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Virgin Media Hub 3 Poor WiFi Signal

WolvesWillis
Tuning in

I've been a VM Customer for approx 10 years now and during the past year my WiFi signal around my house has been shockingly bad. I've contacted VM Customer Support on numerous occasions in an attempt to get to the bottom of this issue. I've relocated/rebooted/reset and even had the Hub3 replaced with a new one and still no real improvement. I have even recently tried one of those 'Evo' Mesh Network routers and placed the Hub3 in Modem mode, yet this has also showed no improvement.

My last call to VM Support was approx 1 month ago where I was advised to carry out yet another full reset of the Hub. I was also directed to the 'VM Connect' app to monitor signal strength in rooms. VM Support appeared to be clueless with this issue and said they would callback that same day after I carried out my check on the various areas, but as expected, no callback!

I'm really losing faith in the service provided by VM. Given them the benefit of the doubt in many cases. I do feel it would be beneficial if a Technician could check things out, as it baffles me at how poor things have gotten over the past year or so.

Please can I get some REAL support??

20 REPLIES 20

jbrennand
Very Insightful Person
Very Insightful Person
The community here can advise 🙂

Firstly... are the issues only evident on wifi connections or do you see them at the same times on devices connected on ethernet cables? If you don't know, can you check to help diagnose whether it is just a wifi issue or it could be network connection related?

What are the various Hub lights showing/doing when this happens?

The Hub3 wifi has never been great - there are a few things you can do to try and improve it - getting a Mesh is one that usually sorts it. What "Evo" mesh system is it - make & model?

--------------------
John
--------------------

I do not work for VM. My services: HD TV on VIP (+ Sky Sports & Movies & BT sport), x3 V6 boxes (1 wired, 2 on WiFi) Hub5 in modem mode with Apple Airport Extreme Router +2 Airport Express's & TP-Link Archer C64 WAP. On Volt 350Mbps, Talk Anytime Phone, x2 Mobile SIM only iPhones.

Hi John,

Thanks very much for replying to my query.

The issue is only with devices connected to WiFi, not those connected via Ethernet cables. For example; my Ring Doorbell and Blink security cameras are now inoperable due to the weak signal they're receiving. The hub lights all appear correctly lit (no change & checked by VM support). We live in a standard 3 bed end of terrace. Approx 15-20 devices connected (Alexa, Blink, Ring, Smart TV's, iPhones, iPads etc), but not all working at the same time. Like I said, the issue has only really been bad the past year or so. The previous 9 years with VM have been fine!

Regarding the Mesh item purchased, apologies I misspelled the product, it was actually the 'Amazon Eero mesh WiFi router/extender'. We ended up sending it back for a refund as it made no real difference.

jbrennand
Very Insightful Person
Very Insightful Person

OK. If ethernet connected devices are all fine, it may just be a wifi issue. Your wifi "environment" changes constantly as usage around you increases and other interfering devices start up around you.   There is a sequence to follow for setting up Mesh systems which if you didnt follow may be the reason it didnt help. If you do want to go that route again I would suggest you look at the TP-Link Deco M4 or M5's,  2 or 3 pack and we can tell you how to set it up properly.

But first see this for the Hub3..
________________________

If it is a wifi only issue, then on a Hub3/4, you can try separating the SSID's of the 2.4 and 5 GHz wifi bands by renaming them in the settings and at the same time switch off "channel optimisation/Smart wifi” “ apply and save the settings. All wifi devices will need reconnecting to the best SSID at each location. Also use a wifi scanning App to find the best wifi channels to use (just select and use channels 1,6,11 on 2.4GHz) - this often helps Hub3 users get better wifi performance - but its still no substitute for getting better kit 🙂

If you want to try that, I can post up the instructions in more detail if you arent sure how to

To address the wifi issues, VM now supply “wifi Pods” (no longer doing cheap and cheerless “boosters”). However, their Pods are only free to customers on the 1GB, Ultimate Oomph or Volt packages - is that you? If so they are worth trying - they should work for you.

If not… you will be charged £5/month. Its a simple solution and should work for you. However, you would soon pay off that cost by buying your own wireless solution that will be yours to own and use forever, but it isn’t the simple plug and play option of the Pod(s).

You would need to get either a… (1) Mesh System, (2) Wireless router, (3) Wireless access point (4) Powerline adapters (+/- inbuilt Wifi,) (5) A combination of (2,3,4).


