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[dayvh]

Just an update, after 4 days of trying to get on remote chat with Virgin I finally managed to get on this morning.
This is how it's gone so far...

10:05 (ME) If it's not going to be fixed any time soon I was wondering if its possible to have my profile switched to one of the new fixed rate equivalents
10:08 (Virgin) There is no fixed rate profiles anymore. With high ping rates for online gaming, we dont support this on our service.
10:09 (ME) There are two new equivalents for maxdsl though
10:09 (ME) BT IPStream Max Capped Rate Profile 2000
10:09 (ME) and BT DataStream Max Capped Rate Profile 2000
10:11 (Virgin) I will request this for you and see what can be done about it.
10:15 (Virgin) The time frame is unsure at the moment as I will not know untill the request has been looked at and I have been informed about it. Once this has been done and I have a response I will give you a telephone call.

[jeffbb]

Hi
Well at least this one seemed to listen 

Regards Jeff

[dayvh]

Nah he never even entered it into the system then he took the rest of the day off ahaha.
After 6 hours of waiting for a phone call I logged back on to try and get a rough time frame of the request and the new operator I was assigned said there wasn't even a record of a request on the system or on my account.
This new operator seems to be a little sympathetic to my cause so let's see what he says.
Virgin are basically telling me that they don't provide DataStream anymore and than the BT IPStream Max Capped Rate Profile 2000 profile probably wouldn't even make a difference..

Regarding the BT IPStream Max Capped Rate Profile 2000;
15:28 (Virgin) I dont think we can do it, I certainly have not heard of it but I will make a call and check.
15:28 (ME) It's in the BTw Max Customer Handbook
15:28 (ME) and is also mentioned in BT SIN 485 page 16
15:31 (Virgin) I'm sorry but we cant offer that. I have just checked.
15:31 (ME) Could I ask why or could we talk about some of the methods you mentioned that might fix my connection?
15:33 (Virgin) We only have certain BT Wholsale products available to us. Currently Max is the only one we use. We cant provision that type connection.

Update: After an hour we came a conclusion after I mentioned large amounts of incoming packets didn't seem like they were being received fast enough, I asked if a mix of reduced speed from peak times mixed with my extension that runs the filter from downstairs to up could be the cause, it didn't seem very logical as 2MB ran fine 24/7 and the 8MB runs perfect after midnight til early morning but we decided it would be worth me lugging all my stuff downstairs and plugging directly into the wall.
,
Update: I plugged into the Test Socket downstairs behind the lower plate of the main socket and my internet is actually WORSE!

[kitz]

Since they have moved you over to IPStream Max..  theres no reason why they cant offer you BTw IPStream Max Capped Rate profile 2000.

Basicially its the same product that youre already on - but they simply request BTw to cap it at 2000 to improve stability.  The BTw Max customer handbook is all about the Max product which they are claiming to use.   

However..   from looking at your line... this doesnt appear to be a stability problem with BTw.. (and probably why they wont request it)..   it seems far more likely that its problems within Virgins own Central pipes and their capacity. :/

[dayvh]

The trouble is they aren't going to admit that..
Events have taken a turn and I'm on the phone with them now.

Update: I basically gave up and couldn't be bothered with them anymore so my mother rang up and went all "complaints" against them, got her notepad out and started taking names.
Clearly the guy on the phone sat up straight and tried to solve my issues, he's filed a fault and passed it on to second line BT or something and ran literally every test he could from where he was sat.
If the second line people can't find a fault then they will pass it on to the third line and apparently someone will be sent out. It supposedly takes 7 to 10 days to complete the second line process and I will hear from them via email or phone. If it reaches the third line and someone is sent out and the fault appears to be my fault, IE a filter extension or something then I could be charged a call out fee.

[orainsear]

Update: I plugged into the Test Socket downstairs behind the lower plate of the main socket and my internet is actually WORSE!

Can you explain how it is worse; using the test socket should make things better because it removes your house wiring from the equation.

Also have you tried the f8lure ping test that kitz mentioned?

[dayvh]

I'm not actually sure if it's made it that much worse. After I switched into the test socket and reconnected I was using my ventrilo server based out of Amsterdam to watch my ping. This has been spiking between 50ms and 3000+ms for the last 2 hours. I think this is mainly because for some reason It's having to go quite a few hops to Amsterdam? Pings reported below are from WinMTR but Ventrilo reports them much higher.

