POOR PRODUCT, BAD SERVICE

[Jdatkin]

I wont bore you to tears with the endless issues which include being cut off in error in January, Reconnected, then disconnected again because someone forgot to cancel the original re-provide order etc, or when it took BT 5 days to realise the problem with my broadband was because they had put 2 usernames on one dsl line.

And i wont mention beyond this point the incident when the tried to tel me that a fault was actualy because i dont have a phoneline!!!, even though they had called me on that very BT phone!!

ANYWAY - THIS MONTHS PROBLEMS................ 

I regraded my ADSL2 to Infinity 80/20 (Busines) a couple of days go. Was estimated to get 56 download and 18 upload, so chose the Infinity 80dl/20ul. At installation we got 30mb download which was quite a way short of what we was expecting!!

Have had problems with it dropping out and demanding new usernames etc.

BT sent an engineer out yesterday to check it, but he admitted he was actually a telephony engineer and not broadband trained!!! GO FIGURE!

He was very nice and spent hours on it but couldnt offer much resolution.

At one point he spoke to technical dept, and they said it could be that the Business hub 3 may be incompatible!!!!! AGAIN-GO FIGURE!!

One curious thing is that it has period where it refuses to work, giving just 0.3 - 0.7mb speed!!, BUT, if you turn off the router, then reboot it................

run a speedtest when the Broadband light is still ORANGE, i get speeds of 50mb-80mb !!!!!!!

As soon as the broadband light turns from orange to blue, the speed hits a brick wall, drops to 15mb - 30mb!

Also i usually use a simple gigabit ethernet switch (8port) from the GigE socket of the Business hub 3, then plug the pcs etc into that and its always worked great, but since we went infinity you cant connect through the switch?

Any Suggestions!!

Have tried calling BT - WAITED 2hr 15min to be answered only for the lady to tell me that 30mb way the best id get, even though there own tests suggested 56mb, and i have had speedtests show 50-80mb, but only when the Broadband light is Orange!!

She basicaly said its better than what you had on ADSL and thats that!!

I pointed out that i had opted for a 80/20 Infinity, but if i was only going to get 30 then i should be on the 40/10, but she said i should change as it could effect my speed!!, even though she said the max i would get would be 30mb!, it makes no sense at all.

I also questioned the fact that the original engineer that intalled the infinity mentioned that it was on a '40mb bearer' or '40mb pair' or something like that. When i pointed out that i had gone for the 80mb not the 40mb, he just said that he only does what the laptop tells him, and i would have to ring up.

I called, they just said that ' you should be on a 80mb connection', i pointed out i knew full well that i had asked for an 80mb, and that i was paying for an 80mb connection, but could they tell me why the engineer said it was a 40mb, and can someone actually physically check it!

She didnt know!

I asked the engineer the same thing about if i was on a 40mb or 80mb connection, and he said it seems i could be on a 40, which would explain the much slower than expeted speeds, but he didnt know how to check it physically as he is not a broadband engineer!

ALL BT STAFF JUST KEEP SAYING THEY JUST DONT KNOW!, BUT TRY TO FOBB ME OFF BY SAYING, ITS MUCH BETTER THAN YOUR PREVIOUS ADSL

I think its all shocking, and im really considering cancelling the planned upgrades of the other 2 ADSL line to Infinity.

IF ANYONE CAN HELP, PLEASE TRY!!

[Jdatkin]

All the pics were not selected as private, all as public.

Ive just looked at all my available forum pictures, and it appears that they are "AWAITING APPROVAL'!!!

Come on MODS, you can approve them, theres nothing nasty ot revealing on their, nothing that im not happy to be seen by all anyway!!

WAITING NOW!!!

[Seraphsailor]

I can see 'em!          I can see 'em!

[tetrapackage]

I am just thinking, where are those pictures anyway?

[Jdatkin]

Where are the pictures as in Geogrphically??

Brinsley, Nottinghamshire, Fed from the Langley Mill Exhcange

[MHC]

I have been thinking about this and the images posted.     You say you are 1100m from the cabinet which suggests a line length that could be up to 1200m.   At that distance I would expect something less than 40Mbps - even on the 17a profile and an upto 80Mbps option - obviously there are some very good lines which will support more.      

Testiung on good quality lines shows that at 4000 feet - the maximum sync rate is around 45Mb - take into account line qualuity, noise, crosstalk, &c and overheads and it soon drops below 40Mbps.  On the upstream,  10Mbps is about the maximum too.

Then there are questions about where the line runs - is it close to non-resisdential places, offices, industry, schools &c?  And how much is overground or underground?

How many others have been added to your cabinet since your install?  It can cause increased crosstalk.

Your first sync could have been when the background noise was very low, but as that has changed the sync could drop.   Or did you mishear the result?