--------------------
John
--------------------

I do not work for VM. My services: HD TV on VIP (+ Sky Sports & Movies & BT sport), x3 V6 boxes (1 wired, 2 on WiFi) Hub5 in modem mode with Apple Airport Extreme Router +2 Airport Express's & TP-Link Archer C64 WAP. On Volt 350Mbps, Talk Anytime Phone, x2 Mobile SIM only iPhones.

Hi John,

A few months ago I read up about separating the SSID as someone else mentioned this could help, in particular with devices located further away from the router (Ring/Blink Cam etc). These items were added to the 2.4Ghz, with other devices requiring and performing better under faster speeds (Console/TV etc) being assigned against the 5GHz....still this did not help, and in particular the Ring Doorbell and Camera didn't perform well and still showed "Weak Signal" on under the device settings. After my call to VM Support more recently I was asked to do a full reset and keep the SSID's merged, as apparently "devices automatically select the most suitable SSID to connect to".

I am really reluctant to spend more money on a system which was performing perfectly well over a year ago. The single Eero mesh router I bought from Amazon was already £55 and was a trial. I believe it was setup correctly and while I realise it would possibly work better with more than one Eero in the home, like I said, I really don't want to be wasting money on something that was already working perfectly fine. I don't believe much has changed with the environment and general usage, I can't think of any additional devices connected since and I've been working from home for almost two years now and was working fine during the first year of lockdown.

Basically, I just want to rule out if there is some kind of fault somewhere in the system/line/Hub!

jbrennand
Very Insightful Person
Very Insightful Person
Ok but if ethernet connetions are stable - I still think its more likely to be a wifi only issue, but post up the Hub data as below and we can see if anything shows there.....
_______________________________

In your browser’s URL box type in http://192.168.0.1 (or http://192.168.100.1 - if in modem mode) (DONT click these links) - and hit return. On the first page up dont login just click on the “router status” icon/text at bottom-middle (Hub3/4) or top/right (SH’s) of the Login page and then 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 page. 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

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

--------------------
John
--------------------

I do not work for VM. My services: HD TV on VIP (+ Sky Sports & Movies & BT sport), x3 V6 boxes (1 wired, 2 on WiFi) Hub5 in modem mode with Apple Airport Extreme Router +2 Airport Express's & TP-Link Archer C64 WAP. On Volt 350Mbps, Talk Anytime Phone, x2 Mobile SIM only iPhones.

Thanks again John for your help with this. Here is the data...

Downstream bonded channels

Channel

Frequency (Hz)

Power (dBmV)

SNR (dB)

Modulation

Channel ID

1

331000000

3.5

40

256 qam

25

2

267000000

-0.2

40

256 qam

17

3

275000000

0.7

40

256 qam

18

4

283000000

1.4

40

256 qam

19

5

291000000

1.4

40

256 qam

20

6

299000000

1.5

40

256 qam

21

7

307000000

1.9

40

256 qam

22

8

315000000

2.7

40

256 qam

23

9

323000000

3.2

40

256 qam

24

10

339000000

3.7

40

256 qam

26

11

347000000

3.5

40

256 qam

27

12

355000000

3.5

40

256 qam

28

13

363000000

3.4

40

256 qam

29

14

371000000

3.4

40

256 qam

30

15

379000000

3.4

40

256 qam

31

16

387000000

3.2

40

256 qam

32

17

395000000

3

40

256 qam

33

18

403000000

2.4

40

256 qam

34

19

411000000

1.9

40

256 qam

35

20

419000000

1.2

40

256 qam

36

21

427000000

1.4

40

256 qam

37

22

435000000

1.4

40

256 qam

38

23

443000000

1.2

40

256 qam

39

24

451000000

1.2

40

256 qam

40




Downstream bonded channels

Channel

Locked Status

RxMER (dB)

Pre RS Errors

Post RS Errors

1

Locked

40.9

22

0

2

Locked

40.3

6

0

3

Locked

40.3

21

0

4

Locked

40.9

11

0

5

Locked

40.9

10

0

6

Locked

40.3

23

0

7

Locked

40.3

23

0

8

Locked

40.3

15

0

9

Locked

40.9

14

0

10

Locked

40.3

47

0

11

Locked

40.3

58

0

12

Locked

40.9

75

0

13

Locked

40.3

60

0

14

Locked

40.9

69

0

15

Locked

40.3

105

0

16

Locked

40.9

71

0

17

Locked

40.3

93

0

18

Locked

40.3

107

0

19

Locked

40.3

165

0

20

Locked

40.3

181

0

21

Locked

40.9

144

0

22

Locked

40.3

173

0

23

Locked

40.3

218

0

24

Locked

40.3

244

0

 

