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Hub 3 / Compal CH7465-LG (TG2492LG) and CGNV4 Latency Cause

Datalink
Up to speed

Good Day Ladies and Gentlemen,

Greetings from the other side of the pond, so to speak.  Over the last few weeks I've been perusing various user forums across North America and Europe for issues related to Intel Puma 6 modem latency.  Of those forums, your Hub 3 stands out as yet another Puma 6 based modem where users see continuous latency no matter what site is used or what online game is played. Considering all of the problems that are on the go, the following information should be of interest to all Hub 3, Compal CH7465-LG and Hitron CGNV4 modem users.  There is much more to post regarding this, so this is a start, to alert VM users as to the real cause of the latency and hopefully engage the VM engineering staff, via the forum staff, with Arris.  I am surprised to see that there has been no mention on this board of users from other ISPs who are suffering the exact same issues with their modems, so, this may come as a surprise to some, and possibly old news to others.

So, the short story ........

The Hub 3 / Compal CH7465-LG (TG2492LG) & Hiton CGNV4 modems are Intel Puma 6 / 6 Media Gateway (MG) based modems.  These modems exhibit high latency to the modem and high latency thru the modem.  The latency affects all IPV4 and IPV6 protocols, so it will be seen on every internet application and game.  The basic cause is the processing of the data packets thru a CPU software based process instead of thru the hardware processor / accelerator.  It appears that a higher priority task runs periodically, causing the packet processing to halt, and then resume.  This is observed as latency in applications and in ping tests to the modem and beyond.  For the last several weeks, Hitron, along with Intel and Rogers Communications in Canada have been addressing the latency issue within the Hitron CGNxxx series modems.  To date, only the IPV4 ICMP latency has been resolved.  Although this is only one protocol, it does show that a Puma 6MG modem is capable of using the hardware processor / accelerator with good results.  Currently Rogers is waiting for further firmware updates from Hitron which should include an expanded list of resolved protocol latency issues.  For Arris modems, "Netdog" an Arris engineer indicated last week that Arris was onboard to address the issue for the Arris SB6190 modem.  That should be considered as good news for any Arris modem (read Hub 3) user as Arris should be able to port those changes over to other Puma 6/6MG modems fairly quickly.  This is not a trivial exercise and will probably take several weeks to accomplish.  Note that there is no guarantee at this point that it is possible to shift all packet processing to the hardware processor / accelerator without suffering from any packet loss side effects.  Time will tell if all of the technical issues can be resolved with the current hardware included in the Puma 6/6MG chipset.  Last night, Netdog loaded beta firmware on selected test modems on the Comcast Communications network.  As this was only done last night, it's too soon to tell what this version resolves and if it was successful or not.  Netdog has contacts with staff at Comcast, Rogers, Charter and Cox Communications to fan out beta versions and modifications for testing.  I'd say its time to add Virgin Media and/or Liberty Global to that group as well.

Recent activity:

Approx three weeks ago a DSLReports user, xymox1 started a thread where he reported high latency to an Arris SB6190 and illustrated that with numerous MultiPing plots.  This is the same latency that I and other users with Rogers communications have been dealing with for months so it came as no surprise.  As well as reporting via that thread, xymox1 took it upon himself to email several staff members at Arris, Intel, Cablelabs and others.  The result of that campaign was Netdog's announcement, last week, that Arris was fully engaged at resolving the issue.  That has led to last nights release of beta firmware, although as I indicated its too early to determine what the beta firmware resolves, if anything.


The original thread that xymox1 started is here:

https://www.dslreports.com/forum/r31079834-ALL-SB6190-is-a-terrible-modem-Intel-Puma-6-MaxLinear-mis...


Yesterday, DSLReports issued a news story covering the thread:

https://www.dslreports.com/shownews/The-Arris-SB6190-Modem-Puma-6-Chipset-Have-Some-Major-Issues-138...


Today, Arris responded:

https://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Arris-Tells-us-Its-Working-With-Intel-on-SB6190-Puma6-Problems-1...


That response was also picked by Multichannel.com

http://www.multichannel.com/news/distribution/intel-arris-working-firmware-fix-sb6190-modem/409379

This is more news likely to appear in the next few days as additional tech and news staff pick up on this issue.


