Intermittant internet

ericmark · 17 Jul 2018

The router shows internet connected, the tablet says lan connected but no internet, the PC (XP) works some times, the laptop (Vista) fails, and Post Office says if my fault over £100 call out charge.

I was with Sky and everything worked OK, mother died and the CoOp probate stopped payment to Sky which was cut off. I had no say in this.

So no phone or internet for 2 months and trying to get all set up again. If no internet would not worry, but at moment typing this OK. Then next time nothing.

blup · 17 Jul 2018

Upgrade your PC/operating system, and take up Sky disconnection issue with Co-op if they were aware your mother was paying your subscription and did not consult you about terminating it.

Good luck.

Blup,

ericmark · 18 Jul 2018

It seems the old PC with XP works the best, the newer one with Vista some times, and the tablet and phones with the fastest processors never. May be if I can find a windows 95 PC I would be OK!

It is likely down to speed, even the phone dropped out yesterday in the middle of talking with my daughter.

However my old house easy, I open the bottom of the open reach master socket and that disconnectes any internal wiring in the house, and I try the router in that socket, if it works then something internal, if not then external, I can also plug in my LAN tester and check internal lines. However mothers old house is all hard wired, there is no ovious master socket, there is a hard wired connection to the little box marked GPO and I think there are 5 phone sockets, non which seem orignal and heath robinson wiring between them, been like that for years and internet was very good in this house before Sky was disconnected.

The bill should the fault be found to be internal seems silly when I have no way of knowing what sockets are BT and which were added by my dad, and since the phones work, they do what they were designed to do, there was no broad band when they were fitted.

Belle427 · 18 Jul 2018

I’ve read of issues with certain routers and phone socket wiring so it’s one of the first things I’d look at.
A right pita but may be worth disconnecting all but the master if you can identify the incoming line.

ericmark · 19 Jul 2018

There are multi sockets with GPO or BT written on them, not a clue which is the master socket.

ericmark · 19 Jul 2018

Up date, the internet access has improved but still well down from when with Sky. We have not seen Open Reach it does seem they have done something however. The odd thing is unplugging the LAN cables to repeater and hubs has improved the wireless connection which until last night was non existent.

Had we not had Sky standard broadband in this house with better connection than Sky fibre in our old house I would have blaimed the house. Why the hard wired connections should affect the wireless I don't know, we were not using the wired LAN it was just connected.

flameport · 19 Jul 2018

ericmark said:
LAN cables to repeater and hubs

If that is a wireless repeater, has it been reconfigured for the new service, or left with the old Sky settings?
Possible that it is causing interference.

ericmark said:
the old PC with XP works the best,

Insecure, don't use that for anything. All support for XP ended over 4 years ago.
Vista is no better - support for Vista ended in April 2017.

ericmark · 22 Jul 2018

In case the hard wired to wireless repeater was causing a problem it has been disconnected, however no change still no wireless internet.

I rang and complained and they said £140 charge if OpenReach find the fault is within my property, I said this is silly it should be up to the OpenReach socket is the responsibility of OpenReach as I an not to fiddle with any telephone wires up to that socket so how can I be responsible for some thing I am not allowed to access?

They said there is a master socket and up to that is OpenReach, after that is mine, I said there is no master socket, as yet it has not been fitted, so they are now going to send OpenReach to fit a master socket, but still say if they find there is a master socket, then I will be charged.

After the phone call the internet which is hard wired started to work, I get 8.6 Mbps download and 0.83 Mbps upload but the wireless still fails, so phoned them back and said since wired works and only wireless fails it must be the router at fault, however still odd as I can use router wireless to connect to wired computers hard drives, but not internet, however it still points to a router problem.

They to start with agreed, and said they would send out a new router, however then they phoned me back and said they wanted OpenReach to visit first and fit a master socket, So I now take it since I cancelled and they insisted on sending OpenReach then I am not going to be charged, does not matter what they find?

However now got to wait until Friday before OpenReach can visit.

Retesting wireless from PostOffice router it now works, thinking maybe my LAN wiring I brought the repeater to same room as router, tested and that now works, returned it to far end of house and it still works, so every thing is working, but OpenReach is still to fit a master socket.

The only thing I can think is if the speed drops below a limit the wireless switches off, and the whole problem was internet speed? And something has been done to increase the speed at the exchange.

ericmark · 24 Jul 2018

Speeds down load 8.61 Mbps up load 0.81 Mbps attempts at up loading photos seem to always fail, the advert states average peak time speed of 11 Mbps it does not state upload or download, for my address it says 11 - 16 Mbps nothing about upload being different to download.

When at this address we used Sky the speeds seemed faster than at my home address also with Sky even though at home we had fibre. Which is why I never bothered with fibre as we could watch TV using broadband here better than at home.

But no PC at home now to test speed, and never bothered to test speed here until it all went wrong.

bar72 · 28 Jul 2018

If your devices have Bluetooth as well as Wi-Fi card, disable bluetooth, reboot and test connection. Had this with an Atheros Wi-Fi adapter and took me a couple of nights to sort out the problem (Bluetooth was interfering with Wi-Fi). Also check your RJ12 Cable that goes from phone socket to router isn't faulty. Unsure what type of phone socket you got but if it's an older one (uses a microfilter), remove faceplate and plug in directly to test plug on backplate. This will connect you direct to Openreach wiring, bypassing any house wiring and any wiring faults.

ericmark · 29 Jul 2018

After complaining they claim to have done nothing but wifi works. I did wonder about interference, and noted turning off the repeater seemed to help, but once the speed improved then turned the repeater back on and it did not slow anything down, so wifi now working all around the house and gardens.

I made the point to the Post Office that if I could unplug the internal wiring I could do two major tests, one plug router direct into OpenReach socket with nothing else connected, and two plug in my tester and check wiring, OK it only tests no cables reversed but better than nothing. They told me to use the master socket, so I went around removing face plates looking for the capacitor, resistor and spark gap found on the master socket, it was not found, now I know with old phones my dads bells worked so at some point there must have been a master socket, I assume this was removed when the care link unit was either put in or taken out. There was a socket in the living room, that has now gone together with all the wiring to it.

IT Minion · 3 Aug 2018

ericmark said:
Speeds down load 8.61 Mbps up load 0.81 Mbps attempts at up loading photos seem to always fail, the advert states average peak time speed of 11 Mbps it does not state upload or download, for my address it says 11 - 16 Mbps nothing about upload being different to download.

When at this address we used Sky the speeds seemed faster than at my home address also with Sky even though at home we had fibre. Which is why I never bothered with fibre as we could watch TV using broadband here better than at home.

But no PC at home now to test speed, and never bothered to test speed here until it all went wrong.

Speeds advertised are always download speeds. With standard broadband download is always much lower than upload, that's normal.

The first rule of diagnosing network issues is: Don't use wifi, use a wired connection.

Wifi is great, but it is also much more complicated and error prone than plugging in your computer to the router. By plugging in directly you can eliminate wifi as a possible failure mode, if it doesn't work plugged in then nothing will work, if it does work plugged in but not over wifi then it's your wifi at fault.

ericmark · 3 Aug 2018

In the home I have done nothing, however the internet has improved, so clearly the Post Office must have done something their end.

Three computers hard wired, however can't hard wire tablets and phones, it seems odd that tablet and phone can assess hard drive on the computers but not internet when we had the problem, I will guess once the internet speed falls below a limit then wifi internet switches off? As to what switches off I don't know, I have two wifi access points at each end of house seemed to lose both.

But what ever it was now running OK.