I did try the f8lure ping tests but when the tests started it kept saying the destination was offline, no matter how many times I reconnected my connection to get a new IP.
I didn't forget to start a new test with my new IP as the focus so it definitely wasn't an error on my end. The only form of security I even use is Windows Firewall, I use no advanced software or hardware firewalls as they tend to get in my way with configuration and notifications when I'm trying to get something important done. Plus as I mentioned previously if I ever do have security issues with viruses and stuff I generally just format.

Code: [Select]

|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
|                                      WinMTR statistics                                   |
|                       Host              -   %  | Sent | Recv | Best | Avrg | Wrst | Last |
|------------------------------------------------|------|------|------|------|------|------|
|                   No response from host -  100 |  229 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
|bmly-core-1b-ge-016-0.network.virginmedia.net -    0 |  228 |  228 |   31 |   61 |  125 |   46 |
|  bre-bb-b-as3-0.network.virginmedia.net -    0 |  228 |  228 |   31 |   71 |  266 |   47 |
| telc-ic-1-as0-0.network.virginmedia.net -    0 |  228 |  228 |   46 |   60 |  109 |   47 |
|                   ldn-b2-link.telia.net -    0 |  228 |  228 |   31 |   60 |  110 |   47 |
|                  ldn-bb1-link.telia.net -    0 |  228 |  228 |   32 |   68 |  235 |   46 |
|                  adm-bb1-link.telia.net -    0 |  228 |  228 |   46 |   71 |  140 |   47 |
|                   adm-b2-link.telia.net -    1 |  228 |  227 |   46 |   68 |  141 |   63 |
|               adm-evo-i2-link.telia.net -    0 |  228 |  228 |   46 |   72 |  157 |   47 |
|  leaseweb-ic-126777-adm-evo.c.telia.net -    0 |  228 |  228 |   62 |   81 |  157 |   62 |
|              te1-1.sr1.esy.leaseweb.net -    0 |  228 |  228 |   62 |   84 |  281 |   63 |
|                            85.17.59.205 -    1 |  228 |  227 |   62 |   80 |  141 |   63 |
|________________________________________________|______|______|______|______|______|______|
   WinMTR - 0.8. Copyleft @2000-2002 Vasile Laurentiu Stanimir  ( stanimir@cr.nivis.com )
Update: I just had some pretty odd packet loss not to mention my ADSL line just randomly lost connection and I had to unplug the cable from the back of my modem and plug it back in again to initialize the connection, is it possible they're already trying to sort out my line?
The trace also gets worse and even hits 7% packet loss at one point.
Also when my ADSL line initialized and Windows gives you the popup saying what speed it's connected at. Vista always used to say 7.6Mbps, XP usually says 7.4Mbps but just now after reconnecting It's dropped to 7.2Mbps?

Code: [Select]

|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
|                                      WinMTR statistics                                   |
|                       Host              -   %  | Sent | Recv | Best | Avrg | Wrst | Last |
|------------------------------------------------|------|------|------|------|------|------|
|                   No response from host -  100 |  477 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |    0 |
|bmly-core-1b-ge-016-0.network.virginmedia.net -    2 |  477 |  468 |   31 |   55 |  125 |   47 |
|  bre-bb-b-as3-0.network.virginmedia.net -    2 |  477 |  468 |   31 |   62 |  266 |  125 |
| telc-ic-1-as0-0.network.virginmedia.net -    2 |  477 |  468 |   31 |   55 |  109 |   47 |
|                   ldn-b2-link.telia.net -    2 |  477 |  468 |   31 |   55 |  110 |   47 |
|                  ldn-bb1-link.telia.net -    2 |  477 |  467 |   31 |   62 |  235 |   47 |
|                  adm-bb1-link.telia.net -    2 |  477 |  467 |   46 |   65 |  140 |   46 |
|                   adm-b2-link.telia.net -    3 |  477 |  465 |   46 |   62 |  141 |   47 |
|               adm-evo-i2-link.telia.net -    3 |  477 |  465 |   46 |   65 |  250 |   47 |
|  leaseweb-ic-126777-adm-evo.c.telia.net -    2 |  477 |  467 |   62 |   74 |  157 |   62 |
|              te1-1.sr1.esy.leaseweb.net -    2 |  477 |  467 |   62 |   79 |  281 |   78 |
|                            85.17.59.205 -    2 |  476 |  466 |   62 |   73 |  141 |   63 |
|________________________________________________|______|______|______|______|______|______|
   WinMTR - 0.8. Copyleft @2000-2002 Vasile Laurentiu Stanimir  ( stanimir@cr.nivis.com )

[orainsear]

Can you post a tracert from you to one of the Dutch game servers during a time when there is poor latency?  In all likelihood Virgin is suffering congestion, however there was an issue a while back where Zen had a problem with latency to Dutch servers, particularly for WoW, and I think the problem was something to do with an issue with the France Telecom or Telia network.

