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[kitz]

>> and then dies overnight.




>> My neighbour, who has been without internet for over a month now,

Interesting,  has anyone tried approaching the owners of the house?

[idlewilde]

I've tried, but let's just say they are slightly unreceptive to slightly hungover people turning up bearing AM radios, with a world-weary beaten look on their faces.

 

I can't actually reprint their responses, but suffice to say my neighbour and myself were asked to leave their resplendent premises post-haste!

[kitz]

 

[idlewilde]

Ok, really quick one for you lovely people - who, or what is "BT's Complex Fault Team"? Virgin have just called me to tell me that the REIN fault I reported got rejected by BT, but Virgin persevered, so BT have told them that they have passed the fault to the complex fault team.

I can take a rough guess at what it is, but can anyone shed additional light on this crew?

[kitz]

>> "BT's Complex Fault Team"?

Not exactly sure... but years ago there used to be a special department (one was located in Wolves), which specifically dealt with more complex faults.
This dept was called Special Faults Investigation or SFI for short.   These days SFI means something else and allocated more locally.  Whether that is the name for the old SFI dept I dont know.

[idlewilde]

Thanks, Kitz. Appreciate the response. I've got an update . . .of sorts!

Virgin raised the fault to BT who closed it several times, but Phil ( 8)) at Virgin persevered, and eventually got it re-raised. It had been closed due to the fact that when BT checked the line at 3:00am, the router was not in synch. So they closed the fault. 

I then took the liberty of contacting the CEO of BT, and he responded within 20 minutes, copying some very high-level people within BT on the email. My fault was passed on to the high-level faults team, who have escalated the issue somewhat.

Since then, I have been in regular conversations with the director of service for openreach (he's been calling me asking for updates!) and we are well on the way to a successful conclusion. The large house with the high REIN transmissions is now well-known to the engineers that have been calling out to the people in our village, and they are waiting for the REIN specialist for this area to get back off time off so they can fully investigate the fault. It's going to be a slow process, but I can start to see the light at the end of the tunnel now. If it's ok, I'll post some updates as and when I get them.

Thanks, all.

[roseway]

That sounds like some real action. Good luck!

[kitz]

Excellent news - I hope this comes to some fruition.

Good luck and please do let us know how it all goes.

[rjpearce]

Since then, I have been in regular conversations with the director of service for openreach (he's been calling me asking for updates!) and we are well on the way to a successful conclusion. The large house with the high REIN transmissions is now well-known to the engineers that have been calling out to the people in our village, and they are waiting for the REIN specialist for this area to get back off time off so they can fully investigate the fault. It's going to be a slow process, but I can start to see the light at the end of the tunnel now. If it's ok, I'll post some updates as and when I get them.

Have you tried calling in at the neighbours house? .. Might be worth a try!

If not just get some rubber gloves and a large cutter to chop their mains supply.. See if that fixes the problem 

Fingers crossed and i hope you get it sorted soon.

How long has your problem been going on for?

I had a problem with my phone line a few year ago, there was an audiable crackle which disrupted my line (Voice & DSL).
It took BT over 6 months to fix (after I got OFCOM involved), when it was eventually resolved OFCOM forced BT to give me £100 compensation for the delay in resolving the problem.
Always worth a try! 

-Rich

[idlewilde]

Reply imminent - just trying to get some additional details before post!

[idlewilde]

Well, where to start?

After multiple visits from various BT peoplemen (I'd give their respective departments, but they were to varied to list!) I have a solid connection!

The REIN fault was diagnosed as a faulty power supply on a Sky box, and the connection's been up for quite a while now. I've rebooted the router a few times due to asking for Virgin to raise the BRAS profile to a fixed 1Mb, but when I called them today (asked for the 'bump' 3 weeks ago, and several shenanigans ensued) they told me 512k was the fastest I could get on this line. I'm not sure, to be honest, so I'll post stats at the end.

Virgin 2nd line tech support were fantastic and helped me raise this as a fault, and after BT's CEO got on the case, their support has been faultless, pardon the pun. The director of service has been a real help, and I find myself (albeit after nearly 9 months of trying!) with an internet connection. It ain't much, but it's stable, so I am thankful for that. I may try to go for an ADSL max service but I'd love to get your feedback, if that's ok.

I'd like to thank you good people for giving me the encouragement to persevere. You're good people.


So, current stats:

Downstream:

Noise Margin:     15.8   dB
Connection Rate:  576  Kbps
Line Attenuation: 63.5  dB
Power:            16.1  dBm
 
SF:               10768207
SF Errors:        1437
Reed Solomon:     0
RS Corrected:     0
RS Un-Corrected:  0
HEC:              441
Errored Seconds:  1079
Severe ES:        0
Interleave Depth: 1

Upstream:

Noise Margin:     20.0  dB
Connection Rate:  288   Kbps
Line Attenuation: 31.5  dB
Power:            11.8  dBm
 
SF:               10769477
SF Errors:        173
Reed Solomon:     0
RS Corrected:     0
RS Un-Corrected:  0
HEC:              49
Errored Seconds:  0
Severe ES:        0
Interleave Depth: 1

Totals:

Total Up Time:
 1 days 2 hours 52 min 26 sec
 
CRC:  1437
LOS:  0
LOF:  0
ES :  1079


Bytes Transferred (ppp0):
  Tx: 1397763688 (1.3 GiB)
  Rx: 2394734262 (2.2 GiB)

[kitz]

Thanks for the update and Im so glad they found and fixed the culprit.
Thats good news
Funny enough Ive heard of another incident of late which involved a neighbours faulty skybox!

