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Author Topic: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate  (Read 254021 times)

Bald_Eagle1

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #165 on: August 22, 2011, 05:37:03 PM »


Have you tried another phone? Just in-case there is a problem with your phone. That should not interfere with the broadband if the phone is on-hook.
Best of luck Paul, stay with it.


I have tried all that previously. Everything connected, nothing connected, phones connected one at a time.

It all seems fine for a few days, then BANG, off it goes again.

Today's 2nd PSTN engineer has just left.
Unsurprisingly, the phone line was as quiet as the proverbial mouse again.

He suggested that I contact Plusnet again & insist on a broadband engineer's visit that will have to now check EVERYTHING, including the fibre & PSTN ports at the main exchange, the MFD (or something similar sounding), the equipment in the street cabinet etc. etc. etc.

He didn't think it would be a dry joint on the D-side though.

What a P.I.T.A this is turning out to be!

Paul.
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silversurfer44

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #166 on: August 22, 2011, 05:56:08 PM »

Yes, it's enough to make you want to pull your hair out doesn't it?
I must bow to the engineers superior knowledge with regard to the D-side fault.
I watch with bated breath for the out come.
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burakkucat

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #167 on: August 22, 2011, 06:02:10 PM »

Some quick comments from The Cattery.

Don't be disheartened, Mr Eagle. Significant advances in the progress to an ultimate resolution of your unhappiness have been made. You now need a visit by a multi-skilled, "broadband-enabled", OR engineer -- complete with his JDSU and other gubbins. Your CP, PlusNet, are now fully behind you and will do the right thing in requesting such a visit. (Remember to stock up on bacon, butties, for the use of, and chocolate biscuits.) The POTS engineer who visited you this morning seems to have been someone with whom I would have enjoyed a discussion. ;)

Give up the battle now :no: and you will disappoint numerous people here. In that case you can expect the most grumpy of black looks >:( from a certain burakku tomu kyatto, who will ensure that his claws are as needle-sharp as possible -- all ready for a paw-swipe, if you should ever come into swiping range! And you wouldn't like that, would you? ::)

[Edited to correct a grammatical faux pas.]
« Last Edit: August 22, 2011, 07:09:05 PM by burakkucat »
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Bald_Eagle1

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #168 on: August 22, 2011, 06:21:05 PM »

I realise this matter could end up potentially quite time consuming & expensive for someone (not me).

But what a fantastic learning curve it is for all involved (including the service providers), that once resolved will surely set precedents & methods for similar fault finding issues in the future, thus making it really cost effective in the longer term?

I just hope that BT & Plusnet both agree to stick with this & don't give up just yet.

Paul.
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razpag

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #169 on: August 22, 2011, 07:00:52 PM »

What a shame BE. Backing the engineer up here, you do seem to have been visited with one of our better ones, and in fairness to him he's TDR'd your line and probably seen something akin to a roller-coaster (or a Sine wave) on his HAWK measuring back to the PCP. He's then left his signalling kit on the line to make sure it appears in the PCP where his routing suggests it will be. Upon finding a 'double-jumpered' circuit, he (like I and any other decent engineer) would have probably been convinced that this was the fault repaired. He must have put the socket back together when returning back from the PCP, and he will have checked for dial tone. Obviously the crackle wasn't there when he did this.

Some might say he was wrong for not re-TDRing the line. I absolutely say he wouldn't have been expecting to. If you take a mains fed Radio to a repair shop with the plug hanging off, when the chap in the shop puts on a new plug would you have him perform diode,resistor, transistor, capacitor checks ?? Would you heck. You'd turn the radio on and when you hear music, you know it works. Same in this scenario, the engineer has found an absolutely blatant, hard & fast fault that WAS causing massive fault attenuation problems. He's repaired that and basically 'switched the radio back on' and got dial tone. Happy days. Who's to say he didn't carry out the 'Leg balance' test at the PCP that I mentioned earlier in the thread, which would also rule out the need for any further TDR tests ??

Anyhows, this tiny, very intemittent crackle that you get sounds like an E-side type noise. D-side faults tend to progressively get worse quite quickly, but E-sides are under constant air-pressure from the ECP racks in the exchange, in order to keep moisture at bay. It may be a drop in pressure (that can and does happen) that is causing the intermittency of this fault ?? Either way, it shouldn't affect the DLM in such a way as to keep your synch down at 22 Meg. By removing the double jumper your speed should go right back up. 
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razpag

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #170 on: August 22, 2011, 07:03:05 PM »

PS ...... it most definitelt is NOT REIN if it's a 'crackling' noise.
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burakkucat

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #171 on: August 22, 2011, 07:20:58 PM »

I would like to add to Mr Pag's post script that what is talked about in fora, such as this, as REIN is more often than not the more common RFI.

