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PPP timing out

gromit69
Grafter
Posts: 27
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Registered: ‎02-12-2014

PPP timing out

Last night my very stable fibre connection dropped and hasn't reconnected since. It seems to be something related to the PPP connection.

It's the first time I've seen this. My DSL sync is fine, but according to my TP-Link router, attempting to authenticate the internet connection just times out. (It says "TImeout waiting for PADO packets").

After speaking to phone support, my router was blamed. So I dug out the Plusnet Hub One which is exhibiting exactly the same issue.

What would cause PPP to suddenly fail? My initial guess would be a connectivity problem at the cabinet, but obviously that's just a guess.

18 REPLIES 18
mikelahey
Pro
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Registered: ‎24-11-2015

Re: PPP timing out

It's probably an issue in the BTW network. When the router is trying to establish a connection it sends out a broadcast (PADI) to find out who it should be connecting to, the PADO packet is the response to the broadcast which gives the router information about the network it is connecting to so that it can establish a session.
gromit69
Grafter
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Registered: ‎02-12-2014

Re: PPP timing out

Ah, this makes sense. I can see the PADI packets being sent, but nothing's coming back. 

It sounds a bit like DHCP Smiley

 

I guess I'll have to wait for PN to engage a BTW engineer to do some poking Sad

edwardw
Grafter
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Registered: ‎17-01-2013

Re: PPP timing out

I have the same issue.
Since just before 10pm last night. Still not up. Which area are you in?
mikelahey
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Registered: ‎24-11-2015

Re: PPP timing out

The issue is somewhere down stream of the street cabinet, could be between the cab and the exchange or even further back in the Openreach network. In which case you'd expect to see more than one user affected by it.

 

So when the router establishes a connection it brings it online in stages, the technical term for these stage is layer. The first stage is to establish the physical connection to the equipment in the street cabinet (technical term is DSLAM - Digital Subscriber Line Access Module), this is when the DSL light flashes on the router and the router and the DSLAM agree the connection speed.

Once this link is established the next stage is to bring up the Ethernet connection using the PPPoE (Point to Point Over Ethernet) protocol. The WAN interface on the router and the device its connecting to on the Openreach network both have a physical network address which is a long  48 bit long unique address. In order for the two devices to communicate they each must know each others addresses.

So the first thing to do is establish the address of the device that the router will be talking to that carries out the authentication and establishes the link. In order to do this the router sends out a broadcast message containing its own physical address (PADI) and waits for a response from the device on the Openreach network containing its physical address PADO. Now that both addresses are known to both devices a connection can be established and then authentication can proceed followed by IP address allocation delivered by DHCP.

 

The failure you are both seeing is that nothing on the Openreach network is replying to the initial broadcast message but the physical connection over VDSL has been established, which points to some problem downstream of the street cabinet.

npr
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Registered: ‎21-01-2013

Re: PPP timing out

Sounds like a stale ppp session, don't know if Plusnet still have this issue on their new network.

It was simply fixed by PN support performing what they called a session kill.

It's disappointing that Plusnet phone support weren't more helpful and unfortunate one of the forum reps hasn't dropped by, I'm sure this could have been sorted quickly.

 

gromit69
Grafter
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Registered: ‎02-12-2014

Re: PPP timing out

Yep, same as me. I'm in South Yorkshire on the SLRY exchange. Apparently it's a known fault in the area and PN's suppliers are looking into it (though there were no OR vans at the exchange when I passed it!)
gromit69
Grafter
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Registered: ‎02-12-2014

Re: PPP timing out

I was pretty disappointed by phone sorry to be honest. First guy told me it was my router. Whoever was on Twitter was pretty good though - he told me it was a known issue that was affecting a few people and that someone was already looking into it.
(I'm on a static IP which I seem to remember were treated differently to normal sessions. Wonder if they're still on the old network?)
No fix yet though, 24 hours on 😕
edwardw
Grafter
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Registered: ‎17-01-2013

Re: PPP timing out

I’m in royston also. Wonder if your on the same cabinet? I guess the annoying thing is, if it is a stuck PPP session then surely a temporary fix would be to issue us with temp user names?

My next door neighbour is on BT and his is down too, so sounds more like a BTW issue rather than ISP!
gromit69
Grafter
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Registered: ‎02-12-2014

Re: PPP timing out

One of the updates just says "Royston loss of PPP" - which is pretty brief but also informative.
I'm on cab 24, but I thought that the fibres went back to Barnsley. Though I could be making it up!
edwardw
Grafter
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Registered: ‎17-01-2013

Re: PPP timing out

I’m on 24 also.

Interestingly the cabinet is now full.... and notice they were digging there the other week.

Do plusnet offer fttpod?
mikelahey
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Registered: ‎24-11-2015

Re: PPP timing out

No they only offer FTTP where there is existing fibre in the street, it needs to say FTTP WBC on the BTW dsl checker page. before Plusnet will provide FTTP. FTTPoD is aimed at business customers and the install costs can run into 4 figure numbers. I the monthly wholesale cost is quite high too.

@npr I didn't think you got stuck PPP sessions on fibre as the timeout is set to 20 seconds by Openreach so that if the line loses sync it automatically starts a new PPP session.

npr
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Registered: ‎21-01-2013

Re: PPP timing out

You're probably right about the new network.
Don't know if it's still the case but I believe, on the old network, PPP was done by PN not OR and I'm sure the timeout was more then 20s.
It was recently confirmed that static IP,s are on the old network.
gromit69
Grafter
Posts: 27
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Registered: ‎02-12-2014

Re: PPP timing out

I've just received an update about suppliers and vendors. Reading between the lines, it sounds like a piece of kit has broken and BT/OR are waiting for a replacement.
edwardw
Grafter
Posts: 49
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Registered: ‎17-01-2013

Re: PPP timing out

Hmm they replied to me saying it should be working now?Huh

Cheers