Kitz Forum
Computers & Hardware => Networking => Topic started by: jabns on April 11, 2008, 05:24:47 AM
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Hi all,
Just thought i would let you all know how it went:
I had been up all night configuring my load balancer so it was ready for the activation then about 1 hour ago i noticed I lost sync to the exchange on 2 lines. So I ran and switched the modem cables from the old gear to the new setup and waited for about 10mins then all of a sudden the pings started returning.
The first thing I did was a speed test of course and here are the results:
http://b.imagehost.org/0445/speedy.jpg (http://b.imagehost.org/0445/speedy.jpg)
Its not to bad considering i am only syncing at around 15,000kbs on both lines(not DMT'd them yet). I am hoping to push the speeds up to around 17,000kbs and then get Annex M(2.5mb/s upload) enabled which will drop a bit of the download speed but give me around 5mb/s upload.
I was quite surprised that my attenuation went up by 6db on both lines.
I think this is what they call geek heaven :lol: .
PS @ Kitz: I still have another 2 lines on the way to cripple your download speeds :P ;)
James
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Title amended by Admin - re thread later split
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Your attenuation isn't being measured at 300kHz now so it will be higher.
I assume both lines are fully interleaved? If so then you'll get a couple more Mbps if they are capable of "fastpath" without doing any tweaking. Just get Be to switch you to fastpath once the DLM period has ended. With a decent line you are better tweaking (using DMT Tool) a line which has minimal interleaving on it as you'll get a far better idea when you've tweaked "too far".
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Uptime: 0 days, 3:14:56
Modulation: G.992.5 Annex M US 56
Bandwidth (Up/Down) [kbps/kbps]: 1,940 / 14,407
Data Transferred (Sent/Received) [MB/MB]: 15.89 / 119.83
Output Power (Up/Down) [dBm]: 13.0 / 18.5
Line Attenuation (Up/Down) [dB]: 14.5 / 28.0
SN Margin (Up/Down) [dB]: 6.0 / 6.0
Vendor ID (Local/Remote): TMMB / µ
Loss of Framing (Local/Remote): 4 / 0
Loss of Signal (Local/Remote): 1 / 0
Loss of Power (Local/Remote): 0 / 0
Loss of Link (Remote): 0
Error Seconds (Local/Remote): 86 / 0
FEC Errors (Up/Down): 0 / 74,006
CRC Errors (Up/Down): 0 / 145
HEC Errors (Up/Down): 0 / 130
I just was not expecting it to go up by 6db. Since they enabled Annex M its gone up by another 1db.
I have loads of FEC errors and was wondering what sort of frequencies ADSL2+ operates on and what interferes. Do you think i should drop the speed a bit by raising my SNR or is this number of errors normal for ADSL2+. The one problem is that its a pain DMTing to the beboxes because they are in bridge mode and on different subnets.
Thanks,
James
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ADSL2+ is all the way up to 2.2MHz or so. Annex M uses frequencies from 25kHz to 276kHz for upstream rather than 25-138kHz on Annex A.
Your FEC errors are fine as they're showing corrected errors. CRCs and HECs are reasonable. No problem with either.
However you either have a problem with local wiring or a local noise source as you're showing a Loss of Framing/Loss of Signal event (they usually go 4:1 ie 4 LoF = 1 LoS on Be) and your upstream isn't maxed out - which it should be with that attenuation.
Do both lines look the same?
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oooooooh glad you got the load balancer sorted. :thumbs:
(or am I?) :lol:
I have a few things to sort first... but I have seen the shiny new Be* MSAN. Unfort I couldnt photograph any non BT dslams/msans, but I do have a piccy of their BTw handover frame and the backhaul fibre which I will post up at some point if youre interested.
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Yes please do kitz.
Rizla i have redone my wiring in my house and now both lines have the same attenuation (they were different by 0.5 before). Here are printscreens from DMT of both lines. What do you make of the difference in sync speed. I noticed it said there was a frequency gap.
WAN1:
(https://forum.kitz.co.uk/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fb.imagehost.org%2F0577%2Fdmtw1.jpg&hash=652dfbabe71b7ec23493bac619cd6be9b6bf3feb)
WAN2:
(https://forum.kitz.co.uk/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fb.imagehost.org%2F0577%2Fdmtw2.jpg&hash=28f6f8a4a400998b920726f364a0eb6ed8433c5e)
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Is there any difference in the graphs if you only permit one line at a time to sync? While you're trying that also try swapping the PSUs over on the ST585 boxes to remove that as a factor.
kitz also mentioned that your lines might not all come from the same cab?
WAN1 still looks like bad wiring to me - you can see how fast the upstream bitloading drops off compared to WAN2. I'm assuming you're using twisted pair cable for extensions and not the horrible (useless) flat extensions?
Edit - the cable from the faceplate to the router doesn't go through any sort of surge suppressor does it? eg the ones that are common on consumer UPS boxes.
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/me spams thread back to top and beats James over the head in the hope of an update :P
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Sorry about that I have been so busy programming a new CMS for my site that I have not had time to think. It also could be the fact that I have had Grand Theft Auto 4 for the last 6 days so I have kind of not seen much daylight :lol:.