[dayvh]

Dutch servers are usually fine, this is an error within this past 2 hours of the latest phone call with Virgin technical support. Ironically he said it sounds like my modem might be the problem and since then my ADSL line oddly lost sync and dropped to 7.2Mbps line rate. In the last 29 minutes of connection I've had 29 Losses of Signal, 29 Losses of Framing and 3 Losses of Link..
I hate the internet now ;d

[kitz]

I pressume you mean that after reconnecting to the master socket that this made your latency worse... NOT your line stats?

Each time you connect to Virgin, there is a strong chance you will connect via a different Central Pipe (what Virgin call a BAM and the only ISP that calls them BAMs).  As mentioned in one of my earlier posts reconnecting can sometimes mean that you will get on a better Central..  but on this instance you may have connected to one that was even busier than the previous one.... which would fully account for the increase in latency times.

You can check which of their BAMs you connect to from the 2nd hop of your tracerts.

>> I did try the f8lure ping tests

f8lure normally requires a static IP.. however if you sign up with somewhere like dyndns, then you should be able to use that to set up a test.

Ive just been able to set up a new f8lure test for a dyndns name... simply type in your dyndns address rather than your IP.  eg username.chosen_dyndnsname.com. 
It took about 5-10 mins for f8lure to update to the new account name but its now showing as live and graphing ok.

Dont forget because youre on a dynamic IP youll also need an update client running on your PC such as one of these.  Must admit I havent tried that particular one as Im on a static IP

[dayvh]

I made an A record on a domain I own and I've been assigning my IP to that and I've had no luck with f8lure working with it, even when I use my actual IP without a dns it doesn't seem to work, It's actually rather odd.
Also you're correct on what I meant before, after connecting back into the master socket I had terrible ping from the "BAM" I was on and I reconnected three times to get a different "BAM" and had no better luck which I guess would indicate a temporary problem somewhere else down the line.
I actually had to keep reconnecting the other weekend because the first two hops on all my tracerts kept timing out to east coast US servers.

[kitz]

>> I made an A record on a domain I own and I've been assigning my IP to that and I've had no luck with f8lure working with it, even when I use my actual IP without a dns it doesn't seem to work, It's actually rather odd.

I just created an account at dyndns..  then used that when setting up the f8lure test by inputting kitz."chosenName".com

From the screen cap below you can see its been running fine since I set up the new test account at about 6pm earlier.

[attachment deleted by admin]

[kitz]

Also you're correct on what I meant before, after connecting back into the master socket I had terrible ping from the "BAM" I was on and I reconnected three times to get a different "BAM" and had no better luck which I guess would indicate a temporary problem somewhere else down the line.

Either that or all their BAMs are busy - just some more than others. 

[dayvh]

Well everything seems to be alot worse than it was now, as I previously said the last phone call to Virgin he passed my problems on as a fault to second line BT and he thinks the problem is either something local, on my line or my actual modem. Approx 10 minutes after the phone call my line lost sync and I had to reconnect my modem to reinitialise the ADSL line, at this point it reconnected with a lower line rate than usual and ever since then my internet has actually been horrible.
I haven't been able to run any BTw speed tests as all I get is what I pasted below in the snippet; Please note that I'm inputting my telephone number correctly and I've masked it for obvious reasons. BTw speed tests were working fine previously.

Code: [Select]

Performance Tester was not able to find all the network details required for telephone number:xxxxxxxxxxx.

Please check that it is the correct telephone number for your service, and if not try again. If you believe it is the correct number for your service then please raise this as a fault with your service provider.
My ping is now spiking 24/7 to everything, be it ventrilo, a game or even a tracert and the numbers coming back even ranged above 90,000ms yesterday.
He said it would take 7-10days for second line to even look at my fault so why did all this happen right after the call?

I can't get on 50% of websites I'm trying to and my actual download speed at 11pm is jumping from 50kb/s up to 700kb/s and back at stupidly fast intervals. It's like my internet is confused ;p

[orainsear]

Can you post your stats again?