Hub 3 observations:

Like many others using a Puma 6/6MG modem, Hub 3 users are experiencing latency when they ping the modem, or ping a target outside of the home, game online or use low latency applications.  The common misconception is that this is Buffer Bloat. It's not. Its most likely a case of the packet processing stopping while the CPU processes a higher priority task.  The packet processing is done via the CPU no matter what mode the modem is operating in, modem mode or router mode and no matter what IPV4 or IPV6 protocol is used.  Normally, the latency is just that, latency.  The exception are UDP packets. In this case there is latency and packet loss.  The result of that is delayed and failed DNS lookups, and poor game performance for games that use UDP for player/server comms or player/player comms.


Can this be fixed?

So far, it appears that the answer is yes.  Rogers Communications issued beta firmware to a small group of test modems in October.  This version shifted the IPV4 ICMP processing from the CPU to the hardware processor / accelerator, resulting in greatly improved performance in ping latency.  At the present time we are waiting for the next version firmware which should shift other protocols over to the hardware processor / accelerator.  That can be seen in the following post:

http://communityforums.rogers.com/t5/forums/forumtopicpage/board-id/Getting_connected/message-id/369...

The details and results of last nights beta release to the Comcast group have yet to be seen.

At this point there is enough reading to keep most staff and users busy.  My intention is to post some of the history leading up to this point and instructions on how to detect the latency and packet loss.  This is not thru the use of a BQM.  I had hoped to post this all at once but events are moving much faster than I had thought they would.  For now this should suffice to get the ball rolling.

Below is a link to a post with a couple of HrPing plots from my 32 channel modem to the connected CMTS.  This shows the latency that is observed and reflects what others have posted in this forum using Pingplotter and HrPing.

https://www.dslreports.com/forum/r31106550-

HrPing is one of the freebie applications that can be used to monitor the latency to and thru the modem. 

Pingplots with Pingplotter which show the latency from my modem to the CMTS can be found in the first two to three rows of my online image library at Rogers Communications, located below.  They are essentially what the BQM would look like if you were able to zoom into the plot to the point where you could see the individual ping spikes.  Those ping spikes are common to Puma 6 and Puma 6MG modems.

http://communityforums.rogers.com/t5/media/gallerypage/user-id/829158

 

 

 [MOD EDIT: Subject heading changed to assist community]

4,478 REPLIES 4,478


@RidingTheFlow wrote:

Well, I've also managed to get SuperHub 2AC back (details on how I've lost it and what transpired in my own thread - http://community.virginmedia.com/t5/QuickStart-set-up-and/Hard-to-pinpoint-daily-connection-sync-dis...). Its a joy finally to be able use Citrix without cursor moving at like 10fps.

My written complaint was processed and I've got a call from head office last Friday. 


Fantastic news, and congratulations!

Thanks for sharing too. Really quite encouraging to unequivocally hear the SH2 re-activation can be done. If I'm being honest, a part of me was briefly tempted to tease the few posters earlier in this thread. You know, the ones that repeatedly insisted that an SH2 activation happening was almost a factual impossibility of nature itself. And of course, delivered with haughty obstinance that'd make a bureaucrat blush. But I digress ... 🙂

So this has given me a bit of boost to go on a letter writing foray!

Would you be comfortable sharing how to go about getting contact details for the CEO's office?

 


@astrohominis wrote:

@RidingTheFlow wrote:

Well, I've also managed to get SuperHub 2AC back (details on how I've lost it and what transpired in my own thread - http://community.virginmedia.com/t5/QuickStart-set-up-and/Hard-to-pinpoint-daily-connection-sync-dis...). Its a joy finally to be able use Citrix without cursor moving at like 10fps.

My written complaint was processed and I've got a call from head office last Friday. 


Fantastic news, and congratulations!

Thanks for sharing too. Really quite encouraging to unequivocally hear the SH2 re-activation can be done. If I'm being honest, a part of me was briefly tempted to tease the few posters earlier in this thread. You know, the ones that repeatedly insisted that an SH2 activation happening was almost a factual impossibility of nature itself. And of course, delivered with haughty obstinance that'd make a bureaucrat blush. But I digress ... 🙂

So this has given me a bit of boost to go on a letter writing foray!

Would you be comfortable sharing how to go about getting contact details for the CEO's office?


