Update 07/04/2012:Whilst awaiting the engineer for this morning's visit, I noticed my connection drop for a few minutes.
When the engineer (Tyrone) arrived, he explained that the purpose of his visit was to check for HR faults & to investigate dropping SNRM levels & occasional disconnections while the phone was in use.
He said that he hadn't been made aware of the long-standing issues, but he would be checking everything he could to try to get to the bottom of them (even though this wasn't officially a "Boost" visit).
What's a Boost visit, anyone?He confirmed he had run a TDR & a FDR test from the cabinet (hence the disconnection) & both looked exactly as they should.
He did mention he had spotted a small amount of corrosion on the connection in the cabinet, which he dealt with while he was there.
From my home Tyrone ran an Equal Leg balance test & confirmed good balance (both legs around a value of 12).
He also ran a TDR test from my home (unfortunately I didn't get a photo), which showed a gradual tailing off of the plot until a large peak, which he confirmed as the cabinet itself.
There was a bit of an upward "hump" (I missed the distance, but was perhaps 1/3 of the way from my house to the cabinet). However, Tyrone said that was quite normal & to be expected.
He also mentioned the lack of any other evidence which more or less confirmed a lack of Aluminium cabling which would have shown on the graph.
One Exfo screen reported a line length of 1155m, which he said was a known "bug" (supposedly being looked into by Exfo) & then Tyrone showed me another screen which confirmed a line length of 834m from the cabinet, which is apparently accurate to within a few metres & is the "real" length.
This 834m ties in with a previous engineer's comment that my connection was roughly 820m & NOT THE 1100m OR SO THAT HAS BEEN MENTIONED ELSEWHERE.
Various other tests all passed, with the exception of the insulation test which failed.
Tyone checked the crocodile connections & about 5mm of the end of one of the pairs in the drop wire snapped off.
I suppose this could/would have been the cause of the dropping SNRM issue?
Tyrone also brought his laptop in, specially so we could have a look at Network Records & I now have confirmation of my connection's actual route.
The last section goes past my house (underground) to a joint chamber & then comes back to the pole opposite my house.
Pacing it out, that adds 60m to my D-side.
I wonder how how much sync speed & stability is lost in those 60m
He had an Exfo tester, so I can't quite compare against any previous JDSU results from my connection.
These are the Exfo's stats (read out by Tyrone, but he said he was happy for me to take as many photos as I wished to):-
US DS
Actual Line Rate 6 24
Max Rate 6 33
Capacity 100% 75%
Noise Margin 6 9
Output 6.3 11.2
Loop Attenuation 7.9 31.6
Signal Attenuation 11 31.4
Now, the 31.6dB Loop Attenuation & 31.4dB Signal Attenuation (DS) bothered me a little as they have previously been reported as 23dB (from a JDSU) & when my connection was at its worst at 30.2dB.
However, as my connection was still capped by DLM at this stage, I thought I would wait until the modem was reconnected.
At least I would then be able to compare stats like-for-like.
The modem stats now show a slight reduction in DS attenuation (now more like the usual levels), which has allowed me to use some of the D2 frequency band again.
@BS, or any other engineers passing through:-
Is it usual to see large difference between Exfo & JDSU Attenuation readings?Anyway, the HG612 was connected up & we had a look at its stats.
Sync speed was still at 24999k, so I asked Tyrone to phone through to get it re-set.
Watching SNRM while using the phone, resulted in a drop of only 0.2dB.
So it looks like replacing the master socket's filtered parts and/or the end of the drop wire cable snapping off and/or sorting out the slight corrosion on the connection at the cabinet has resolved the recent dropping SNRM & occasional disconnection.
On leaving, Tyrone said he would phone through from his van to get DLM re-set.
I did see a re-sync, with a resulting speed of 31115 k DS & 5795 k US.
That was a little disappointing as the previous re-set gave me a DS sync speed of 35322 k DS & 6372 k US.
A few minutes later, the phone went dead & the connection dropped.
Oh, no!
On checking, Tyrones van had gone.
5 minutes later, the phone came back on & the connection was restored, a tiny increase, but still disappointing at 31251 k DS & 5807 k US.
Tyrone then phoned, saying he had been sent to check that everything at the cabinet was 100% correct, so that was what had caused the disconnection.
He also mentioned that while he was on the phone to OMC (I think that what he called it), the gentleman at the other end had told him there was a long history of instability & low speed on my connection & that they believe there is still another underlying issue as I am not too far from the cabinet.
He told OMC that 79Mb was showing at the cabinet (I'm on Plusnet's 80Mb/20Mb trials at the moment) & they both agreed that I should be seeing somewhat better speeds & certainly more stability over the 834m.
I'm not sure how this has been left, so I will be contacting Plusnet to find out.
While he was still at my house, Tyrone mentioned the slight possibility of REIN being the cause of my connection's issues, but looking at my graphs, he more or less ruled it out as there was no discernible pattern to the frequent but irregularly timed disconnections/errors etc.
Without any prompting, Tyrone said he would provide fully detailed notes from today's visit.
I wish to record that Tyrone was the most polite, helpful & informative of engineers, talking me through everything he was doing & showing a genuine interest in anything I mentioned & showed him.
He seemed really interested in the unlocked modem's GUI & mentioned that enginners were only shown that during their initial fibre training session.
He even held out his hand for a handshake on arrival & again on his departure