutes and just connecting via the modem ? and seeing if the router is the cause ?

Request your ISP to do a Woosh test on your line, this test will indicate any faults that your broadband line maybe suffering as it tests the frequency range and strength and quality of signal that reaches your house thus if its abnormally low then they can pick up a fault and dig deeper into it. ( not sure if that test can only be run on DSL lines though ? but I spose it couldnt hurt to try and get them to run it if possible )

 

[bigdavethehorn]

I’m not familiar with the technical terms of cable TV & internet, so my explanation may be a little simple for you techy folk!

My internet is the only service which comes via cable. I have a separate copper cable for my phone line and my TV is freeview.

I have a little white plastic box on my internal living room wall. A length (20m?) of coax cable comes from this box and connects into my cable modem.

There is another available socket on the white plastic box, presumably for cable TV, but there’s nothing plugged into it.

I’ve never paid much attention to the white plastic box. Never removed the cable, switched sockets, or been tempted even to pull the cover off.

 

[Toytown]

Hmm, well it seems that virgin are over charging you I think ?, unless you are on a different package, the XL 20 mbit package is £10 for the first 3 months and £20 thereafter for an " Unlimited" line, If you are on the XL package which I think is the largest then I would call them and ask them to adjust your price,

The top based package for internet on virgin media has been £35 and now £37, since they released the 3tiers sometime ago. Ive always been on the top package, when they first released cable modem in my area 0.5Mbit was £24. But 20Mbit is £37

There is currently an offer to get 20Mbit for £20, but for that you have to sign up for all the other packages at the same time, which brings the total amount a lot higher.

 

[bigdavethehorn]

I pay £92 for 8mbit truly unlimited, no caps no throttles nothing and I doubt that my isp is making any money from that due to the cost of bandwidth, so I really cant see how virgin or any other isp can have 20mbit service for half what I pay or even quarter and have a great service to boot, the cost of bandwidth is just too much and in the end the isp suffers either from over subscription or from degradation of service due to whatever reasons.

ADSL can now reach a good 5k + from the exchange, so you may now be able to get a somewhat decent radsl service if virgin cant get your problem fixed, personally I would rather stay with the cable option but if your going to suffer for it then it isnt worth it.

The entire UK BB infrastructure is in a right mess, isps are falling over there feet to keep customers, so maybe you will be able to wrangle a good deal from them if you threaten to leave, as they like their longtime customers, and since something like 98% of UK isp's are all traffic shaping/throttling/port blocking bastards then it really is a gamble on what ISP you end up with, it maybe better staying with the devil you know than going with the devil you dont unless you are willing to pay a fair bit for a top notch line, which is sickening at times, but I got sick with the majority of isps available in my area as they were all lieing shites.

I hope you get your problem figured out anyway

Just a thought, have you tried taking the router out of the equation for a few minutes and just connecting via the modem ? and seeing if the router is the cause ?

Yup, tried removing the router. Problem remained

Also tried phoning them and threatening to cancel, took it as far as I could, they were quite happy to let me go.

 

[Nate7311]

Try requesting a tech come out to inspect/troubleshoot. May times the techs know their company is shit and are sympathetic to your cause and will fight to get issues resolved.

 

[Deleted member 133315]

Shit yea, it was a bundle I was looking at, I just noticed the 20 quid a month and when I looked at the small print it says xl bundle with phone which is an extra 11 quid a month.

http://allyours.virginmedia.com/html/internet/bb_deal_size_xl.html

thats the page I was reading which at first I thought was just BB only, but phone bundled alongside it.

Yea, you cannot argue about 20mbit v 0.5mbit, however much problems you might face with the 20mbit package, as 0.5mb is back in medieval times and is no use in todays "press play to watch this video now" webpages.

If you do decide to change ISP for whatever reason, I am not sure if you know about this but your area may or may not already be enabled for 21CN, which is capable of pumping out 24mbits on adsl+2 lines and is BT new network solution for adsl broadband and also it goes much farther from the exchange than traditional adsl was capable of reaching and it started in late 2006 and will be completed by 1st quarter 2012 or so they say, if your area is enabled your lucky as I gotta wait til 4th quarter 2011, but its something to think about if and when you ever change, BE Unlimited supports it and supposedly they are a good unlimited isp with decent caps, so to find out I spose you could always check out your phone number in the be adsl checker.

