Forum Discussion

djgeurn's avatar
djgeurn
On our wavelength
4 months ago

Help!!

Can one of the Mods or anyone please help me? I've had intermittent faults going on for what feels like about a year. Had a few new modems, engineers out 3 times and starting to lose faith in the Virgin service. I'm quite a heavy user in that I have maybe 60 odd devices connected and do use a lot of multimedia and large files over the network. It feels like the engineers that come out don't really understand the router or what the error messages mean on the router status page and as for the tech support team, well I cant bring myself to talk to them anymore. The symptoms are disconnects maybe 10 times a day, mostly brief but a pain, on speed tests we seem to be getting dropped packets (between 2 and 5%) on every test when connected to the wifi pod, if on the router itself it seems to be ok. Speeds vary, latency varies. On the Router page I notice a number of messages from DHCP errors maybe every other day to "US profile assignment change" which sometimes happens 20 times in one day, always swapping from one profile and back to the same one. Last engineer told me this was nothing to worry about but I definitely notice it degrading the experience. Then, maybe once or twice a week I get the router resetting out of the blue saying "Because of Kernel Panic". So frustrating because when it works it's great, but the inconsistency of it is making me pull my hair out.

Feels like it's a router problem first and foremost, but interested to hear people's thoughts? Also interested to know if people think a business connection with Virgin would see a better experience? IS it the same router? I work from home so on video calls a lot which is another challenge as the dropouts are a challenge! 

Can anyone help? And before you ask I've reset, rebooted tried all sorts. I work in IT so am fairly savvy although no network expert!

Any ideas welcome!

 

moderator
ModTeam

18 Replies

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  • jpeg1's avatar
    jpeg1
    Alessandro Volta
    4 months ago

    You need to post all the Hub stats here to be checked. 

    60 wifi devices really calls for better wifi equipment than the VM hub and a VM pod.  Good wifi equipment isn't expensive. 

    How are ethernet connected devices working? 

    VM business uses a different Hub but everything else is the same. 

    • djgeurn's avatar
      djgeurn
      On our wavelength
      4 months ago

      To be honest the Ethernet devices suffer too

  • legacy1's avatar
    legacy1
    Alessandro Volta
    4 months ago

    Looks like the hub is not fit for your use look to get your own router with 1Gb ports or better and put hub in modem mode.

  • Robert_P's avatar
    Robert_P
    Icon for Forum Team rankForum Team
    4 months ago

    Hello djgeurn

     

    We're sorry to hear of the connection issues experienced with your broadband service, we understand the frustration this can cause and appreciate you raising this via the forums.

     

    The number of devices you have is higher than most and could potentially cause problems depending on how many are active and using the connection at any time. From checking, quite a few of the devices show poor performance and a lot of these showing as offline.

     

    Currently, the speeds to the Hub are showing as averaging 1129Mbps download and 102Mbps upload, latency shows as 16.5ms and zero packet loss. There have been some disconnections over the last seven days up until 1.12am yesterday morning with none recorded since.

     

    I appreciate you have mentioned this has been going on for over a year, does the timings for the disconnections (particularly the last one) tally with the ones you have experienced? 

    • djgeurn's avatar
      djgeurn
      On our wavelength
      4 months ago

      you may see 1129Mbps but sometimes its down in the 300's. We've just had a really bad half hour, maybe you could investigate that?

    • djgeurn's avatar
      djgeurn
      On our wavelength
      3 months ago

      Hi Robert, can you review the updates and advise on a solution please?

  • jbrennand's avatar
    jbrennand
    Very Insightful Person
    4 months ago

    As others have said - you are a heavy user you need to get yourself a good quality router and wireless equipment.  These are not too expensive - just ask on here if you want some pointers and how much you are prepared to spend in the £50-500 range

  • djgeurn's avatar
    djgeurn
    On our wavelength
    4 months ago

    Thanks for the replies everyone. If anyone has experience of good alternatives? I have the superhub 5 and 2 pods, coverage is really good round the house and speed is not the issue per se. It's robustness and consistency that I need!

