topic Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable in Broadband

Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Junkman — Tue, 16 Apr 2024 10:13:32 GMT

Good morning,

Still on rural FTTC here unfortunately. Close to a km from the cabinet but, since Openreach changed the target SNR from 6 to 3 in my area, my connection has been synced @c. 39Mbps giving me a download speed around 38. Rock solid for at least 2 years with the occasional overnight adjustment and the odd dropout.

Then 3 dropouts in 24 hours last Friday, which seems to have resulted in the target SNR being set back to 6 and consequently my sync speed dropping to 34.

I have tried reboots and another router but SNR is stubbornly stuck at 6. I have contacted Plusnet but they say they can't see anything wrong with the line.

Anyone have any ideas how I can resolve this? Do I just wait or should I push for a DLM reset?

(also just noticed a large increase latency this morning which is a new thing).

Any ideas will be much appreciated.

Thanks, Stuart

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Baldrick1 — Tue, 16 Apr 2024 11:26:31 GMT

@Junkman

The first thing to do is nothing.
Constant reboots may be interpreted as line drops and can make things worse. Leave it switched on for at least a week and with a bit of luck the DLM will do it’s thing and automatically reduce the SNR back to 3dB.

A DLM reset returns the SNR to the default, which is 6dB

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Junkman — Tue, 16 Apr 2024 13:15:12 GMT

@Baldrick1 thanks much appreciated. The router swaps Plusnet had me do would likely be seen as drops too, so Saturday was a right mess DLM-wise.

If the DLM default is 6dB, do I have any options if it hasn't reverted to 3 by, say, this time next week? Any other way it can be returned to 3 when it has been stable at that for more than 2 years?

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Junkman — Thu, 18 Apr 2024 12:30:36 GMT

Anyone help me with this? Just need to know if there's anything I can ask Plusnet to do in order to get my target SNR back to 3 and thus my sync speed back up to where it has been solidly for more than 2 years (up to last Friday).

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Baldrick1 — Thu, 18 Apr 2024 15:54:37 GMT

@Junkman

Is it still at 6 dB?

Is the speed higher than your contractual minimum guaranteed speed?
If it’s above the MGALS Plusnet are unlikely to be able to do anything.

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Junkman — Thu, 18 Apr 2024 16:36:30 GMT

Thanks@Baldrick1 . Yes still stuck at 6 and the speed I'm now getting (33MBbps) is definitely higher than guaranteed.

Interestingly this has happened 2 weeks after I took out a new contract with Plusnet. So stable at 3dB and 38Mbps for the whole of an 18 month contract and now this problem. I'm sure that's just a coincidence but......

Annoying if Plusnet can't do anything when it's obvious that the line is/was capable of the higher speed. When you're down at these sorts of speeds every little counts!

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Baldrick1 — Thu, 18 Apr 2024 18:47:14 GMT

@Junkman

Be patient, there’s still a chance that it will start improving.

Be assured that there’s no plot to limit your speed after you’ve renewed your contract.

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Junkman — Tue, 30 Apr 2024 08:27:43 GMT

Spoke to Plusnet again yesterday. They did a DLM reset for me which changed nothing and, as you suggested @Baldrick1 , they were unable to do anything else as there is no fault showing on my line. But can anyone tell me what this might be (see attachment)? A massive increase in latency last night between 8pm and 10pm when we were not using the internet at all. (The DLM reset is the dropout at 12 noon)

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Junkman — Wed, 01 May 2024 08:23:57 GMT

Same again last night

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

pvmb — Wed, 01 May 2024 09:46:16 GMT

@Junkman wrote:

Anyone help me with this? Just need to know if there's anything I can ask Plusnet to do in order to get my target SNR back to 3 and thus my sync speed back up to where it has been solidly for more than 2 years (up to last Friday).

Good luck with that!

This reminded me of the situation I found myself in when I was still on ADSL 2+ (now on 40/10 FTTC). After several happy years on 3dB SNRM I ended up - after a difficult period - speed capped on ADSL with no discernable explanation. Very frustrating.

In the end it was this that eventually prompted me to give up on ADSL and embrace FTTC.

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Junkman — Wed, 01 May 2024 20:56:54 GMT

And again today. Starting earlier and this time with significant packet loss. Speedtest.net says my download speed at 9.45pm is 0.64 and my latency is 358. On an FTTC connection. But the Plusnet bot says there is nothing wrong with the line. Please see the attachment showing latency and packet loss via Think Broadband. No idea what to to do now so would appreciate it if anyone can HELP!

@Gandalf are you still around?

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Townman — Fri, 03 May 2024 09:39:34 GMT

Have you had any issue outside of 7pm-10pm 29th, 30th April and 1st May?

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Junkman — Fri, 03 May 2024 10:27:35 GMT

@Townman the 1st May occurrence was more like 4pm to midnight. As well as those 3 days, if I look back just at April, it occurred 7pm -10 pm on 3/4, 8am-10am on 12/4 and 6am-11am on 16/4. It has happened occasionally before that, but just for brief periods 10pm ish. Why do you ask?

