Virgin Media Community

[SCA1972]

Thanks for the input @griffin. James did post a screenshot of the log but the mods have rejected it.  It had four entries, two T3 errors and a couple of DHCP warnings which don't look significant to me. I wasn't sure about the upstream and was kinda clutching at straws.

I agree that the lack of corroboration of the dropouts from a wired devices makes it difficult, but I feel the staff input on this thread so far has been poor so I think the least they can do is check James's connection and rule out any issues on their side.

______________________
Scott

[griffin]

I have just taken a look at the logs myself and agree with your assessment.

You are right, the inability of staff to query James's hub and the CMTS is very poor and it is very hard to understand why VM have removed this asset from the Forum staff, whilst it was a matter of course for the sacked Swansea team, which would have shortened this thread, saving time for the OP and Forum staff.

[Sonofkong]

Hi Griffin. 

Thanks for replying. 

I’ll move the hub away from my modem and see if that helps. The issues started a while back. We used to be on the 200Mbps connection and I downgraded to 100 and then we started getting issues. We were told that it was to do with the fact that 100 can only handle up to 10 devices so we went back to 200, but the issues remain. It’s very frustrating as the fault is intermittent so calling their IT helpline doesn’t work. 

[griffin]

Let's put the number of devices to bed first.

The package you are on is basically the size of the pipe to the internet and the pipe is used to feed all your devices.
So, the pipe is a shared resource, if you have 10 devices connected, each device should get 10Mbps each on a 100Mbps package.
You shouldn't be experiencing disconnections, just slow speeds.

The Hub's wireless radios (2.4 GHz and 5 GHz ) are also a shared resource as only one device can talk to a radio at a time.
The more devices connected to a radio, the slower that network will become as each device will have to queue to talk to the Hub.
If a device has to queue too long to talk to the Hub, it will drop the connection.

It is a bit more complicated when you consider that a client cannot talk to the Hub if a neighbouring wireless network is broadcasting on the same channel at the same time.A client will be sharing airtime with not just clients on your network, but also with all devices on networks in range, broadcasting on the same wireless channel.

There are a couple of things you can do to offset this, like balancing the number of devices between the 2.4GHz and 5GHz network, setting the Hub to use less congested (non overlapping) channels, or additional Wireless Access Points. You will need to separate the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands as advised above to load split.

Being late to the party I have reread your OP, and the connected but no internet message could suggest a local circuit drop, but without collaboration  with a wired device, hard to say. (there are many other reasons)
Starting a Broadband Quality Monitor may shed some light. However, will be no substitute for VM checking your connection and FECs.

I would split the SSIDs as advised (if not already done so) and turn off channel optimisation.

Maybe you could also provide a bit more detail on  issues you are having, exactly what issues you are experiencing, on which devices, the band they are connected to and what error messages you are getting.
I am afraid wireless and broadband can be complex  so as much info as possible can help.

[Sonofkong]

Hi Griffin.

So essentially what is happening is, a device will be connected to the network, say my mobile and you’ll try to go online or onto Facebook or anything requiring connection to the internet and it’ll just hang. This doesn’t happen all the time but it’s definitely a daily occurrence. 

Typically now I just leave the WiFi turned off on my mobile and stick to 4G. This also happens on my wife’s phone, the Amazon Echo, occasionally the fire stick and also the iPad. It is almost like the devices are hustling for bandwidth as there’s no pattern to the issue. 

I’m afraid I have no way of hardwiring any device that I could test with. We don’t own a laptop and my Mac hasn’t been fired up in years. 

In all honesty, I’m getting to the point where I just want to call and cancel the whole thing and go elsewhere. I’ve had more help from you kind people than I’ve had from Virgin. 

[griffin]

Intermittent issues like you are experiencing can be hard to pin down, so a few diagnostics is needed.

Now maybe a good time to dust off the old Mac to test the internet connection. The Hub stats are showing a lot of Pre RS errors, but as they are all being corrected they should not be an issue, so testing wired would help to see if thee is a bit of a glitch on the connection as the downstream isn't quite as clean as it should be.

On the wireless side, did you separate the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands and turn off the Channel optimisation as JBrennand advised earlier?
Are you using the 2.4 GHz or 5 GHz band?

[Rachael_F]

Hi Sonofkong,

I'm really sorry that this is ongoing. Thank you for flagging this to us again, Scott!

I've had a look at your services from our end and haven't been able to identify any major issues. All your up- and downstream levels are reporting within expected parameters, and there don't appear to be any area issues. It does look like there might be a little bit of congestion around peak times, but nothing out of the ordinary and certainly nothing to be causing such a major issue.

I'd agree with griffin that a wired test (or a handful) would really help us to narrow this down further. Would you be able to dig out your Mac to run some checks on speedtest.net? It would also be handy to know whether this drops connection at the same time as wireless devices.

In fact, have you noticed whether all devices stop working at once, or is it sporadic? Could you also confirm whether the lights on the front of your hub change when you're unable to access the internet?

It does look like there may be a device or two which are too close to the hub and causing interference. Is there anything which could be moved away or connected via ethernet instead of wifi to reduce the queuing also mentioned by griffin and reduce the strain on the network? jbrennand has previously mentioned our WiFi Wins which may help explain this if you're unsure.

Thanks,

Rachael

[Sonofkong]

Hi Rachel. Thanks for your help, but I cancelled our service today. 

I greatly appreciate all the help everyone’s given me on here, but it goes above and beyond what I should be doing just to be able to use my broadband. 

Again, thank you and keep up the good work you all do on here :0)

[Rachael_F]

Hi Sonofkong,

Thank you for getting back to me. I completely appreciate your frustration and I sincerely apologise that we've been unable to reach a suitable resolution for you. I suspect that it may be an issue somewhere with your console itself or the connections being used.

We'll be sorry to see you go but wish you all the best in your future endeavours. Please don't hesitate to give us a shout if you change your mind and we'll take another look. Take care and enjoy the rest of your evening 🙂

Thanks,

Rachael