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Erratic pings and packet loss

Snarf
Grafter
Posts: 352
Thanks: 9
Registered: ‎04-08-2007

Erratic pings and packet loss

Was playing Lord of the Rings Online today and noticed that on occasions my packet loss was shooting up to around 20% with pings between 500-1000ms. Running ping tests to www.plus.net results in (on average) 5-10% packet loss, standard ping times are around 40-50ms, but they spike to well over 100ms. I'm running TBB's quality monitor (I rebooted the router in the hope it would solve the problem but it hasn't) and I'm showing some high maximum latencies.
Any idea what could be wrong? This has only been an issue recently, the only difference I've noticed around here is the large amounts of rain we've had recently, but I live on a relatively new estate so would hope that's not an issue.
15 REPLIES 15
adamwalker
Plusnet Help Team
Plusnet Help Team
Posts: 16,871
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Registered: ‎27-04-2007

Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

Sorry to hear about the issues you're having there. As latency issues often go hand in hand with slow connection speeds in general I'd advise running a BT speed test to see what that reveals too http://www.speedtester.bt.com
If this post resolved your issue please click the 'This fixed my problem' button
 Adam Walker
 Plusnet Help Team
Gus
Aspiring Pro
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Registered: ‎31-07-2007

Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

If you downloaded Lotro recently unless via Steam, it uses Pando media booster, which is a custom p2p utility which stays active unless you manually disable it or better yet uninstall it.  So if you used it recently, make sure it's uninstalled as it will still be Sharing the downloaded files which will cripple the ingame pings.
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Kelly
Hero
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Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

Quote from: Snarf
Running ping tests to www.plus.net results in (on average) 5-10% packet loss, standard ping times are around 40-50ms, but they spike to well over 100ms.

This definitely sounds like problems with your connection, rather than traffic management. 
Kelly Dorset
Ex-Broadband Service Manager
Chris
Legend
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Registered: ‎05-04-2007

Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

Quote from: Gus
If you downloaded Lotro recently unless via Steam, it uses Pando media booster, which is a custom p2p utility which stays active unless you manually disable it or better yet uninstall it.   So if you used it recently, make sure it's uninstalled as it will still be Sharing the downloaded files which will cripple the ingame pings.

Interesting, I hadn't heard of that before and could certainly cause problems depending on how much of the upload bandwidth it takes.
Former Plusnet Staff member. Posts after 31st Jan 2020 are not on behalf of Plusnet.
Snarf
Grafter
Posts: 352
Thanks: 9
Registered: ‎04-08-2007

Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

Well the line hasn't been used all day but my ping graph still looks erratic.
http://www.thinkbroadband.com/ping/share/949b5a5480d538e7024f5d5749a2aafd.html
I'll try a speed check via BT later and post the results.
Gus
Aspiring Pro
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Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

That does look suspicious, do you still have pando installed?  It will have a icon in the control panel, if not would check exactly what is actively online via taskmgr
startbar / run type taskmgr
click the Performance tab and then Resource Monitor
FTTP 500 regrade from Tues 28th November
Gus
Aspiring Pro
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Registered: ‎31-07-2007

Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

Note Turbine is having problems, lotro forum and login servers are down if you are thinking Lotro is going bad on you.
FTTP 500 regrade from Tues 28th November
Snarf
Grafter
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Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

I've uninstalled Pando Media Booster, however I doubt that is the root cause of the problem as nearly all day there are no computers connected to the network.
BT speedtest reports everything ok at the moment.
Logging into Lotro now, I'm going to monitor the performance and see how it goes, but something doesn't quite seem right!
Gus
Aspiring Pro
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Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

Those spikes say to me something on your network is uploading regularly, if you just uninstalled pando that could have been it, if you just uninstalled it and its still happening, time to double check you have not picked up a trojan
FTTP 500 regrade from Tues 28th November
houlton23
Grafter
Posts: 268
Registered: ‎22-05-2011

Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

Those constant ping spikes are a normal symptom of using a TG585v7/8. Is this the router you have?
Edit: I should add that they don't actually affect the BB connection, just show up as an odd BQM graph, so you can basically ignore them.
Kelly
Hero
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Registered: ‎04-04-2007

Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

Are they?  I've never seen it before?
Kelly Dorset
Ex-Broadband Service Manager
houlton23
Grafter
Posts: 268
Registered: ‎22-05-2011

Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

We had the same thing using a 585V7 pre getting fibre,

I've also seen numerous BQM's with the same thing but naturally I can't find any right now..
Snarf
Grafter
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Registered: ‎04-08-2007

Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

Quote from: houlton23
Those constant ping spikes are a normal symptom of using a TG585v7/8. Is this the router you have?

Yup a TG585v7
Gus
Aspiring Pro
Posts: 3,236
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Registered: ‎31-07-2007

Re: Erratic pings and packet loss

A replacement router is due then and send it back for it to be dissected that shouldn't be happening
btw been farming hides for my tailors for last 4 hours on and off and had no issues in game, ping pre peek time 120ms and  currently 140ms with no loss
FTTP 500 regrade from Tues 28th November