Of course I still have the initial issue as well. Switching routers has ruled out my kit and since the cabinet only serves our small village I think it is highly unlikely to be congestion.

I've attached a screenshot showing the performance c 8pm on 1st May. Using the same speedtester the download was back to 30+ after the latency issues had passed

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Townman — Fri, 03 May 2024 11:32:29 GMT

"Why do you ask?"

Elsewhere there have been reports of slowness around those times. Could be related to heavy internet usage - possibly some big sports fixture? Who knows, personally football leaves me cold.

Keep a watch and please post more TBBQBMs of anything which looks odd - those you have posted have been helpful.

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Junkman — Fri, 03 May 2024 11:51:52 GMT

@Townman if it was football I'd know 'cos I am a fan, and some of those times I posted weren't football (or any other event) times. And as I said, small village (30 houses) with its own cabinet. Many residents 'getting on a bit' who don't use the internet much. So I don't think it's congestion, unless of course that can happen on the feed to the exchange rather than from it.

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Dan_the_Van — Fri, 03 May 2024 12:16:02 GMT

@Junkman

You say you've taken out a new contract, are you now 'Fibre' with no landline phone? If yes, have you removed any redundant internal extension telephone points.

New Hub Two or still using old Hub which is?

Have you tried connecting to the test socket found inside the openreach master socket.

Apart from sharing your Public IP Address the speedtest does indicate high latency, have you done any ping test to anything like google.co.uk? Some latency can be caused by internal network traffic

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Junkman — Fri, 03 May 2024 12:54:31 GMT

@Dan_the_Van nope still on FTTC. Billion router that I can interrogate. Latest BT phone socket so direct to master. Not done ping tests recently but the speed test I posted correlates. I do use a NAS to stream music and video over my network, but this doesn't correlate with the times of high latency. It can happen when there is no network traffic and the internet connection is idle. And ta for the IP address tip I hadn't thought of that. Wonder if I can take this thread down when it's exhausted?

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Dan_the_Van — Fri, 03 May 2024 15:03:21 GMT

@Junkman

Does the billion router record data sent/received on a device basis? Which model?

What is noticeable there are some dropped packets during the latency. Here is a BQM of mine from 4th March, here I am streaming Sky Go to my tablet, probably Monday Night Football LIVE on Sky.

If you have a landline phone is the line clear of noise during the high latency periods? Dial 17070, select option 2 for quiet line test.

Be interesting if you ping something wired local on your LAN (NAS drive or Router) during these latencies see if the ping times out of has extended reply times

Do you use any Quality of Service?

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Junkman — Sat, 04 May 2024 13:07:33 GMT

Thanks again@Dan_the_Van but it's not from streaming. Firstly I do very little of that and, secondly, on your BQM the minimum latency doesn't increase at all and the average latency only marginally. Mine go through the roof when the issue occurs. I also doubt that your latency goes over 400 when you are streaming

Router is a Bipac 8800AXL R2. I can access a QoS page but nothing is set there - both upstream and downstream are zero. I don't think it records data per device - or at least I can't find it. Haven't been able to check the landline in such a period yet. It's seldom used, but the last time (about 3 days ago) it was a crackly connection. But Plusnet continue to tell me they can't see any fault on my line (despite sending me a text saying they have rectified one) and their only solution is for me to junk my router and have a Hub2 delivered, which doesn't work for me for a few reasons - I'm relatively certain it isn't my router having switched it out for a period already, it would be a PITA to set up the LAN static IPs I need etc, and I wouldn't be able to get the same data from it as I can now.

I'll try the ping test next time I get the latency issue. Edited to add take a look at the BQM named 1.png and you will see the difference between your latency change and mine, including significant packet loss. And I believe that the BQM works by pinging my router so don't understand how that could be affected by my NAS. In any case it isn't - as I've said I can get this issue on an idle connection. Edited again to add that my NAS currently pings at 5ms with no packet loss

Cheers, Stuart

Re: Sync Speed Reduction after 2 years Stable

Dan_the_Van — Sun, 05 May 2024 08:45:00 GMT

@Junkman

My reference to a BMQ for streaming was an example for comparison only.

Not suggesting the NAS drive was causing your issue but to use it as a local LAN ping target, around 5ms is what I would expect.

The landline phone connection should not be crackling is must be silent, speaking from experience any noise with have an impact on your sync speed. It is not unusual for line tests not to detect the cause of crackling, it can be caused by a poor joint anywhere between the Master Socket and the Green Cabinet possible beyond towards the Exchange.

Master Socket 5c with a MK4 faceplate, sometimes the faceplate through time can become poorly seated and can be the cause of noise, a suggestion would be for now to try using an in-line ADSL filter to illuminate any internal cabling.

I would not recommend the Hub Two DHCP server, its not the best for giving devices fixed IP Address assignments.

Maybe consider using 'Routerstats Lite' which your router supports, this allows you to monitor the signal noise margin for your connection