BT trouble

quad_red

Hey all,
Been having problems with our broadband the last while. Last night I couldn't connect to the internet full stop. Skype didn't work and AVG couldn't update either.

Turned the 360 on to test that and it failed as well - it detected the line and got an ip address but the DNS step failed.

Now, I changed to open DNS on the laptop a while back so it probably isn't a DNS issue, correct?

Anyone have any ideas or tests I can perform?

Cheers,
Quad

(lets hope this isn't the beginning of something nasty )

vibe666

make sure you are using ONLY the opendns servers.

I tried it on mine and initially it was also using the ISP served DNS as well as opendns and this caused almost as many speed problems as just using the bt dns servers.

it's quite possible that your modem/router is still dishing out ISP served dns as well.

see if you can set the dns on your modem/router to only use opendns and then reboot modem/router and all connected clients. an "ipconfig/flushdns" followed by "ipconfig/registerdns" (without quotes) in dos might well move things along a bit more speedily too.

of course it might be some other connectivity issue.

my modem dies every few weeks for no reason (well, there is a reason, but it's kinda complicated) so a power cycle every so often won't do it any harm.

has anyone been doing any heavy p2p downloading recently on your connection? same sort of problems can arise from that too.

tbh there's so many possibilities you might not ever find the cause.

Eurorunner

Have heard mention of this 'opendns' recently with the couple of BT outages that occured. How do I go about switching to it?

Sculdugery

I had a problem aswell all of a sudden it said Server not Found and 360 didnt work either and after a good few calls i finnaly got a person who knew what he was doing. Check the ip address and see if thats right, i had to uninstall all avg adware spybot etc. and there was anothe thing called connect deleted that and rebooted and the bt page came up and it was back working but yours could be somethin else

Ciaran500

Eurorunner wrote:

Have heard mention of this 'opendns' recently with the couple of BT outages that occured. How do I go about switching to it?

http://www.opendns.com/

Instructions all on there.

quad_red

Cheers for the replies.

Well, I followed all the instructions from the OpenDNS site (changing the router settings etc.).

I plugged the router and booted up the laptop last night ready for action and.... well, it was all working again perfectly

This seems to be intermittent. It happened Thursday morning as well. We're very light users and don't use P2P. The network is WPA encrpyted so it's unlikely that it's been hacked.

Beta Bill

Hey I've been having a problem the last few weeks with BT Broadband. The service is intermittent and when I check the router the DSL is flashing which usually indicates the system fell over and is re-booting or something along those lines.

After much putting up with this I finally got around to trying to do something about it today.

Here's the interesting bit, I rang every goddamn BT number today and eventually was told that I needed to call 1890 923 111. Muggins rang the number about 8.14pm knowing full well they close at 9.00pm. As I got to about 8.50pm I suddenly had a terrible thought, after being told a million times I was in a queue and my call would be answered shortly it suddenly struck me that they were'nt going to answer my call at all. No, surely not, well guess what come 9.00pm I heard a click and that annoying message about going to anwser my call changed to "Our offices are now closed, blah blah blah". So there you go they dont at least clear those people waiting on line they just let them sit there and then dump them at 9pm. This is so TYPICAL of BT, you can rarely ring them that they dont say they are "experiencing an unusually high level of calls" hint hint expect a HUGE delay.

I'm sorry but I'm fed up with BT and am going to shop elsewhere. I've had them for years and its great they kicked Eircom up the ar*e but they've dropped the ball for sure.

Just hope I can post this before my Broadband connection drops again......


If BT is as good as it gets god help us all..............

generalmiaow

Our service has been dropping for about 2 minutes every hour and a half or so. The downstream DSL speed has dropped to 984 kbps (from the usual 3072) since yesterday (though upstream is still fine, strangely). I had contacted them to try and solve these issues, giving detailed outputs of adslctl commands and statistical observations about line status and the best I get is a "is your router plugged in" type email 2 weeks later. They are so hopeless. It's like trying to rent a car in baghdad or something.

rogue-entity

I give up on BTs DNS servers, I switched to OpenDNS, and I havent had a problem since then. And I have always had a rock-solid service from BT, except for two occasions when their PPoE server went down, and I couldnt connect, even though the line was synced.

Just to note, the blinking DSL light means that the modem is syncing with the exchange. If this is happening often, the modem is losing sync and this is an eircom problem.

I blame my good service on the fact that we have a really good quality line, less then 400m from the exchange. As for BT's customer service, well, they speak for themselves <_<

Linford

I am having problems with BT too at the moment. I have had no internet connection between 6.30pm and 10.30pm the last few nights. Its fine in the afternoon and its fine after 10.30pm. Anyone else experiencing similar problems?

Beta Bill

Right here's an update. I spent another 36 mins on hold on my mobile today such that my ear was burning from the heat of the phone. I gave up and rang their main number (BT). I picked sales because they always answer quickly when they want to bag more gullible customers! I got a quick answer as expected and explained the saga of last night (see earlier post) and again that I was getting no answer. Here's the best bit the girl said okay I will transfer you to the TOP OF THE QUEUE. Happy days got answered within a minute.