Anyway, as i said before I hope you get your problem fixed, just to add, that I found this little trick with many many isps that I had, if you ask for your MAC code, even if you have 0 intention of using it, you will normally get 1 to 3 months of free internet usage, I lost count how many ISP's gave me freebie months because I asked for my mac code with no intention of migrating, I ended up doing it every few months especially with freeserve then wanadont, but then they stopped handing out the freebie months to me so I did migrate that time but maybe they have caught onto the fact that people were trying it on for a fre month here and there ? but right up until i left BT Business for Zen in january they were handing me a free month here and there for just requesting a mac code, who could refuse such kindness ?

 

[Toytown]

Also tried phoning them and threatening to cancel, took it as far as I could, they were quite happy to let me go

Could you post a traceroute?

Theres no point in asking for the MAC code as virgin media dont have one (unless you have the connection going over ADSL instead of cable). Also whilst they maybe happy to let you go, as soon as you actually start the cancel procedure, they will put you through to retentions, who will do everything they can to keep you, completely different to the normal customer service/tech support people and as such you can follow Scotsman lead and get as many freebies as possible.

 

[Nenu]

Could you post a traceroute?

Theres no point in asking for the MAC code as virgin media dont have one (unless you have the connection going over ADSL instead of cable). Also whilst they maybe happy to let you go, as soon as you actually start the cancel procedure, they will put you through to retentions, who will do everything they can to keep you, completely different to the normal customer service/tech support people and as such you can follow Scotsman lead and get as many freebies as possible.

I emailed Virgin with the following which got me out of their clutches almost straight away.
I appreciate the op wont get a MAC code but if they neglect to tell him what he needs to do to leave them, he may have a case for them to answer.
Before I canceled I read up on other peoples experiences and found that many people had to go through hoops to get their MAC code and were subjected to long talks to get them to stay.
They also ignore nearly everything you tell them, which is why I worded it strongly.


"I would like to cancel my connection with Virgin net.
Can you please tell me my MAC code.
This isn’t negotiable, I would like you to send me my MAC code in the reply to this email.

I require you to waive any disconnection fee as you have forced me to leave you by not providing a usable service for a very long time.
As one of the original Virgin Net customers, I have seen the service degrade since you took over it.
I have waited years for things to improve but they actually get worse! I am now down to a 14K to 30Kbit connection despite paying you for 8mbit and connecting to you at 8mbit.
My upload speed is faster than my download speed during peak times and recently at all times!
Your Status page does not accurately reflect the service you are giving either,

Can you please advise me of anything I need to know about cancelling my account with Virgin Media including how long it will take and why.
Do not omit anything that I am required to know as I will add this to my complaint.
I also need to know if there will be any period of time during the transfer of my broadband to another ISP that I will be left without a viable service, the reasons why and how long it will be.

Any delay or trouble I have obtaining a satisfactory cancellation will be recorded and will be passed to those bodies that monitor activity of this nature.
Do not send me your standard response, I require you to send me the information I have requested and to adhere to my wishes.

If you need to speak to me, please arrange with me a time when you can call me."

hehe.
I'm now with "Be" 24mbit and couldnt be happier, especially at £18 a month !
(I get between 12mbit to 18mbit)

 

[Toytown]

Can you please tell me my MAC code.
This isn’t negotiable, I would like you to send me my MAC code in the reply to this email.

Well im sure you can mention it, but as they have NO MAC code on there cable modem service, its hardly going to get them to react, you only get MAC codes per say on ADSL services and not cable modem services.

I believe that the OP is on cable modem as he mentioned that he tried ADSL sometime ago and it was poor.

 

[Nenu]

Well im sure you can mention it, but as they have NO MAC code on there cable modem service, its hardly going to get them to react, you only get MAC codes per say on ADSL services and not cable modem services.

I believe that the OP is on cable modem as he mentioned that he tried ADSL sometime ago and it was poor.