    Would the business hub give better results or is it worth me spending the £500??

    Open to advice !

     

    Thanks again

     

    • Salt-n-Pepper's avatar
      Salt-n-Pepper
      Joining in
      4 months ago

      The problem is that we have no way of knowing if the issue is internal, ie is it the Hub/pods or external, bad connection, cable fault. If the latter then you could spend £500 or £5000 on your own equipment and it won't make any difference.

      But as ‘jpeg1’ posted five days ago, you need to post up the status details and logs for the hub to see if it does indicate an external fault, otherwise nobody here can possibly advise.

    • jbrennand's avatar
      jbrennand
      Very Insightful Person
      4 months ago

      As said.. post up the connection details as per below so we can look for issues.

      Whatever that reveals I still believe you usage and 60+ connected devices needs a better router than that in a VM Hub.  In strip downs its been estimated to cost VM between £20-30.  That's for inbuilt modem, switch, router and wireless transmission - two of those would cost far more individually and have much better specs and able to connect >100 devices simultaneously.

      ______________________________________________________

       Post up your Hub/network connection details in the format below and someone will check to see if there is a problem there.  In your browser’s URL type in 192.168.0.1  if in router mode or 192.168.100.1 if in modem mode.     No need to log in - just click on the “Router Status” icon/text at bottom-middle (Hub3/4/5) or top/right (SH’s) - of the Login page.

           Then… Navigate to these “data pages” and just copy/paste the normal  “Formatted Text” (not images) 3 FULL sets of data onto here – 2 tables from the Downstream, 2 from the Upstream, &  the Network Logs pages.  Don't worry too much about the formatting it can be easily read & DON’T include personal data or MAC addresses - blank them out - if you copy/paste the data, the board software will do this for you (you may need to click the "submit" button again). If character limits are “exceeded” - just do two posts

      Also, If you haven’t already, set up a free, secure and “offlsite”  - “Broadband Quality Monitor” to continually monitor the state of your connection and record any true network dropouts , latency issues, packet drops, etc - it will thus allow you to differentiate between those and simple wifi dropouts.  It does it 24/7/365 and it keeps a visual record of any/all of your network disconnections, useful data to have to match to the Network logs (in your Hub settings) and also in discussions with VM - note it will take a few hours to start seeing a sensible picture - post up the “link” to the “share live graph”.  Click the lower link (Share Live Graph) then, click generate. Copy the text in the Direct Link box, beware, there may be more text than you can see.  On here click the Link icon (2 links chain to the left of the camera icon) In the URL box paste the link you copied and then click OK
       https://www.thinkbroadband.com/broadband/monitoring/quality

  • djgeurn's avatar
    djgeurn
    On our wavelength
    3 months ago

    So, update for you - I invested in an Asus router which seems to be working well. Seeing more robust connectivity and great speeds/latency and no packet loss. 

    However, still getting drops from the SH5 in Modem mode. here's what we're seeing on the SH page:-

    Time Priority Description

    18-02-2025 11:22:57 critical Unicast Maintenance Ranging attempted - No response - Retries exhausted;CM-MAC=

    18-02-2025 11:22:57 critical 16 consecutive T3 timeouts while trying to range on upstream channel 8;CM-MAC=a