Both the lines defiantly take the same route according to the BT engineer that was here last time.
None of the lines have any extensions.
Here is a diagram to let you see how i have done it:
(https://forum.kitz.co.uk/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fa.imagehost.org%2F0230%2Flinelayout.jpg&hash=c27736c9bcbfa8b1652423f1b74116b536a66fe1)
The green dots are a CAT5e cable that i have fed from the hall to the study. I have lobed one RJ45 connector of normal modem cable and used 2 junction boxes (1 at each end of the CAT5e) so it goes: Modem Cable>>CAT5e>>Modem Cable
What i am going to do is put 1 be box in the hall and then use the CAT5e as a ethernet cable to the router in the study.
When i swapped the modems over both lines dropped by 1mbit and there SNRs stayed at 6.5DB. When i swapped them back they have stuck at the same sync speeds :'( . I think i am going to try 2 DG834GT's as the BeBox is very very hot running and i get packet loss sometimes.
I also tried swapping plug sockets over(and plugs) to no avail. I have also flicked ever circuit breaker bar the modems and routers and that did not change any stats either.
I am stuck now ???
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What's the green blob in the garage? Some sort of junction box? If it is then I would be inclined to open it up and see what the wiring looked like (yes I know about the legalities of this but I personally would still do it). For example you may find a tangle of wires which were twisted pair but have been untwisted (if you see what I mean). Shortening the untwisted sections would reduce crosstalk considerably, as indeed physically separating the two lines as far as is possible would. Do remember that I lost a couple of Mbps just because I hadn't terminated the centre ground connection on a CAT6e cable that ran about 2 metres away so all sorts of weirdness is possible.
Re the BeBox - yes they do run hotter on interleaved lines and also if the wireless is enabled. The packet loss is unlikely to be the BeBox I'm afraid, it is far more likely to be the transit Be are using from your exchange to the world.
Edit - you have turned the BeBox upside down haven't you? It'll run much cooler that way - no joke.
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They already are :lol: .
I laughed at that design. Why have they thrown convection out of the window???
I am already in the progress of separating the lines into two separate junction boxes. I have already removed the mass of wires that were in there and have just left the 4 wires from the lines in there.
Do you know where you can get official BT junction boxes from.
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Yo, Ive got two bethere lines currently installed. For the past few days ive been trying to figure out how to load balance them, is there any particuluar software or hardware your using?
I would really appriciate the help
Cheers.
I have removed your email address from this post to prevent crawlers getting it thus resulting in a load of spam.
We do not need your email address on public forums because we only normally give advice in the forums. That way others can also benefit from any help given.
dave
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I am currently using pfsense.
http://www.pfsense.com/ (http://www.pfsense.com/)
You can use any old PC you have lying around.
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I've been following this thread, but so far have not understood a word of it... should I be worried?
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I am currently using pfsense.
http://www.pfsense.com/ (http://www.pfsense.com/)
Oooo its a monowall fork.
/me wanders off to look
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I've been following this thread, but so far have not understood a word of it... should I be worried?
Not until someone produces a spectrum analyser :P
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No that's my fault.
I originally posted it in the Tech Chat section because I did not want to bore or frighten anyone who was not interested but as with all my posts one thing led to another and me and Rizla have been trying to push my lines to the limit (Sorry mods ::) ).
Basically What I am doing is effectively strapping 2 lines together. Say for example if you have 4 computers downloading at once from the internet, the router(load balancer) at the edge of my network would distribute the load evenly so that two of the downloads would go through one internet connection and two trough the other. That is what it is in its simplest form but it can get as complex as you would like(You could say you want 75% of the traffic to go down 1 line and 25% of the traffic to go down the other for example).
Hope that clears things up a bit.
James
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Its very good rizla.
I am currently messing around with the radius server it comes with and captive portal.
The next version is going to be amazing by the looks of it :) . They have completely redone the traffic shaper.
Just use good old VM Ware to have a look at it ;) (there's a guide with the settings for the VM on the site somewhere)
EDIT: I first found out about it at the bottom of the monowall website as there a button :)
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Ah I see it's something to do with networking, no wonder I haven't a clue... I've not even been able to set up a simple file sharing system between 2 PC's (don't ask).
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>> I originally posted it in the Tech Chat section
Interesting thread and Ive moved it to the Networking section :)
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Have you got any time to upload them pics (Just a gentle nudge ;) )
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I had a browse around the pfsense site, could you explain it in abit more detail if you have the time?
Is like another OS for a computer that you run to do your network bonding and traffic ?
I currently have two bethere lines, One on pro package and one on the regular package, I get speeds of
18.5/1.3
and
20/2.5
Neither of them have been DMT'd
I havnet read into much detail about how to load balance and bond my lines.
Would it play any benifit say If i was to use it for gaming,
Any help you could shed on the subject would be of great help to me.
Cheers.
