line problems...?

zynaps

I've been a nolimits user for about 2 years, and have been getting 48k, 49.2k and 50.6k most of the time over the last few months since moving into our new house in Cabra, though the odd time I'd get 31.2k for no obvious reason, since I'd hang up on the spot and reconnect to get 48-50k.

That is until this Saturday... since then, I haven't once connected beyond 31.2k.
I assumed it was esat's fault, and waited a bit, but it's basically Tuesday morning now, and I still can't connect beyond that.

I then got access numbers for eircom net and oceanfree, which both connect at the exact same speed, 31.2k.

It's hard to believe my line quality has suddenly dropped substantially over the weekend, but I'm gonna have to get eircom to do a line test now.

Does anyone know of anything I can do to locate possible problems on my line, without having to get eircom to send engineers out if the test fails, and charge us 60 euro or something if it's the wiring in the house?

It is fairly ganky wiring, with double adapter things hanging from doorways chaining the phone in the hall to the socket in this room, and something similar going on upstairs... but even with everything but this one unplugged I get the same.

Anyone got any ideas?

zynaps

zynaps

Huh... eircom's fault people tell me my line is perfect according to their test.

Anyone know why I might still be getting a really low connection speed?

Also, during both calls to eircom faults, I was informed that their USO does not cover data calls.
Is this blatantly untrue, as I've heard bitrate figures such as 9600 and 33600 bps bouncing around on irelandoffline?

zynaps

eth0_

Originally posted by zynaps

Also, during both calls to eircom faults, I was informed that their USO does not cover data calls.

It *does*, but they only have to guarantee a 9600 connection!
Basically you should never mention the internet when asking for a line test because 1/2 the time I don't think they even bother testing your line. You should always tell them there's a crackle on your line, or the person on the other end is hard to hear.

Did they try and sell you ISDN when you rang them, as a matter of interest?

zynaps

No, but they implied that they only guaranteed data quality on ISDN lines... as if I shouldn't expect a good connection because I had a PSTN line.

(edit edit)

Ahh.. I kinda hoped it wasn't this :P
I updated the modem driver on Saturday at some point as it kept crashing my xp machine.
Reinstalled the older driver a few minutes ago, and am now connected at 49.2kbps.

How embarrassing

Sorry lads!

zynaps

po0k

*cough*

Still, shows you how stuff can go wrong in windows.
Surely if the driver was wrong it would've connected at 31200 from the word go, the thing with connect once @ 31200 then reconnect @ 42 shouldn't have happened (logically).
Badly written drivers.

zynaps

More importantly, a modem driver shouldn't really give worse performance in newer versions...

Having to hop back down to an older driver to get proper connection speeds kinda makes Lucent look a bit crap. :P

zynaps

Chaos

Goes to show people shouldnt always assume the isp or the line is the fault....

spongebob

Originally posted by eth0_
It *does*, but they only have to guarantee a 9600 connection!
Basically you should never mention the internet when asking for a line test because 1/2 the time I don't think they even bother testing your line. You should always tell them there's a crackle on your line, or the person on the other end is hard to hear.

Good advice. Dont mention extensions either , tell them theres only the one inside the door (that they would have installed)

The Guaranteed USO rate is 2400 for FULL DUPLEX data and 9600 for HALF DUPLEX Fax

M

zynaps

Originally posted by Chaos
Goes to show people shouldnt always assume the isp or the line is the fault....

Well, esat went down bigtime over the weekend, which is about when I installed the 'new' driver.
It didn't seem likely to me that a newer driver would be what was causing me to have bad connections, but... ye live and learn

zynaps