    18-02-2025 11:21:49 critical Started Unicast Maintenance Ranging - No Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC==3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:21:06 critical Unicast Maintenance Ranging attempted - No response - Retries exhausted;CM-MAC=;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:21:06 critical 16 consecutive T3 timeouts while trying to range on upstream channel 4;CM-MAC=-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:20:42 critical Started Unicast Maintenance Ranging - No Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=aOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:20:23 critical No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:20:09 critical Started Unicast Maintenance Ranging - No Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:20:09 warning TCS Partial Service;CM-MAC=a-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:19:58 critical Started Unicast Maintenance Ranging - No Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=a;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:19:44 critical No Maintenance Broadcasts for Ranging opportunities received - T2 time-out;CM-MAC=a-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:19:43 critical No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:19:38 notice CM-STATUS message sent. Event Type Code: 4; Chan ID: 19 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38; DSID: N/A; MAC Addr: N/A; OFDM/OFDMA Profile ID: N/A.;CM-MAC=a7;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:19:31 critical No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:19:28 critical No Maintenance Broadcasts for Ranging opportunities received - T2 time-out;CM-MAC=a;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:19:10 warning MDD message timeout;CM-MAC=f;CMTS-MAC=;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 11:19:10 critical No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=a7;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    18-02-2025 00:50:35 error DHCP RENEW WARNING - Field invalid in response v4 option;CM-MAC=;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    16-02-2025 17:47:04 notice US profile assignment change. US Chan ID: 6; Previous Profile: 12 13; New Profile: 11 13.;CM-MAC=aCM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    16-02-2025 17:42:01 notice US profile assignment change. US Chan ID: 6; Previous Profile: 11 13; New Profile: 12 13.;CM-MAC=aCM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    15-02-2025 14:22:45 critical Unicast Maintenance Ranging attempted - No response - Retries exhausted;CM-MAC=;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    15-02-2025 14:22:45 critical 16 consecutive T3 timeouts while trying to range on upstream channel 8;CM-MAC=a;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    15-02-2025 14:21:37 critical Started Unicast Maintenance Ranging - No Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=a7;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    14-02-2025 12:50:34 error DHCP RENEW WARNING - Field invalid in response v4 option;CM-MAC=;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    13-02-2025 23:45:32 notice GUI Login Status - Login Success from LAN interface

    13-02-2025 15:18:32 notice US profile assignment change. US Chan ID: 6; Previous Profile: 12 13; New Profile: 11 13.;CM-MAC=7;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    13-02-2025 15:08:19 notice CM-STATUS message sent. Event Type Code: 5; Chan ID: 33; DSID: N/A; MAC Addr: N/A; OFDM/OFDMA Profile ID: N/A.;CM-MAC=a7;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    13-02-2025 15:08:15 notice US profile assignment change. US Chan ID: 6; Previous Profile: 11 13; New Profile: 12 13.;CM-MAC=7;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    13-02-2025 15:08:09 notice CM-STATUS message sent. Event Type Code: 4; Chan ID: 33; DSID: N/A; MAC Addr: N/A; OFDM/OFDMA Profile ID: N/A.;CM-MAC=a;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    13-02-2025 15:07:52 warning MDD message timeout;CM-MAC=a7;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    11-02-2025 00:50:32 error DHCP RENEW WARNING - Field invalid in response v4 option;CM-MAC=;CM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    10-02-2025 12:44:00 notice GUI Login Status - Login Success from LAN interface

    08-02-2025 16:15:33 critical Started Unicast Maintenance Ranging - No Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=aCM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    07-02-2025 12:50:31 error DHCP RENEW WARNING - Field invalid in response v4 option;CM-MAC=aCM-QOS=1.1;CM-VER=3.1;

    06-02-2025 23:45:00 notice GUI Login Status - Login Success from LAN interface

    06-02-2025 19:30:19 notice GUI Login Status - Login Success from LAN interface

  • djgeurn's avatar
    djgeurn
    On our wavelength
    3 months ago
    3.0 Upstream channels
     
    Channel Frequency (Hz) Power (dBmV) Symbol Rate (ksps) Modulation Channel ID
    0 49600000 43.3 5120 QAM 16 1
    1 43100000 43 5120 QAM 16 2
    2 36600000 43 5120 QAM 16 3
    3 30100000 42.8 5120 QAM 16 4
    4 23600000 42.5 5120 QAM 16 5
    3.0 Upstream channels
     
    Channel Channel Type T1 Timeouts T2 Timeouts T3 Timeouts T4 Timeouts
    0 ATDMA 0 2 5 0
    1 ATDMA 0 2 7 0
    2 ATDMA 0 2 21 0
    3 ATDMA 0 2 6 0
    4 ATDMA 0 2 6 0
    3.1 Upstream channels
     