Agreed, read the first few lines of my post

 

[Nenu]

Lol, this demonstrates Virgins Ethos
http://www.dailytech.com/Virgin+CEO++Declares+Net+Neutrality+is+a+Load+of+Bollocks/article11473.htm
Virgin CEO Declares: “Net Neutrality is a Load of Bollocks!”

"While it is unknown which providers are in negotiations with Virgin, If Berkett’s statements are true, then the ISPs’ UK customers can look forward to a tiered internet in the near future."

Looks like its started!

 

[bigdavethehorn]

Right folks, the results are in:

Pinging my router:

Pinging my modem:

And pinging VirginMedia:

As you can see, everything seemes to be working again

 

[Nenu]

As you can see, everything seemes to be working again

I hope it stays that way.

Mine started out with the occasional problem at peak times.
The peak times started to get longer and longer (as they oversubscribed more and more) until the connection caused me more stress than it was worth.
Gaming online was absolutely impossible at any time.

On the day my connection was changed, it took 1/2hr to disconnect from Virgin and connect to Be.
My speeds went from 30k download to 18MBit download in 1/2hr LOL

 

[bigdavethehorn]

Spoke too soon

 

[Deleted member 133315]

What time of the day does this happen ? is it only at night time between say 6pm and midnight or thereabouts ? or does it happen during the day also ?

if its only happening at night time between 6-12 or 4- 11 or similar then chances are it is 99.9% caused either by Throttling by the ISP or congestion at your phone exchange, if its the latter then thats BT fault and only they can fix it by upgrading the exchange to handle more traffic, you can find websites to see if your phone exchange is congested or not. If its your isp thats throttling you at those times then you can try and do something about it.

Also do traceroutes instead of ping and post the results as ping tells us nothing except that your losing packets, atleast tracert will tell us where in the journey you are having problems which you can then forward onto virgin that a fault in a piece of their equipment is causing you problems and if you have screenshots to prove it then they cannot deny they are at fault.

TBH, if this just happens at night time and at certain hours in the weekend then it could be your isp throttling at peak times to reduce capacity to make sure their service doesnt break down due to demand, if it is that then it is very unlikely you can do anything about it unless you get through to someone who sympathies with your situation and gets your number taken off of the throttling/shaping list.

tracert www.bbc.co.uk

and post the results when you have problems and we will see exactly where on the journey you are having problems.

 

[Toytown]

its the latter then thats BT fault and only they can fix it by upgrading the exchange to handle more traffic

It doesnt even run through BT's infastructure so it has absolutely nothing to do with them. Its Virgin Media who run there own network and he is connected through a cable modem. Also its not a capacity issue by the looks of things its simply a network fault somewhere, the first thing that happens when you have an oversubscribed UBR or overloaded router is that pings shoot up. This isnt happening, instead he is getting LOSS which is more a sign of a hardware issue within there network.

f this just happens at night time and at certain hours in the weekend then it could be your isp throttling at peak times to reduce capacity to make sure their service doesnt break down due to demand,

That is simply untrue, i get throttled quite a lot from 20Mbit to 5mbit and there is never any loss on the network when im throttled, just a reduced down/up stream. Throttling should never introduce loss into the network.

Right folks, the results are in:

Everytime you get loss, like in the screengrabs, simply mark the date/time down and the % of loss your getting. Do this 3-4 times and then phone up Virgin Media. If you want to leave and your outside of the original 12months, then you can simply leave within 30 days as normal. If you are within the 12month new signup period then tell them that you are unhappy with the service and that they are breaking the contract by not supplying you with a reliable service, make sure to point out the exact times and % of loss you are getting on your system as evidence. As they will be in breach of contract for not supplying you with a reliable service then you should be able to leave.

 

[bigdavethehorn]

i get throttled quite a lot from 20Mbit to 5mbit and there is never any loss on the network when im throttled, just a reduced down/up stream. Throttling should never introduce loss into the network.

I'm in agreement with you here.
I'm used to being throttled regularly from 20Mbit to 5Mbit, as you say throttling does not (normally) bring packet loss.

Even whilst experiencing packet loss, I can still download at approximately 16Mbit/s, which is slower than usual, but definitely not throttled.