[Jdatkin]

Hi MHC, thanks for the reply.

the first third, or may upto the first 50% of the run from the cabinet is a residential area, although its not very dense.

About half of the residential area is sing sided only - by this i mean it has houses on one side of the road - just in case it help answer your questions!

Im not sure, but it think that maybe the first half is underground.

Once its out of the residential area, its into a very rural area, this makes up 1/2 - 2/3 of the total run.

This run is mainly overhead, with perhaps 25% of this run underground.

From the point where it leaves the residential area there are 4 lines which run from this, 2 of which have internet.

There are still only 2 infinity connections from the cabinet, i checked again with the engineer when he came a few days ago.

As for noise, even the engineer commented that it was particularly good, he said 'its as close to absolute silence as anyone is likel to get', so i dont think its a noise problem.

I did at one point wonder wether i had mis heard about it being on 40 to begin with, but i have made sure every engineer checks it whenever one comes out.

I can say with total confidence that it has never been at 80mb at the cabinet, it started at 40, the highest test at the cabinet showed 44 on an engineer test.

As mentioned previously i can get 50-60mb running a speed test when the broadband light is orange on the hub after restart, (before authentication is complete), but once thatlight turns blue, were back down to 20mb!

Other tests i have run show, 0% packet loss, 23ms ping, with 0-1ms jitter, Pingtest shows the result as 'A'

Although i realise that this test show very little, but it may be of use.

SUGGESTIONS PLEASE as bt are now trying to give it the old excuse of maximum for the line rubbish!

[MHC]

Noise - two versions.  The first was always referred to as "in-band" and is within the audio frequency band and it can be heard (or not).  The second - "out of band" is outside the audio band but now sits within the DSL/ADSL/VDSL/SDSL band and can never be heard.  This noise is cause by electrical inteference, from the atmosphere, from electical appliances, from cars, from the sun and more ...   Factories can be a real problem with large electrical machinery - I came across on case where a company had abysmal performance during te wirking day, but it was great overnight - the problem was one of their own machines.

With the "highest test at the cabinet" how did the technician achieve that?    Putting his tester on yor line at the cabinet should ALWAYS give 80Mb sync with an indication of 120Mb capability.    There is no line to attenuate or pick up noise.

Which speedtest are you using?

Have a look at teh PM I am about to send.

[Jdatkin]

Hi MHC,

              they engineers tested on 2 occasions for 'RAIN', and confirmed that they didnt detect any, if that helps.

When they tested at the cabinet, they disconnected my line altogether and plugged into the cabinet.

44mb was the highest, then engineers said it should be 80mb, the helpdesk, techinical & all other 'call centre' staff keep telling me that the reason its slower at the cabinet is that the line from the cabinet to my premises cant handle the speed, so it reduces until its stable.

JUST been told a few minutes ago that my speed at the cabinet today is 29mb, again due to the line being unable to handle faster speeds.

They have agreed today that the line length is not over 3km, they said 1.4 from the DP, as i said the other day i measured it at 1.1km from the cabinet.

Theyre are now adament that its the copper line after the cabinet that cant handle any faster speed that what i have now.

hey are now talking about downgrading the connection to a 40mb/10mb, but they have said that my speed could slow even further - GO FIGURE!!!

[MHC]

It is actually REIN !

So, plugging in at te cabinet and getting 44Mb - with your line disconnected is odd.   I will ask a BT Technician I know to see what he has to say.

1.4 km >>> 4600 feet which points to around 35000kbps in ideal conditions.   But still does not explain the at cabinet figures and why you get the drops.    I would expect it to be stable with maybe +/- 5% maximum say 32Mb +/- 1Mb over time.

Moving to a 40/10 will NOT change the speeds - all that happens is that a cap is placed on te line and you still use all of the tones that can be used.

[Jdatkin]

Im sure the engineers disconnected the line and tested the speed at the cabinet to make absolutely sure tat they knew for certain what the spped was at the cabinet.

I mentioned all of this today to the infinity helpdesk lady, and she said that the reason that the speed was not tested at any higher than this at the cabinet was due to the 'system' knowing that the copper part of the line could not handle those speeds, so it wouldnt try it up at 80mb as it knew already that it couldnt handle it at 44mb even, so from there it staerted to drop the speed until it found a speed at which it was 'happy'!

Ive just checke BT site AGAIN, and it still says that my speed range is 56mb download, and 18mb uploadn - I WISH!!!

i feel like they just dont know what the problem is, and are know resorting to the old 'Your line wont support it' routine.

They also said that as long as my phone line is ok, and i can recieve calls they arent obliged to look at it or treat it as a fault!

So they sell me a metre, Give me half a meter and theres no fault!!!!!

ONE THING I KNOW FOR CERTAIN - It Aint My Fault But Im Still Paying For Something Im Not Getting!!