Replacement of the original type one or type two BT-logo'd NTE5/A with a latest OR-logo'd one (containing the common-mode chokes) or the addition of a BT80B-RF3 in place of a BT80A will resolve all but the most severe RFI. (As b*cat has noted, by personal experiment. ;) )
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silversurfer44

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #172 on: August 22, 2011, 07:50:56 PM »

I had an idea I would be brow beaten for my posts ;D
I let the engineer off the hook a few times, however I pointed out that there is nothing like having another check. Yes he repaired a fault, but it is obvious that there is still a fault. Where or what it is obvious I cannot say. Working practices I can say, much to my cost in early days of training and later years before retiring. As a manufacturer of a tea trolley at school I was taught to measure twice and cut once. Just because the guy was professional and thorough doesn't mean to say he is infallible.

I still say best of luck Paul.
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razpag

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #173 on: August 22, 2011, 08:00:19 PM »

I agree with you there SS, re- measure twice, cut once. But unfortunately the same adage cannot be applied to an intemittent fault. I still don't know what another TDR check from the EU's would show ? The engineer could only 'see' something wrong at a distance that measured back at the PCP, and he located and repaired that particular anomoly.

My advice now to BE would be to 'suggest' the next engineer TDR the E-side cable from the PCP back to the exchange.

There was only one bloke who was ever thought to be infallible SS, and they put him on a cross.  ;) ;D
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Bald_Eagle1

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #174 on: August 22, 2011, 09:36:08 PM »

What a shame BE. Backing the engineer up here, you do seem to have been visited with one of our better ones, and in fairness to him he's TDR'd your line and probably seen something akin to a roller-coaster (or a Sine wave) on his HAWK measuring back to the PCP. He's then left his signalling kit on the line to make sure it appears in the PCP where his routing suggests it will be. Upon finding a 'double-jumpered' circuit, he (like I and any other decent engineer) would have probably been convinced that this was the fault repaired. He must have put the socket back together when returning back from the PCP, and he will have checked for dial tone. Obviously the crackle wasn't there when he did this.

Some might say he was wrong for not re-TDRing the line. I absolutely say he wouldn't have been expecting to. If you take a mains fed Radio to a repair shop with the plug hanging off, when the chap in the shop puts on a new plug would you have him perform diode,resistor, transistor, capacitor checks ?? Would you heck. You'd turn the radio on and when you hear music, you know it works. Same in this scenario, the engineer has found an absolutely blatant, hard & fast fault that WAS causing massive fault attenuation problems. He's repaired that and basically 'switched the radio back on' and got dial tone. Happy days. Who's to say he didn't carry out the 'Leg balance' test at the PCP that I mentioned earlier in the thread, which would also rule out the need for any further TDR tests ??

Anyhows, this tiny, very intemittent crackle that you get sounds like an E-side type noise. D-side faults tend to progressively get worse quite quickly, but E-sides are under constant air-pressure from the ECP racks in the exchange, in order to keep moisture at bay. It may be a drop in pressure (that can and does happen) that is causing the intermittency of this fault ?? Either way, it shouldn't affect the DLM in such a way as to keep your synch down at 22 Meg. By removing the double jumper your speed should go right back up.


@ razpag.

I forgot to mention that I brought up the lack of another TDR test from my home when the 2nd engineer visited this afternoon.
He said that the 1st engineer had actually done a TDR test while he was down at the PCP & classed the line as clear.
Maybe that's what he meant when he said another TDR test wasn't needed from my home.

FYI, my IP Profile did increase to 21680 K for a short while after the 1st engineer left, but it is currently at only 12065 K.

I wish I could have seen the effect of of the removal of the double jumpering on my attenuation, as a comparison to when it was quite recently tested via the JDSU.

At the very least, I now know my actual Line Length & its route, which finally confirms beyond any doubt that I should be able to achieve & sustain a sync rate of around 35 Mb (ish), with downloads a little lower than that.

The 1st engineer had a quick read through the notes & recommendations you had so kindly provided, verbally ticking them off as done, apart from the obvious broadband aspects, which he said he would haved loved to have done for me.

I wasn't knocking the efforts of the 1st engineer, I apologise if my post came across that way.
In fact I intended the complete opposite as he couldn't have been more helpful, keen to locate the fault, & informative.

Indeed the phone line was quiet when he left, my IP Profile had increased from when he first arrived, he had dealt with an obvious fault. What more could he have done, especially as the actual intermittent cause may well now prove to be elsewhere?

There probably isn't that much left to eliminate now..........is there?
I suppose that sometimes you are lucky & land on the cause at the outset & sometimes it is the very last thing in the elimination process.

Silly question time now:-
The double jumpering couldn't possibly have been a previous well-meant effort to increase the poundage of my line to compensate for length, corrosion etc. could it? Is this ever done as a quick fix by BT, a bit like bonding 2 lines back in the old days to give a sync rate of was it 128K on dialup? (just trying to think laterally here - maybe I shouldn't!)
If so, could the removal of the double jumpering have actually increased my attenuation by leaving 800m or so of "loose end" if it was still connected somewhere near my home?
It does seem strange that my IP profile didn't shoot all the way up again & is now in fact much worse than it was this morning.