Everytime you get loss, like in the screengrabs, simply mark the date/time down and the % of loss your getting. Do this 3-4 times and then phone up Virgin Media. If you want to leave and your outside of the original 12months, then you can simply leave within 30 days as normal. If you are within the 12month new signup period then tell them that you are unhappy with the service and that they are breaking the contract by not supplying you with a reliable service, make sure to point out the exact times and % of loss you are getting on your system as evidence. As they will be in breach of contract for not supplying you with a reliable service then you should be able to leave.

I started "record keeping" with screen shots last night.
Bizarrely at about 23.10, everything was back to normal, again. Like someone had flicked a switch. No changes at my end.

We'll see what happens when I get home tonight.

I don't want to leave, cos when it works, there's no complaints.

 

[Deleted member 133315]

Shit, thats right, you on cable, my bad for thinking it was exchange congestion, which would totally exclude bt from the exchange problem. :S

 

[bigdavethehorn]

Slightly OT, but the benefit of not having decent internet access last night was that I managed to OC my Q6600 to 3Ghz!

Couldn't believe how easy it was, upped the FSB to 333Mhz, and bingo!

I struggled for about 3 weeks to get an additional 300Mhz from my old S754 A64, and now quad cores can be OC'd by 600Mhz without batting an eye!

That's progress!

 

[Deleted member 133315]

It doesnt even run through BT's infastructure so it has absolutely nothing to do with them. Its Virgin Media who run there own network and he is connected through a cable modem.

I agree, and I slipped up by thinking it was adsl, when it was cable, which would exclude bt from the exchange problem, early in the morning and I wasnt thinking.

Also its not a capacity issue by the looks of things its simply a network fault somewhere,

Not capacity per-se, ( as in the line cant handle X amount of subscribers ), but the capacity of the network to handle those subscribers without any problems at certain times of the day at a decent speed without too much of a problem introduced into the network.

the first thing that happens when you have an oversubscribed UBR or overloaded router is that pings shoot up. This isnt happening, instead he is getting LOSS which is more a sign of a hardware issue within there network.

I agree, hence the tracert *site here* command which would point to a faulty router on VM's network.



That is simply untrue, i get throttled quite a lot from 20Mbit to 5mbit and there is never any loss on the network when im throttled, just a reduced down/up stream. Throttling should never introduce loss into the network.

I agree that throttling should never introduce PLoss into the line, but if VM network is saturated due to oversubscription at certain times of the day, IT CAN introduce PLoss into the line. Just because it never happens to you, doesnt mean to say it cant happen, you could be neighbours with someone and it can happen to one and not the other.

And yes, Although I am on adsl now, I used cable before from NTL and did experience a shite service, even with the cable fibre dug into my garden and less than 6 feet from my actual house, they still couldnt supply a decent service to me, and I suffered from congestion/ploss at times, fault associated and decided to leave just months before ntl went the way of the rest of crap BB isp's.

Also he says that its like a switch being flicked, typical throttling behaviour, your ok one second and then the next bang, shit starts and whether its the same in his case but its normally at the very same time day in day out that the "switches" occur.

http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=10347

 

[Deleted member 133315]

Slightly OT, but the benefit of not having decent internet access last night was that I managed to OC my Q6600 to 3Ghz!

Couldn't believe how easy it was, upped the FSB to 333Mhz, and bingo!

I struggled for about 3 weeks to get an additional 300Mhz from my old S754 A64, and now quad cores can be OC'd by 600Mhz without batting an eye!

That's progress!

Crazy things them 66s, makes you appreciate them even more when you think what it was like a mere 3 - 5 years ago when 1 core was all the rage and reaching 3 gig was a push, now 4 cores in one package all at 3 gig is the norm, crazy crazy times.

 

[bigdavethehorn]

http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=10347

Thanks for the link, I'll quote this parargaph:

"In that time, perhaps I could have applied for a job as a Virgin Media engineer, done the interview, got the job, gone on the training course, started work and fixed the damn fault myself... and maybe I'd have made enough money to afford me the luxury of ringing your support line."

Class.