PPoE Connection become unreliable?

[#1]

I've been back with Plusnet since mid-September and enjoying the return after 6 or 7 years on the dark-side!  And (until Saturday) had a lovely, rock solid connection with full 80/20 sync speeds and some SNR margin to spare. G.INP on.

I'm using an unlocked HG612 with an Asus AC68U (I used with my previous cable connection).

All was well until Saturday afternoon (after well over a month of perfect connection) when the usage became erratic with dropped connections, intermittent VOIP registration failures and so on.  DNS failures sometimes and Asus router showing WAN disconnected intermittently.  Modem was still rock solid and hadn't dropped the VDSL connection for over  a month. 

At 5am on Sunday morning, The router stopped responding to ThinkBroadband pings and Asus showed the PPoE connection as disconnected - we were all asleep so definitely nothing changed at my end!  Nothing useful in Asus log and nothing had changed for weeks in any of my  settings or equipment.  I'd even stopped logging the Huawei modem stats as they were so boringly constant.  A reboot of the Asus router will sometimes bring it back to life but then it fails again with no obvious consistent reason.

I've swapped in a different HG612, flashed the Asus back from Merlin to stock firmware and built it back up from a factory reset and even bit the bullet and got an integrated modem/router (Billion 8800AXL R2) which I tested with only a laptop connected on the LAN side (by wired connection).

All show the same symptoms as if the PPoE tunnel is intermittently failing.  Outer VDSL wrapper is always rock-solid.

BT wholesale test this morning showed zero download and 16(ish) Mbit/s upload.

I briefly tried to call support twice on Sunday but the call times were so long that the connection kept coming back up so I rung off.  Also, I suspect this is a bit involved for first line support as this is not a classic noise, extension wiring type thing (its a brand new line with just a filter faceplate anyway, and the VDSL isn't dropping).

So I'm launching in here in the hope experienced hands can look at the Openreach/Plusnet side of things and check all is well.

And also while I have some Internet at work

[#2]

Hi @albany,

Thanks for getting in touch and for providing such a comprehensive post.

This is a physical connection issue rather than a router issue - we can see the drops from this side.

I've tested the line and no external faults exist, so I'd suggest running through the troubleshooting here and then raising a fault here if that doesn't rectify the situation.

Let us know if you raise a fault and we'll get it picked up for you.

Best wishes

Dave

[#3]

Hi Dave,

Thanks.  Can you confirm when you're seeing drops or post a quick log so I can cross-reference with when I was swapping kit? 

There will be a bunch on Sunday eve and a couple more last night while I've swapped kit.  I'm not seeing any other physical line drops at all.

The physical troubleshooting in the first link you gave, was all done before I posted here.

Modem stats below - stays this way always - unless I unplug or reboot it!

Andy

Modem Stats from 31 Oct 2018

[#4]

Hi @albany,

Thank you for confirming you have completed our troubleshooting steps, below is a log of the drops in your connection.


If you continue to experience drops in the service, raise a fault and let us know when you have completed it so we can pick it up as soon as possible for you.

Thank you.

[#5]

Hi,

Thanks. 

That's more diconnects than me swapping kit.  So I've raised a fault ticket - I hope - connection went down in the middle of submission but did eventually confirm a ticket has been raised.

Andy

[#6]

Hi @albany

Thanks for your response, you have indeed raised a fault.

The last step we'd look to take before booking an engineer would be to ensure that you're in the optimal setup, by accessing the Openreach test socket.The test socket is under the face plate of your master socket and we'd like you to monitor the connection for 24 hours to see if the drops stop. This rules out internal wiring, face plates and extension sockets as being the cause. How to locate the test socket and set your connection into it can be found here.

Let us know how you get on.

[#7]

OK that's done. 

Straight into the test socket with a filter.  Line, box and filter faceplate is a month old and there's no extension wiring so without too much surprise, it's not making any obvious difference.

Small decrease in max attainable (had to scrabble aound to find a reasonable filter) but otherwise modem looks very happy (see below).

Give it 24 hours by all means but even though the modem says all is OK, it's dropped out twice whilst posting this so I'm now posting by hotspotting off my phone.

Looks like an engineer visit to me.  The sooner the better please.  Not much mobile signal around here...

Andy

[#8]

Still effectively an unusable as an Internet connection at 12+ hours in on Master Socket only.  Mandatory 24 hours on master socket or can you order an engineer earlier?

Pretty please

It's been out since last Saturday eve (I know i didn't raise a full fault ticket then) and all of us at home have now maxed out our mobile data allowances for the month getting around the problem with hotspotting. 

Kids at home over half-term has not been a great help.  Weekend coming up will see my getting some serious strife!

[#9 · Accepted solution]

Hi @albany,

Before we go down any engineer routes I think you maybe have more than one account so I just want to make sure the discussion from our side relates to the account you believe is affected.

I've noticed this because on one of your lines there are two active connection with different BT Circuit references, both connecting using the same username and password. They're also both connecting using the same IP address which is going to cause some severe problems with at least one of those sites connections and data transfer abilities. Part of the issue you're experiencing could very easily be caused by this.

Can you do me a favour and PM one of the online staff the username for affected account, and also detail any other accounts you might have too. 

[#10]

That sounds similar to previous cases where a PlusNet router has been given or sold to someone else and is connecting with the old account details so 2 connections are trying to function with same login details, as Jolo says it won't work very well.

[#11]

That sounds like a distinct possibility from the faults I'm seeing.  But I'm not clear how that would happen.

How do I work out who is online to pm them?

Andy

[#12]

Jolo,

Just PMed you as you seem to be online. 

Any chance of a call when you have a moment as Internet is tough to use.  Andy

[#13]

Jolo and RealAleMadrid,

Many thanks. You were bang on the money.

I lent my PN router/modem out to help someone who is also on Plusnet, with a problem.  I preconfigured it with the other details but it presumably pulled down my details when it was plugged in.  As such a hobbled bit of kit I couldn't see any of what was going on without being there in person.

I recognised the issue as pretty severe packet loss and spent a lot of time (to no avail) trying to resolve that on my LAN.  It didn't cross my mind that the loss was happening WAN-side.

Lessons learnt: 1.Don't let your PN modem out of your sight.  2. DSL will happily authenticate on the wrong BT circuit (big surprise that one!).

My Penance: A 5hr round trip last night to recover the PN modem and replace it with some stuff I can remotely diagnose.

[#14]

Hi @albany,

Firstly, I'm sorry I couldn't ring you yesterday but I'd left the office by the time I noticed your PM asking for a call. 

I'm really glad you managed to get it resolved, I've just checked the affected accounts and they both seem to be as they should be now which is a good sign. 

I'm sorry we weren't able to pick it up sooner, as I think the matter could have been resolved much faster if we'd have noticed those two connections. So I'm sorry about that!

[#15]

Joe,

Just glad its sorted out and thanks for the quick PM even after you'd left yesterday. 

All working nicely again here and other account looks good to me too.

Just one question which might be useful for others finding this thread in the future - will a current Plusnet router/modem always pull down dsl username and password based on the account it's originally linked to?

Thanks also for seeing beyond the usual line noise expectations and spotting the real problem.

Andy