>> they told me 512k was the fastest I could get on this line.

That will now depend on your line being stable and what happens in the evenings over the next few days.
If the line remains stable and the SNRM doesnt start dipping then theres hope that the line will be capable of higher speeds.

Your current SRNM of 15dB looks fine and if it stays that way then you should be able to support a 1Mb fixed line.
Due to the length of your line.. things could go a bit more weird on Maxdsl so I think Id be inclined to see how things go for a short while before going for an upgrade.

>> Virgin to raise the BRAS profile to a fixed 1Mb,

bRAS/IP profiles arent applicable to fixed rate lines, so rebooting the router isnt going to make much difference.  I think what I'd do if I were you would be continue to monitor your SNRM for a week or so, making sure that there arent any nasty dips.

>> 512k was the fastest I could get on this line

Back to that again..  unfortunately your line will have been profiled as this due to the problems that have been caused by the REIN issue. 
If your line is stable for a period of time.. then you can go back to your ISP and say.. look there was a REIN fault that has now been fixed and my line is now perfectly stable.. could you at least try putting me on a fixed 1Mb account.

[idlewilde]

>> Virgin to raise the BRAS profile to a fixed 1Mb,

bRAS/IP profiles arent applicable to fixed rate lines, so rebooting the router isnt going to make much difference.  I think what I'd do if I were you would be continue to monitor your SNRM for a week or so, making sure that there arent any nasty dips.

>> 512k was the fastest I could get on this line

Back to that again..  unfortunately your line will have been profiled as this due to the problems that have been caused by the REIN issue. 
If your line is stable for a period of time.. then you can go back to your ISP and say.. look there was a REIN fault that has now been fixed and my line is now perfectly stable.. could you at least try putting me on a fixed 1Mb account.

/smacks head off desk

I should have realised that with a fixed profile, rebooting would not benefit me. In my enthusiasm, I ignored that and merrily rebooted the router in desperate anticipation of a 1Mb profile. I will ask Virgin to retrain the line, and see where that gets me.

Like I say, huge thanks for your input. It is very much appreciated.

[kitz]

>> I should have realised that with a fixed profile, rebooting would not benefit me.
>> I will ask Virgin to retrain the line, and see where that gets me.

NPs ,  its ok... 
I hate to say this, but asking for a retrain wont help either, since a retrain also only works on Max too, because thats a reset of your maxdsl profile. 

What you actually need before your speed can improve is an actual change of BT Wholesale product.
Fixed rate IP stream 512Kb will only ever sync at 512/288 since that figure is set on the DSLAM.

If your ISP moved to DSL Max, this is the product that will change speed each time you do a resync or retrain. 
TBH just right now Im not sure if this would be the right product for your line, since maxdsl doesnt always work too well on some longer lines thats subject to line fluctuations.  If you had been on maxdsl during the REIN issues, you very well would have soon found your line was actually syncing at way less than the current 512kb.  There are many people on long lines who do have problems with Max, and we therefore recommend that their ISP moves them back to a fixed rate line..  hence why monitoring your SNRM own line for a short while now the problem has been fixed may be a good idea.. so that a decission could be made if max or an upgrade to 1Mb fixed would be the way to go.

Have a read of this thread here and you will perhaps understand what we mean.

[idlewilde]

Right, here's the latest! Connection has remained solid (apart from one instance where my daughter kicked out the power suppply to the router!) and the SNR margin has stayed level Stats are below:

ADSL Link     Downstream     Upstream
Connection Speed    576 kbps    288 kbps
Line Attenuation    63.5 db    31.5 db
Noise Margin    17.1 db    20.0 db

SNR Margin averages about 16.5db over the space of the last 5 days, with one small dip down to 12.4db. This was the only dip I've seen.

My question would be if it were worth trying to move to an ADSL Max service, and if so, would I experience *any* speed increase? I have tried to get Virgin to move me from a 512K profile to a 1Mb profile, but I am getting nowhere. Inevitably, after being told (4 times now) that they will move me onto a 1Mb profile, I find myself calling them days later for an update, and them telling me "we can't move you over, as that product no longer exists". They are trying to get me to move to Max product under the premise that it will save me money.

I don't really want to move to a product that could potentially leave me with slower speeds, but I am also curious to find out what sort of speed I could get *if* the SNR Margin stayed betwixt 16 and 17db, and the previous problems remained solved?

Hoping you good people can help.