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Check this post of mine out for a little more info on the differences in bonding and load balancing :http://forum.kitz.co.uk/index.php?topic=1911.msg62830#msg62830 (http://forum.kitz.co.uk/index.php?topic=1911.msg62830#msg62830).
Before I go into detail about whether it could help you, how many devices(PC,Servers,360,PS3 ect...) do you have on your network.
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Have you got any time to upload them pics (Just a gentle nudge ;) )
Yep - although they need resizing and putting on a page. I was at a couple of exchanges and need to sort out the best.
I was away last weekend hence not getting chance.. and then for the past couple of days Ive been indulging in setting up the new network and cabling... oh and playing with my new connection :D
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:lol: kk
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Rizla i just put a bit cardboard down the middle of the junction box and resynced both lines and i have just got around 500kbps extra out of one. Just about to go and check the modem stats in a min.
Here is a pic of the improvment(I have left the CPU stats in ect so you can see what sort of gear you would need ect...)
(https://forum.kitz.co.uk/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fb.imagehost.org%2F0635%2Fnewspeed.jpg&hash=2b977f6912794bdf9f48d8d979d299b97d7b830e)
P4 and 1GB RAM is way to much but its all I had lying around.
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Have you got any time to upload them pics (Just a gentle nudge ;) )
Yep - although they need resizing and putting on a page. I was at a couple of exchanges and need to sort out the best.
I was away last weekend hence not getting chance.. and then for the past couple of days Ive been indulging in setting up the new network and cabling... oh and playing with my new connection :D
Ive got 2 PC's running, one which I use for storing all the files in the house
2 Laptops - used for streaming stuff off my main pc.
X360 - 360 proabably what I need the bandwidth for. Im a top UK gamer, plays halo 3 competitivley and I host alot of games. I want to make my connection like as crisp as I can get it for other gamers playing on my host.
What would you reccomend to use for Bethere.
P.S. Im on xleague fairly often and attend halo 3 lan events.
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James - did moving the wires/putting cardboard in do anything to the upstream?
Your downstream WILL vary due to time of day - eg I have 0.8dB variation on the downstream margin which results in a downstream speed variation of about 800kbps. Of course you're not going to see this on Be as they don't use SRA, so you're going to have to find the noisiest time to sync if stability is the overwhelming consideration.
Edit - the periods on the graph where you see my connection synchronised at the fastest speed is when our central heating is ON. I'm not kidding, the noise on the line decreases when the central heating comes on, and increases by 0.4dB as soon as it turns off. Voodoo science or what :lol:
[attachment deleted by admin]
[attachment deleted by admin]
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Here is a pic of the improvment(I have left the CPU stats in ect so you can see what sort of gear you would need ect...)
Interesting. Does it run with full functionality under VMWare?
Edit - the reason its interesting is that O2 have just launched their business broadband products and I am aware of a company who use O2 for the corporate mobiles and also have a pressing need* for both hotspot and videocon connections which run at a sensible speed (ie not BT). Oh yes they are also situated less than 300m (line length I think) from an exchange which has both Be/O2 and UKOnline present. I was thinking of O2 & UKO on two lines for the hotspot and a third line with O2 for dedicated videocons/time critical stuff. That ought to give them around 35/3.5Mbps on the hotspot and 18/2.5Mbps on the videocon. I'd leave them all interleaved as stability is vital.
*they're not aware of this pressing need yet, but they will be ;)
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It runs with full functionality in a VM but they say don't do it like that in a production environment.
Here is a link to lots of the tutorials including the VM one(it gives you an idea of what it looks like as well because they are vids): http://doc.pfsense.org/index.php/Tutorials (http://doc.pfsense.org/index.php/Tutorials)
They could probably make good use of the captive portal as well.
I have finally come to the conclusion that it is the Be Box that is causing the problem. Which ever line a plug into 1 of the box's looses about 1500kbps in sync :no:. So i am just going to ebay 2 DG834GTs and use them. They can probably stay upright as well :lol:.
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@singhwon
If I am honest I would just leave 1 line plugged into the 360 all the time as load balancing does not effect games consoles(they only allow 1 IP address per session). What you could do is DMT WAN1 connection so it is rock stable(ie raise your SNR) then setup load balancing and make a rule saying:
if LAN_IP == whateveryour360ipis then use WAN1
if LAN_IP != whateveryour360ipis then deny new sessions to WAN1
else LoadBalance
There's a GUI don't worry I am just trying to explain it.
What this would do is always send 360 traffic down WAN1 but all other traffic would get shared between the two connections. So when you are on your 360 it would get all of wan1 to itself but when it was not in use everything would use both lines so you would not be wasting a connection.
It depends on whether you think its worth the effort really. I just did it because I did not have much to do and it was something new to learn.
James
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Its entirely plausible that it is the Bebox James, assuming you mean that one out of the two does this?
I've seen a couple of threads in the past where something in the Bebox was generating noise. Does the upstream on the "good" Bebox improve if the "bad" Bebox is powered down?
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Yep
Its definatly the Bebox so I am just going to get 2 DG834GT(sky ones).
Thanks,
James