Sky problems

[#1]

Internet at my mother's is very poor, currently 800kbps  up and 340kbps down. I know the line is capable of 4500kbps as that's what it was with PN before my brother changed it to Sky.

The Att is 46 but the SN is 13 (I have seen it showing as much higher at times). A couple of years ago I did ask that the SN be reset to 6 and the speed crept up over a couple of days to over 4Mbps.

Saturday I rang them to be told they can't do a SN reset as they don't have that facility and don't know who can. When I mentioned the speed we should be getting with that Att but the SN is high he said, and I quote, "My words are going over his head"!

He said all his tests indicate an issue with the router and it needs to be replaced at a cost of £29.99 +P&P as it is 8 years old according to their records. It was a new router when the line was switched from PN around 4 years ago so no idea where he gets his info from except my brother had Sky TV installed about 8 years ago.

Anyway, my question is could a router fault be the cause? As far as I know Sky is locked to their own routers so taking a PN router for testing isn't going to work... or could it. The new router is due to arrive tomorrow but I am not there again till Thursday.

[#2]

ADSL on sky is not locked down and you can use any router you want - the Ts&Cs allow it.
FTTC the Ts&Cs say you can only use they sky router, but nothing physically stopping you.

you just need to extract your username from the router. there are many tools that will do this for you via google.

[#3]

in short yes the router can be faulty and cause the problem(s), but if it is an 8 year old unit chances are its just not working as well as it could do and that's causing the problem.

[#4]

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@Mav wrote:

He said all his tests indicate an issue with the router and it needs to be replaced at a cost of £29.99 +P&P as it is 8 years old according to their records. It was a new router when the line was switched from PN around 4 years ago so no idea where he gets his info from except my brother had Sky TV installed about 8 years ago.

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£30 for a new router? You can get a good used one off ebay for less, I just got myself a Netgear WNDR4300 for a total of £16.60 last week, not an ADSL model but a lot cheaper and a lot better than the average ISP offering!!

[#5]

indeed it should have been free given they were able to say it was 8 years old, I would of told them to provide a new one or I was moving as they were unable to provide the service contracted for the agreed price/

[#6]

That was my brother's call

I would have haggled or threatened to leave

[#7]

Connected the new router using the new connector and filter and, as I expected, no improvement. In fact the Att has changed from 46/47 to 51 and the NM is still at 20.

If the router is simply just left for a few days with no intervention is it likely to reset to, what I understand for Sky, 7dB?

I did a quiet line test and the automated system indicated no noise found but it did sound noisy to me. Will have to ask my brother is he has a corded phone to test with.

I can't get back there till the end of next week, probably.

[#8]

@Mav

perhaps a stupid question but was the old router removed left at least 45 minutes and then the new one plugged in or was it a relatively quick switch over (under 5 minutes) ?

also did you just replace the router box or the leads and psu as well ? I have in the past just swapped the box and transferred a fault (it was the second box swap with the same fault that pointed me at the accessories)

[#9]

A quick update...

Two Sky engineers arrived this morning with a new router to install. Before they did that they opened up the BT socket and disconnected several wires including the bell wire and  things were back to normal.

If it wasn't for the fact that everything had worked without issue prior to this problem I would have considered the bell wire and disconnected it myself. Maybe someone with more knowledge could explain possible reasons it would suddenly start to cause issues...or maybe it was just a coincidence?

Anyway speed back to 5MB and NM at 7.7dB although the Attenuation is now 52. I may try the old Sky router just to see if that still reports Att of 47 and can squeeze a bit more out of the connection.

[#10]

its possible that someone else noticed a problem caused by the router and checked the socket then inadvertently followed a really old wiring diagram and connected up all the wires and that seemed to fix the problem of no connection but created the really poor connection ....

or its possible that one of many BT network upgrades caused the problem but the wires had all been in place for the entire time as its an adsl connection who knows.

[#11]

Definitely not the former