iPlayer Buffering in Hampshire

[#1]

Are there currently congestion/capacity problems in the Petersfield area?

Visiting Plusnet-ified friends and iPlayer cut out 5 or 6 times in the course of a 1 hour programme yesterday evening.

All possible on-premises causes investigated and eliminated. Seems to be very much T.O.D. dependent and an ongoing issue.

Good connection according to the Plusnet Hub One:

3. Firmware version:

Software version 4.7.5.1.83.8.263 Last updated Unknown

6. Data rate:	19999 / 77705
7. Maximum data rate:	24389 / 77694
8. Noise margin:	15.1 / 5.9
9. Line attenuation:	9.4 / 9.8
10. Signal attenuation:	9.4 / 9.9

23. Modulation:	G.993.2 Annex B
24. Software variant:	AA

Can Plusnet staff shed any light?...

[#2]

@InterZoom 

How is the tv connected to the router? Ethernet cable or wireless?

If wireless tnen that is most likely your problem.

If using powerline devices then you need to replace them temporarily with an Ethernet cable as these can also be intermittently problematic..

[#3]

The connection is ethernet.

Testing it at the moment (when, presumably, there's little demand,) there's no problem...

[#4]

Hi there @InterZoom, can you send me over a PM with the username of the account relates to (or full address and postcode if you're unsure) so we can take a look at this.

Once you have sent the PM, please just let us know via this post

[#5]

Hi @LaurenB 

Thanks for replying and taking a look. I've sent you a PM with that and some other details just now 

[#6]

It's definitely network congestion (query packet loss). General internet browsing is slow as hell just now: nearly 8 seconds to load the Guardian homepage, as measured by both Chrome and Safari developper tools on 2 different computers. That's not normal.

Will leave it with you, PN...   🐢

[#7]

Thanks for getting back to us @InterZoom

I'm sorry to see you're experiencing speed problems. I've firstly checked for congestion at the Petersfield exchange you've mentioned and there's no capacity issues showing on our suppliers weekly report.

I've also tested your line and there aren't any issues or errors showing with the router getting a speed of 77mbps.

To investigate further can you connect a computer to the router with an ethernet cable with no switches or powerline adapters in place, then run a BT speedtest at https://speedtest.btwholesale.com with no other programs running at the same time such as streaming, general browsing and the most common one is antivirus programs downloading updates in the background. I'd also recommend switching off all other devices while you're running the test.

Once the initial result is completed please click Further Diagnostics then type your phone number in and click run diagnostic test. This will run a test and send the results to the BT server for investigation.

Can you post back once you've run the test and we'll be happy to take a look again.

[#8]

Many thanks for confirming no issues with the line @Gandalf 

There isn't any issue with the speed either, as reported by testers: except for relatively poor download latency on the TBB analysis.

It looks to be the same kind of issue I've had with Plusnet myself in the past: sluggishness and latency which is very evident as a user and also impossible for a customer to pin down because of the network design. (ICMP, for example, also reveals nothing untoward, with ping to major news sites around 7 secs.)

There are no further diagnostics which I can offer you from the outside which will convince you that there is a problem at a network level. But I've seen it before, and could safely bet a lot of money that there is!  😉

That said, we've experienced no problems with iPlayer streaming or VPN just recently, and those are the most annoying things. So, coupled with the extremely long response times on this forum at the moment, I'm happy to let it lie for now; unimpressive as it is.

[#9]

Thanks for getting back to me @InterZoom 

I'm happy to see the issue isn't occurring anymore but our tests aren't showing any capacity issues on the infrastructure at the exchange and I doubt this to be related to our own network because if it is then I'd expect this to affect a large number of people rather than seemingly just yourself. 

Could you at least run a trace-route on a direct ethernet connection with no powerline adapters it switches in place, nothing running in the background and no other devices switched on?

I'd still recommend running the BT further diagnostics because this gives us more information than you'd think and it also helps us to raise a fault with our suppliers.

Having said that if you believe there is a fault it may be worth asking your friend/the account holder to raise the fault themselves online at http://faults.plus.net

[#10]

seemingly just yourself

Hmm. That doesn't follow. Networks don't run on rhetorical devices.

Anyway, I've done the BT diagnostics for you. They show a slightly low IP Profile of 75.21Mbps - which is neither here nor there.

Also, below, three mtr traces, as requested, (though over wireless, as it happens,) two to www.guardian.co.uk although the routes are different, and one to www.telegraph.co.uk for rhetorical balance  😉

peer7-et-0-1-5 was showing about 1.2% packet loss on one run, but I didn't save it and it resolved on the next, so that may or may not be relevant. I'm fairly sure routing was via Edinburgh last week too, but again I don't have a record of that.

[#11]

Thanks for getting back to me @InterZoom 

Apologies for the confusion, what I'm trying to say is that there's no congestion seen that would be causing this.

Those trace-routes you've done look perfectly fine, some hops will time out or show high packet loss but that's not necessarily an issue because those hops would just be prioristing internet traffic rather than respond back to you.

What's interesting about a trace route if you see continuous high latency or time outs.

Are you having any issues now streaming? If you're not it may be worth running the trace route when you are. I'd also recommend tracing pingbox1.thinkbroadband.com as that's unlikely to rate limit ICMP requests.

[#12]

TBB for good measure (wireless):

[#13]

Looks pretty much perfect to me, I'm actually a bit jealous at those speeds. 

[#14]

---

Those trace-routes you've done look perfectly fine

---

Indeed. As I say, from past experience, it is unlikely that I will be able to demostrate the network issue to you (whatever it is) in dagnostic numbers because the required visibility is not available from a consumer endpoint. It all looks great from here. Except to a human being, who can well perceive that "it's a bit rubbish!" But hey, streaming is OK at the moment, so  🙏

I do appreciate your follow-up, @Gandalf 

[#15]

No problem, if there was congestion afoot I'd expect this to reflect on a speed test, but it's good to see that the streaming's OK at the moment. Let me know if further problems occur though.