Virgin Media Community

[Helen_s]

Hi,

I have looked at a few posts related to speed issues and gone about setting up a BQM and run some ping tests.  I think, from comparing my figures to views online and in this community, that my latency is high.

I run the Virgin Hub3.0 as a modem and use a Tplink AX50 for other network aspects, which I upgraded to from my old router.  I also have 4 PowerLans running to try and remove WiFi for a couple of work laptops, a "Zwift" PC and the TV.

For example:

Pinging www.google.com [172.217.169.68] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 172.217.169.68: bytes=32 time=686ms TTL=115
Reply from 172.217.169.68: bytes=32 time=927ms TTL=115
Reply from 172.217.169.68: bytes=32 time=700ms TTL=115
Reply from 172.217.169.68: bytes=32 time=519ms TTL=115

Ping statistics for 172.217.169.68:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 519ms, Maximum = 927ms, Average = 708ms

I ran this on one other machine too and got similar figures.  I will go about testing on wifi / direct connection to router / PowerLan connection, etc... but need to wait for the end of our 'working' day here at home.

Can anyone help me work out how to rule out issues.

[Andruser]

Setup a BQM over at https://www.thinkbroadband.com/broadband/monitoring/quality that'll show what's going on with your VM connection.  Post a link to a live, shared graph here and we'll see what's happening.  Usually needs to run for 24 hours before we can draw reasonable conclusions, but the live graph will continuously update so you can do that immediately.

Whilst it could be power or noise problems (which we can move on to look at if needed), I would caution that at the moment VM are suffering more than most ISPs because of Covid, which is creating congestion issues on the cable network upstream in quite a few areas.  If it does turn out to be this, then the "cure" is a return to normal working and schooling patterns, because generally speaking there's nothing VM can do in the short term, and even if the money (lots of it) were available, to solve the problem would take longer than the probable timescale for a return to normality.

[Andruser]

Oh, and make sure the AX50 is configured to respond to ICMP test packets, because that's required to generate a BQM.

[Helen_s]

Thanks for a very quick reply. I am chuffed to say I got all that set up, I think.  Only been running for an hour or so and I totally 'get' that we ned to have a reasonable 'period' to look for any trend/issues.  I found the FAQ for reading graphs illuminating.

So I think this is a link that will get access to it:

https://www.thinkbroadband.com/broadband/monitoring/quality/share/01da28cde0daf82ee17d9f9aceea3df78d378b65

Many thanks,

Krishen

[Helen_s]

I have just turned off a few devices, and seen a marked (positive) change in the graph output.  So I will try and self-diagnose if there is a particular device causing a problem - this will obviously mess with the graph output so I thought I'd say what is going on... 🙂

[Helen_s]

Ok. I'm a lot better now. the realtime logging site identified in this forum really helped. So much more useful than a raw speed check, I felt.

Krishen