I got a call from them on literally the same day they must have received my letter. By that point I'd already had friendly engineer install a SH2AC for me, so no need to pursue it.

CEO's office - just look up virgin media complaints:

http://store.virginmedia.com/content/dam/eSales/Downloads/Consumer%20Complaint%20Code%20of%20Practic...

Complaints, Virgin Media, PO Box 333, Matrix Court, Swansea, SA7 9ZJ



I'll eat my hat, although to be pedantic it's not quite as simple as buy off eBay and activate or ask and you shall receive scenario, but fair play to people.

Now where's this trial? 😛
--------------------------------------------------------
Look behind you, a three-headed monkey


@astrohominis wrote:

So this has given me a bit of boost to go on a letter writing foray!

Would you be comfortable sharing how to go about getting contact details for the CEO's office?


It was posted a bit earlier in this thread - http://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Gaming-Support/Hub-3-Compal-CH7465-LG-TG2492LG-and-CGNV4-Latency...

Not sure if its better or worse address than complaints P/O. CEO office takes longer to respond, and they may just forward one to another, but who knows.

Issue with eBay-bought hubs (for VM) is not difficulty of activation (they could activate them technically in same way just by entering MAC), but by having to prove that hub (which they can't physically check) is indeed authorised and not some cloned/dodgy/tampered with.

 

I don't know if it was within this thread (or even on this forum) but someone recently posted that SH2 reactivations can be done, but only by the CEO office. The normal staff can't override the system to reactivate a SH2AC once a SH3 has been activated by the customer.

Scouts
On our wavelength

@cje85 wrote:

I don't know if it was within this thread (or even on this forum) but someone recently posted that SH2 reactivations can be done, but only by the CEO office. The normal staff can't override the system to reactivate a SH2AC once a SH3 has been activated by the customer.



That's not true. Last Saturday an engineer attended, explained what had happened to him, he went to his van, got a SH2 that from a previous customer and got it switched over to my account.

cje85
Trouble shooter

Scouts
On our wavelength

@cje85 wrote:
The information is from the first two posts on this page:

http://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Gaming-Support/Hub-3-Compal-CH7465-LG-TG2492LG-and-CGNV4-Latency...

It may have been posted but the engineer did it. I think it was recently removed from someone else, but the engineer got it assigned to himself whilst he was here, got the mac address switched and it's now active on my account, allowing me to post this. I listened to his phone calls. 


@cje85 wrote:

The normal staff can't override the system to reactivate a SH2AC once a SH3 has been activated by the customer.


Some of them claim so, but this is either a lie or ignorance. You can ignore my earlier post - because apparently it was based on whatever misinformation they've fed me at this time back.

I've called normal activation line today, certainly not CEO office.

Also numerous people reactivated the SH2 they kept when upgraded, also by just calling normal activation guys.

CEO office may have just gave them bit of encouragement to actually send SH2 to me (before they claimed that this is impossible too).

 


@Scouts wrote:

CEO's office - just look up virgin media complaints:

http://store.virginmedia.com/content/dam/eSales/Downloads/Consumer%20Complaint%20Code%20of%20Practic...

Complaints, Virgin Media, PO Box 333, Matrix Court, Swansea, SA7 9ZJ


@RidingTheFlow wrote:

Not sure if its better or worse address than complaints P/O. CEO office takes longer to respond, and they may just forward one to another, but who knows.

Issue with eBay-bought hubs (for VM) is not difficulty of activation (they could activate them technically in same way just by entering MAC), but by having to prove that hub (which they can't physically check) is indeed authorised and not some cloned/dodgy/tampered with.

It was posted a bit earlier in this thread - http://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Gaming-Support/Hub-3-Compal-CH7465-LG-TG2492LG-and-CGNV4-Latency...

Thanks, I missed that.

As for refurbished being more 'legit' than an SH2 off eBay. That could be the case of course. However, practically speaking how would preventing eBayed SH2's stop someone from cloning / hacking there own SH2s and thereby delegitimizing 'approved' devices?

I recall seeing VM had issues with cloners back in 2009, but it still seems they clamped down in a bit of an over-reaction. I mean maybe 1500 users getting around speed limits out of millions of users? Maybe instead of going after users they should tighten backend security. Placing trust on the client side is invariably a poor design decision.

Many other giant ISP's allow customers own equipment on the network, without all hell breaking loose.. 😛