As we all know, there is absolutely no way that we users can obtain any information from the current BT modem. What a strange situation that is.

Paul.
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burakkucat

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #175 on: August 22, 2011, 10:57:32 PM »

Quote
There probably isn't that much left to eliminate now..........is there?

Just the E-side of your POTS metallic path, I would say.

Having looked at your "Silly Question Time Now" section, I would not expect that to be the case. However, let's see what Mr Pag has to say on that subject.

(P.S. I now have an image, named "Bald_Eagle1_Closet.jpg", stored on my desktop.  :P  )
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waltergmw

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #176 on: August 23, 2011, 12:04:25 AM »

@ everybody,

Please forgive the reiteration. I hope we can all agree this fault seems to be overworking Murphy's law to the maximum !

1.  It does seem that an engineer with a JDSU or EXFO is even more necessary now.

2.  Perhaps the engineer might just try cutting the E side cable and observing a resync of Paul's modem?

3.  Given that the remote testing must have been done from the PCP rather than the FTTC (as the engineers are not FTTC trained) there still remain the two short 100 pr link cables plus the IDC connector blocks and the still unknown circuitry behind them. I do wish we had a better (any real ?) understanding of that circuitry. In the absence of that data perhaps the engineer might change the two corresponding pairs in those cables and have the cct configuration data changed to recognise the new channel if that is needed? (I'm assuming that the routing data does not rely on the MAC data within the modem?)

4.  I expect RP will give me a rollicking but, if all else fails, the low-tec solution might be to apply a large club hammer to each pole in turn ! However, as we believe there is a possibility of aluminium being involved, the cure might be worse than the disease - at least for BT Openreach. I suppose a more acceptable approach might be to swap the D side pair along the entire length if there are sufficient spares, although I have observed that can be a very time-consuming exercise. (Over a month in the snow and where traffic lights were deployed last winter !)

Kind regards,
Walter

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burakkucat

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #177 on: August 23, 2011, 12:43:38 AM »

@Walter,

I think you are possibly too far ahead with trying to think of all the possible fault scenarios and possible solutions. Knowing what we all now understand regarding this issue and if I were the relevant OR engineer assigned to the task, I would:

(1) At "The Aerie", disconnect the incoming pair from the NTE5/A and perform TDR towards the PCP.
(2) At the PCP, disconnect the D-side tie-pair to the DSLAM and perform TDR back to "The Aerie".
(3) Still at the PCP disconnect the E-side tie-pair to the DSLAM and perform TDR back to the exchange.
(4) At the exchange, disconnect the E-side from . . . er, it's not too clear in my mind . . . perhaps the MDF and perform TDR back to the PCP.

Analyse the four results so obtained. If necessary:

(5) Return to the PCP and repeat TDR to the exchange, c.f. (3), now with the exchange disconnected.
(6) Return to "The Aerie" and repeat TDR to the PCP, c.f. (1), now with the D-side completely disconnected.

If all six traces show nothing abnormal, then . . .  :'(
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Ezzer

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #178 on: August 23, 2011, 01:32:52 AM »

The old 128k connection I presume you are refering to what was known as home highway. its 2 channels of an ISDN signal at 64k each. Combined they give 128k, but if you use the voice telephony it occupies one channel while you still have a net connection at 64k on the other.

This is before the days of dsl when the other option was a 56k dial up where you cannot use the phone and net at the same time and typicaly get between 36-48k. Can everyone remember that ? When the norm was 36-48k !

ISDN was referd to as mid band in europe. Would you belive even in the mid 2000's in the states isdn was still classified as broadband so some figures refering to the numbers of people on broadband during those years can be relatively misleading.

I saw your point about the 2nd TDR test and that it wasnt a slight aimed at the engineer. From the customers point of view you dont get to see when the engineer is running tests on the line from locations other than your nte. The TDR often needs to be tried from a location closer to a fault in order to be able to see it. It becomes almost 2nd nature to have a look whenever you intervene in the network. because at the end of the day if you can get in a situation of being able to go "oh hello ! that looks like it"  ;) rather than "Theres something lurking here, now show your self"  >:(
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razpag

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Re: FTTC - Distance from the Cabinet - Realistic speed estimate
« Reply #179 on: August 23, 2011, 07:31:19 AM »

I too know you weren't having a pop at the engineer BE, it was SS my sarcastic post was aimed at. ;)

As Ezzer has explained above, Channel Bonding was applied to ISDN/Highway units if requested. I think you are on about connecting 2 full pairs together (4 wires) on the D-side network in order to give a greater poundage ?? If you are, this is a massive no-no, the AC Balance would be extremely low as it would regard it as a 'split pair'.

I've only 'doubled up' on PSTN lines that were reporting faint ringing.speech and were (from memory) around 13Km from the exchange. I don't work that patch anymore and my poor memory is fading. :(
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