Port forwarding blocked by Plusnet?

[#1]

I'm trying to get port forwarding to work on my BT/2Wire 2700HGV router, as far as I can tell everything should be working but the port is reported as being closed 24/7 (using the Transmission & uTorrent port checkers, in Linux & Windows)

• 2700HGV firewall rule is set to open port for TCP & UDP traffic
  
• SafeSurf is set to unrestricted
  
• Plusnet firewall is set to off
  
• software firewalls are disabled
  

I'm 99% sure that I've set this up as I have done in the past, but maybe I've overlooked something? It used to be the case (months ago) that the ports would be reported as closed around peak times and open off peak, I assumed due to Plusnet traffic management & p2p throttling. However it now seems to be closed permanently? Are Plusnet now blocking p2p altogether or have I made a mistake in my set up?

[#2]

Quote

Plusnet firewall is set to off

Has it always been OFF or have you just changed it. Firewall settings only take effect after a reconnection.
On the 2700 you can just Reset the ISP connection from here http://home/xslt?PAGE=J21&THISPAGE=J01&NEXTPAGE=J21 without the need to drop the DSl connection.

[#3]

It's been off for a couple of years! That's why I'm tearing my hair out, I've downloaded 64bit versions of Fedora 11 & Ubuntu 9.04 using bittorrent when they were made available, so that was pretty recent. I now need a 32bit version of Linux asap so I can install on an old computer and get my neighbour up & running with internet access

[#4]

Sorry to hear that, I had hoped that might help.

Quote

I now need a 32bit version of Linux asap

Can you not just download Ubuntu via http from here http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download ?
EDIT :- I dont use Bittorrent myself ( but I do have a 2700HGV! ) , looking at the portforwarding guide http://portforward.com/english/routers/port_forwarding/2wire/2700hg/BitTorrent.htm , bittorrent doesnt seem to need UDP forwarding, but I dont see how it would cause a problem.
I presume you have double checked that the starting port in your Bittorrent client is the same as you are forwarding ?

[#5]

I have Transmission and uTorrent working with port forwarding under Mac OS X so I doubt it is a PN issue.
Had a 2700 working with port forwarding too.

[#6]

Quote from: MisterW

Can you not just download Ubuntu via http from here http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download ?

will be a last resort, however the http download is very unreliable due to errors

Quote from: MisterW

EDIT :- I dont use Bittorrent myself ( but I do have a 2700HGV! ) , looking at the portforwarding guide http://portforward.com/english/routers/port_forwarding/2wire/2700hg/BitTorrent.htm , bittorrent doesnt seem to need UDP forwarding, but I dont see how it would cause a problem. I presume you have double checked that the starting port in your Bittorrent client is the same as you are forwarding ?

The port forwarding guide is pretty good, and I used it previously with my old Netgear router, and the current 2wire.
UDP isn't required, though uTorrent was moving to UDP as an alternative protocol so I usually set it up anyway.
Have checked the BT client(s) port settings and tried the web based port checker.

Quote from: adiewoo

I have Transmission and uTorrent working with port forwarding under Mac OS X so I doubt it is a PN issue. Had a 2700 working with port forwarding too.

Does the web based port checker show your port as open? http://www.utorrent.com/testport?port=12345 (replace 12345 with your open port number)

[#7]

Quick Q. you haven't changed the ip address of the torrent client pc?
I found this problem when I changed nic's and forgot to change my mac address on my static allocation on the dhcp server.
Even if you are 100% sure just do an ifconfig and check the port forward on the firewall is going to the same ip.

[#8]

I ran the port checkers at 23:15 last night and the port reported as open! Torrents started OK so I did manage to grab openSUSE & Slackware via BT, so that makes the situation less urgent. 08:30 this morning the port was closed, now's it open again. I don't know what's going on. Yesterday newly added torrents just remained idle and wouldn't start. Tried the openSUSE torrent again this morning and download was hitting 200KB/s almost immediately. Peers are connecting and I'm seeing normal upload speeds too.

[#9]

Do you have another router to try? When my 2700 died it started doing all sorts of odd things..

[#10]

Not at the moment, will have to see if I can find a cheap one on eBay or the classifieds. I thought before my original post it might be more aggressive Plusnet traffic management following network issues over the last 2-3 weeks  (I see the problems noted elsewhere on the forum, connections with extreme slowness & long periods of inability to load any web pages)
[Moderator's note by Adie (Adiewoo):  Full quote of preceding post removed, as per Forum Rules ]

[#11]

I am also experiencing port forwarding issues but with a Zoom X6 ADSL router/modem.  It has worked no problem for ages, and I have come to do a torrent download tonight and no port is available.
I have used web based and PC based port checking solutions, along with netstat and TCPView which both show the ports open on my PC, but I keep getting a connection timed out or connection refused error.
I have even updated my router firmware, and reset the forwarding just in case.
Jon.

[#12]

Just to resurrect this subject: I've noticed recently while doing a fair bit of torrenting that my port (as reported by uTorrent) varies seemingly at random between being open and being closed.  For example:
Yesterday:  9pm - open, 10.30pm - closed
Today: 2am - open, 12.40pm - closed, 1pm - open, 4pm - closed, 4.15pm - open.
Is this usual?  My router is the Thomson 585 v7 wireless model, as supplied by PlusNet.  The router's firewall is turned off, as is the PlusNet one, and uTorrent is entered as an exception in the Windows firewall (XP Pro SP2).
Thanks.

[#13]

check the PN firewalls are not blocking anything
https://portal.plus.net/surf/
https://portal.plus.net/my.html?action=firewall

[#14]

Thanks for that.   The second of those is switched off, but the first is not.  However, it says that the blocked ports for BitTorrent are in the range 6881 - 6889; I'm using a port number much higher than that.  Is it still worth switching it off, do you think?

[#15]

if you use torrent clients then you may as well turn of the standard port range surf option. i have  both firewalls turned off and trust my router and software firewall to do it all for me.
am using utorrent 1.8.2 on vista and dont have any problems with ports being closed.
There was another chap recently on here recently that had problem with utorrent closing connections and made the switch to vuse and that worked fine.
sent you a PM with a port number that am using with no problems