Now, the teckkie guy said their DNS servers are over capacity and they are working on it. Does this mean they have oversubscribed their broadband product or maybe a server is down. Either way I dont care I am paying for the service. They wont answer the tekkie helpline because they know why we are all calling - to COMPLAIN!

I hope sharing my experiences of BT over the last couple of days is of some comfort to my fellow consumers who as usual are treated like crap by big business in this country........

I dont mind automated answering systems when you know you have some hope of being treated like a customer... BT wake up and hire more staff and improve your service

dub45

Beta Bill wrote:

Right here's an update. I spent another 36 mins on hold on my mobile today such that my ear was burning from the heat of the phone. I

. BT wake up and hire more staff and improve your service

Sadly people have been echoing those sentiments for years now. For ages BT seemed to have really good bb and lousy customer service and billing but now with the bb itself apparently taking a dive in quality.........................:eek:

Gauge

Last time I rang BT with problems they told me to uninstall Service Pack 2 and it would fix them...

... what?!

quad_red

Gauge wrote:

Last time I rang BT with problems they told me to uninstall Service Pack 2 and it would fix them...
.. what?!

Jesus. If it wasn't so retarded it's be hilarious. :eek:

Well, ours is chugging along nicely again. <fingers crossed>

Dr. Dre

Gauge wrote:

Last time I rang BT with problems they told me to uninstall Service Pack 2 and it would fix them...

... what?!

Oh jesus christ.

parsi

OT but when UTV first started having their DNS issues (Server failed for 10 mins every hours at the exact same time) they told me that because it was a Mac I should get onto Apple...

watty

Yep. they probaly use the iDNS protocol

Auvers

My pings on BT are sh1te tonight on swords exchange

C:\ping www.heanet.ie

Pinging heanet.webhost.heanet.ie [193.1.219.79] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=148ms TTL=56
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=111ms TTL=56
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=115ms TTL=56
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=137ms TTL=56

Ping statistics for 193.1.219.79:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 111ms, Maximum = 148ms, Average = 127ms

Could someone check there ping and post there results please

cord

Hello
I Pinged 193.1.219.79 and 22ms, 21ms and 21ms. How do copy that data to screen? I am having the same probs with BT, except my internet LED is turning to red and blocking access.
Regards
Cord

Auvers

Cheers Cord but where are you living?

And to copy ping results you select all on the DOS command screen and then CTRL+C to copy and then paste with CTRL+V

ct5amr2ig1nfhp

BT Malahide exchange

Pinging 193.1.219.79 with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=21ms TTL=57
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=21ms TTL=57
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=21ms TTL=57
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=22ms TTL=57

Ping statistics for 193.1.219.79:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 21ms, Maximum = 22ms, Average = 21ms

quad_red

Hey. BT line from Subsidiary Exchange off Ship Street Exchange in Dublin 2.

C:\>ping www.heanet.ie

Pinging heanet.webhost.heanet.ie [193.1.219.79] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=19ms TTL=56
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=14ms TTL=56
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=25ms TTL=56
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=18ms TTL=56

Ping statistics for 193.1.219.79:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 14ms, Maximum = 25ms, Average = 19ms

C:\>

Auvers

Looks like everything is back to normal, but my regular wednesday night game of BF2 with the lads is wrecked

Pinging heanet.webhost.heanet.ie [193.1.219.79] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=11ms TTL=57
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=11ms TTL=57
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=11ms TTL=57
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=11ms TTL=57

Oh sorry for hijacking the thread.

cord

Hello Auvers
Also using the swords exchange
Regards
Cord

C:\>ping 193.1.219.79

Pinging 193.1.219.79 with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=23ms TTL=57
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=23ms TTL=57
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=21ms TTL=57
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=19ms TTL=57

Ping statistics for 193.1.219.79:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 19ms, Maximum = 23ms, Average = 21ms

C:\>

zilog_jones

I've noticed I often get disconnected (i.e. everything's down according to the modem) then reconnected promptly afterwards about once a day or so, though it's often when I'm not even using it. Besides that I haven't had any trouble with my connection.

Ping statistics for 193.1.219.79:
    Packets: Sent = 100, Received = 100, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 17ms, Maximum = 25ms, Average = 18ms

The DNS servers I'm getting assigned are 194.125.2.240 and 194.125.2.241. Is this what everyone else is on?

Now, the teckkie guy said their DNS servers are over capacity and they are working on it.

Wow, you got through to someone who actually had half a clue? Amazing!

Sam Vimes

while everyone's posting ping statistics:
Pinging 193.1.219.79 with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=13ms TTL=56
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=12ms TTL=56
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=13ms TTL=56
Reply from 193.1.219.79: bytes=32 time=13ms TTL=56

Ping statistics for 193.1.219.79:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 12ms, Maximum = 13ms, Average = 12ms


@zilog_jones

the dns servers i was connected to were:
168.95.1.1
139.175.55.244

but now i'm using opendns and i think the problem's solved. switch to that. does anyone know if this is going to be fixed soon? i've put up with crap customer care for years because the service was good but now that's gone to crap too. if it doesn't look like being resolved any time soon, can someone recommend a broadband provider, preferably with phone too?

zilog_jones

Can anyone else try the DNS servers I'm using? I've never had problems with them, and they're the ones I always get assigned by DHCP. Do BT have different name servers for different areas or something?