Upstream bonded channels

Channel

Frequency (Hz)

Power (dBmV)

Symbol Rate (ksps)

Modulation

Channel ID

1

46200000

45.8

5120

64 qam

11

2

25800000

43.3

5120

64 qam

14

3

32600000

43.8

5120

64 qam

13

4

39400000

44.3

5120

64 qam

12




Upstream bonded channels

Channel

Channel Type

T1 Timeouts

T2 Timeouts

T3 Timeouts

T4 Timeouts

1

ATDMA

0

0

0

0

2

ATDMA

0

0

0

0

3

ATDMA

0

0

0

0

4

ATDMA

0

0

1

0

 

Network Log

Time

Priority

Description

15/02/2022 12:04:42

notice

LAN login Success;CM-MAC=***

15/02/2022 00:28:46

critical

No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=***

14/02/2022 18:16:3

notice

LAN login Success;CM-MAC=***

14/02/2022 04:10:28

critical

No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=***

13/02/2022 22:41:58

notice

LAN login Success;CM-MAC=***

13/02/2022 13:37:7

critical

No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=***

13/02/2022 13:37:7

critical

Unicast Ranging Received Abort Response - initializing MAC;CM-MAC=***

13/02/2022 13:36:47

critical

No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=***

13/02/2022 13:36:47

critical

Unicast Ranging Received Abort Response - initializing MAC;CM-MAC=***

12/02/2022 18:58:58

critical

No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=***

12/02/2022 17:17:13

notice

LAN login Success;CM-MAC=***

12/02/2022 14:24:44

critical

No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=***

11/02/2022 16:55:42

notice

LAN login Success;CM-MAC=***

11/02/2022 16:54:7

critical

No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=***

11/02/2022 13:58:12

notice

LAN login Success;CM-MAC=***

11/02/2022 12:00:55

critical

No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=***

11/02/2022 12:00:55

critical

Unicast Ranging Received Abort Response - initializing MAC;CM-MAC=***

11/02/2022 12:00:35

critical

No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=***

11/02/2022 12:00:35

critical

Unicast Ranging Received Abort Response - initializing MAC;CM-MAC=***

11/02/2022 12:00:15

critical

No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out;CM-MAC=***

 

As suggested, I've deleted the MAC details (replacing with ***). Hope this is all in order. I'd appreciate your thoughts!

jbrennand
Very Insightful Person
Very Insightful Person
Nothing leaping out as being amiss in there. Someone else will hopefully comment on the logs - but the odd T3 is not usually cause for concern.

Lets see the BQM as soon as.... - but my money is still on a wifi only issue 🙂 Happy to be contradicted.

--------------------
John
--------------------

I do not work for VM. My services: HD TV on VIP (+ Sky Sports & Movies & BT sport), x3 V6 boxes (1 wired, 2 on WiFi) Hub5 in modem mode with Apple Airport Extreme Router +2 Airport Express's & TP-Link Archer C64 WAP. On Volt 350Mbps, Talk Anytime Phone, x2 Mobile SIM only iPhones.

Hi John,

Below is a direct link to the BQM live graph. I'm sure you and others will make better sense of it than I...

https://www.thinkbroadband.com/broadband/monitoring/quality/share/5a90e9d875a300f50ee8de7672a2f565fe... 

Thanks again

jbrennand
Very Insightful Person
Very Insightful Person
Your BQM is either not populating the data yet (it is blank!) or your link is to the static shot of when you set it up. Post the link to"share live graph" - instructions are under the BQM on the TB website

--------------------
John
--------------------

I do not work for VM. My services: HD TV on VIP (+ Sky Sports & Movies & BT sport), x3 V6 boxes (1 wired, 2 on WiFi) Hub5 in modem mode with Apple Airport Extreme Router +2 Airport Express's & TP-Link Archer C64 WAP. On Volt 350Mbps, Talk Anytime Phone, x2 Mobile SIM only iPhones.