Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[emsef]

Hi all! Long time lurker. I could have sworn I'd made some posts in the past!

6 years ago I installed a HG612 to match the Huawei cabinet (Germoe #9) that my broadband comes from. I'm FTTC.

All has been very well until recently, when I noticed access to some sites (eg. archive.org) was very slow and would even timeout in some instances. Connections would take 20-30 seconds rather than one or two. I did a trace route and things were slowing down in the BT network. I've also tried my spare HG612 and it exhibits the same issues.

As a hunch, I plugged in my BT Smart Hub 2 (the most recent hardware they've sent me) and the affected sites had no issues, and browsing was generally faster. I'm now using a TP-Link W9970 only as a modem, effectively as a replacement for my HG612.

So, my question is why would the HG612 stop working as it used to if my cabinet is still the same? Has something else changed I'm not aware of?

Thanks!

[Alex Atkin UK]

There's not really any way it could impact specific sites.  The most likely answer is it was a temporary issue that happened to fix itself at the same time you changed hardware, or its an issue on a specific gateway and you happened to hit on one unaffected.

[emsef]

Thanks, but it's definitely not a temporary problem.

It is ongoing, which is why I had to find a workaround and stumbled across the issue being with the HG612. I changed hardware because of the problem.

The BT Smart Hub 2 does not have the problem.
The TP-Link W9970 does not have the problem.

I can plug either of the HG612 back in and the issue reappears. So I can reproduce it on demand.

And I can reproduce the traceroute, and accesses/timeouts to specific sites.

The gateway issue could be a reason, but only if plugging in the HG612 landed on the same problematic gateway every time. Which feels like a bit of a reach. That said, I'll keep track of their numbers.

ps: funny that the site says I've "just arrived" even though I've been a member for 10 years 

[tubaman]

A long shot, but did you also change the power supply when you swapped the HG612 as dying ones have been known to cause odd things to happen.

I think the 'just arrived' bit is because you've only made two posts despite being a member for a long time.

[burakkucat]

I think the 'just arrived' bit is because you've only made two posts despite being a member for a long time.

Yes, that is the case. 

[kitz]

I think the 'just arrived' bit is because you've only made two posts despite being a member for a long time.

Yes, the software bases it on post count.  iirc by default it was set at 20, but after looking at some stats I've amended it to 10.

-----
ETA  b*cat also replied whilst I was making changes.

[meritez]

Why does this sound like the 2013 bug that was affecting hg612s
https://aastatus.net/1854

[emsef]

A long shot, but did you also change the power supply when you swapped the HG612 as dying ones have been known to cause odd things to happen.

I can't say for sure, maybe not, but I'll try again for certain next time I take the network down.

Why does this sound like the 2013 bug that was affecting hg612s
https://aastatus.net/1854

Curious! Those symptoms do sound similar.

I did record packet loss of ~10% during my tests.

I'm not using VPN or tunneling as far as I'm aware. I'm using a tool to called ia to upload to internet archive (uploads go via S3) so I'd have to look at how exactly that works: TCP/UDP.

Other traffic at the time was unaffected.

If it is that same/similar issue I don't think BT will be interested given the HG612 is old/unsupported hardware, right? How many of them are still in use?

At the end of the day I'm happy to go with a new modem given that I'm seeing better speeds. I'm just curious as to why this would happen "out of the blue".

[g3uiss]

Lots and lots of HG612 in service. They may be old but hard to beat them.

[tubaman]

...
If it is that same/similar issue I don't think BT will be interested given the HG612 is old/unsupported hardware, right? ...

True, but assuming you haven't already just reflash it with unlocked firmware as I'm not aware of any issues of this nature with that.

[dee.jay]

Lots and lots of HG612 in service. They may be old but hard to beat them.

Agreed - I have a 10 1/2 year old one on my Sky line that came with Sky Fibre Pro way back when. It is still chugging away without any problems. The ZyXEL's get a good name around here but I tried them and found them very disappointing in terms of sync rate/performance.

[digbey]

Similar results here, I have an HG612 running with Plusnet for nearly 10 years without any problem. I've also tried several recommended ZyXELs with worse results.

[tubaman]

... The ZyXEL's get a good name around here but I tried them and found them very disappointing in terms of sync rate/performance.

T
The Zyxels, especially the versions with the front end filter, seem to perform consistently well on the majority of lines, but are certainly not the best syncing on every line as you have found.

[Alex Atkin UK]

T
The Zyxels, especially the versions with the front end filter, seem to perform consistently well on the majority of lines, but are certainly not the best syncing on every line as you have found.

Indeed, nothing worked as well as Lantiq on my DSLAM.

[Starman]

My faithful HG612 has been boxed away following FTTP install couple of weeks ago just in case I move in a few years and FTTP is not available at a prospective new address.