    Channel Channel Width (MHz) Power (dBmV) FFT Type Modulation
    6 10.4 38.7 2K QAM 256
    3.1 Upstream channels
     
    Channel Channel Type Number of Active Subcarriers First Active Subcarrier (Hz) T3 Timeouts T4 Timeouts
    6 OFDMA 208 74000000 39 0
    • legacy1's avatar
      legacy1
      Alessandro Volta
      3 months ago

      you have low upstream Modulation and some timeouts

  • djgeurn's avatar
    djgeurn
    On our wavelength
    3 months ago
    3.0 Downstream channels
     
    Channel Frequency (Hz) Power (dBmV) SNR (dB) Modulation Channel ID
    1 258000000 7.6 41 QAM 256 16
    2 194000000 7.7 41 QAM 256 8
    3 202000000 7.6 41 QAM 256 9
    4 210000000 7.7 41 QAM 256 10
    5 218000000 7.6 41 QAM 256 11
    6 226000000 7.6 41 QAM 256 12
    7 234000000 7.6 41 QAM 256 13
    8 242000000 7.5 41 QAM 256 14
    9 250000000 7.5 41 QAM 256 15
    10 266000000 7.5 41 QAM 256 17
    11 274000000 7.4 41 QAM 256 18
    12 282000000 7.4 41 QAM 256 19
    13 290000000 7.5 41 QAM 256 20
    14 298000000 7.5 41 QAM 256 21
    15 306000000 7.5 41 QAM 256 22
    16 314000000 7.3 41 QAM 256 23
    17 322000000 7.2 41 QAM 256 24
    18 330000000 7 40 QAM 256 25
    19 338000000 7 40 QAM 256 26
    20 346000000 6.9 40 QAM 256 27
    21 354000000 7 40 QAM 256 28
    22 362000000 7.1 40 QAM 256 29
    23 370000000 7 40 QAM 256 30
    24 378000000 6.8 40 QAM 256 31
    25 386000000 6.7 40 QAM 256 32
    26 394000000 6.5 40 QAM 256 33
    27 402000000 6.5 40 QAM 256 34
    28 410000000 6.5 40 QAM 256 35
    29 418000000 6.5 40 QAM 256 36
    30 426000000 6.3 39 QAM 256 37
    31 434000000 6.1 39 QAM 256 38
    3.0 Downstream channels
     
    Channel Locked Status RxMER (dB) Pre RS Errors Post RS Errors
    1 Locked 41 59 358
    2 Locked 41 39 323
    3 Locked 41 38 158
    4 Locked 41 2265 27449
    5 Locked 41 1846 2081
    6 Locked 41 2214 26751
    7 Locked 41 1807 1530
    8 Locked 41 1836 1863
    9 Locked 41 2199 26976
    10 Locked 41 2177 26099
    11 Locked 41 2149 27026
    12 Locked 41 2057 28093
    13 Locked 41 2135 26447
    14 Locked 41 2145 26929
    15 Locked 41 2072 27534
    16 Locked 41 2098 27378
    17 Locked 41 2208 26788
    18 Locked 40 1986 26379
    19 Locked 40 2006 25883
    20 Locked 40 1988 2005
    21 Locked 40 1990 27323
    22 Locked 40 2101 25520
    23 Locked 40 2060 25868
    24 Locked 40 2099 23736
    25 Locked 40 1870 1538
    26 Locked 40 2145 23826
    27 Locked 40 2190 24088
    28 Locked 40 2162 24949
    29 Locked 40 2279 24856
    30 Locked 39 1385 1248
    31 Locked 39 2345 22164
    3.1 Downstream channels
     
    Channel Channel Width (MHz) FFT Type Number of Active Subcarriers Modulation (Active Profile) First Active Subcarrier (Hz)
    49 94 4K 1840 QAM 4096 1108
    3.1 Downstream channels
     
    Channel ID Locked Status RxMER Data (dB) PLC Power (dBmV) Corrected errors (Active Profile) Uncorrectable errors (Active Profile)
    49 Locked 38 4.0 3992746035 8415