Five months.....

[#1]

Really sorry to hear the problem has returned.

It looks like the scaffolding work has been completed. As you're still having issues, and since it's been ongoing for quite some time I've raised an escalation with BT Wholesale.

We'd expect an update within the next 4 hours. Our faults team will aim to pick up this ticket within 24 hours.

I apologise for the inconvenience caused.

[#2]

Be interesting to know when the scaffolding work was completed - because apart from the cabinet visit a week ago last wednesday there hasn't been any disruption of any length to my service, and the BT engineer who arranged the scaffolding implied that they'd be dropping a whole new line back to my house.. and even if they've not done that they were supposed to be remaking some connections which unless they've done it in a matter of seconds.....

Also I'm now being told that my line is testing within profile...As you can see my connection has dropped by nearly 6Mbit since the disconnect on Friday... so why has my profile been downgraded?

I'm also fascinated by this bit of conversion between PN and BT:

10:46:35):
I have just checked that VLAN and it is green on the capacity report and well under threshold on real time checker, do you still want it moving

(10:49:33):
Ok I shall do that for you now, if that doesn't work then maybe book an SFI. I can see regular interference being detected at the customers premise.

So BT can see regular interference being detected?

[#3]

@SteveA wrote:

Be interesting to know when the scaffolding work was completed - because apart from the cabinet visit a week ago last wednesday there hasn't been any disruption of any length to my service, and the BT engineer who arranged the scaffolding implied that they'd be dropping a whole new line back to my house.. and even if they've not done that they were supposed to be remaking some connections which unless they've done it in a matter of seconds.....

I was advised by the BTW agent that it was completed on the 14th June.

@SteveA wrote:
Also I'm now being told that my line is testing within profile...As you can see my connection has dropped by nearly 6Mbit since the disconnect on Friday... so why has my profile been downgraded?

Unfortunately, speed estimates can change.

We simply view these at www.dslchecker.bt.com

It's likely due to the quality of the line.

@SteveA wrote:
I'm also fascinated by this bit of conversion between PN and BT:

10:46:35):
I have just checked that VLAN and it is green on the capacity report and well under threshold on real time checker, do you still want it moving

(10:49:33):
Ok I shall do that for you now, if that doesn't work then maybe book an SFI. I can see regular interference being detected at the customers premise.

So BT can see regular interference being detected?

Whilst we too can see that when testing your service, as far as I'm aware it's not really entirely accurate and we don't base a fault on that.

[#4]

So the 14th was when BTOR went to the cabinet - so I guess he did the work on the pole at the same time (still impressed that they got the scaffolding up in the morning before he got there and got it removed before we got home that evening)

But the notes on the ticket from 22/6 state:

Service is now restored for the end customer and the line is testing ok to standards set. We need to make a subsequent visit to rectify an observed issue which is non- service impacting. The work required is Scaffolding is required to fix fault at top of dp and is located at Dp. The line has been proven good to the PCP. The test towards the end customer was inconclusive

So was it done or wasn't it?

It's likely due to the quality of the line.

Err - this is the line that has had so much work done it its basically been rebuilt... but apparently can deteriorate rapidly - surely a sudden drop in sync rate like that indicates a problem?

22:45:04, 30 May.    (2942609.050000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=40714Kbps, Up Rate=7198Kbps; SNR Margin Down=6.0dB, Up=5.9dB
06:16:42, 01 Jun.    (3056105.770000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=40714Kbps, Up Rate=7198Kbps; SNR Margin Down=7.5dB, Up=5.9dB
16:57:28, 02 Jun.    (3180950.220000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=43269Kbps, Up Rate=7083Kbps; SNR Margin Down=5.9dB, Up=6.0dB
10:54:41, 03 Jun.    (3245583.450000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=41030Kbps, Up Rate=7134Kbps; SNR Margin Down=6.0dB, Up=6.0dB
09:27:33, 06 Jun.    (3499554.540000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=41030Kbps, Up Rate=7134Kbps; SNR Margin Down=7.0dB, Up=6.2dB
13:30:40, 12 Jun.    ( 127.610000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=42030Kbps, Up Rate=7217Kbps; SNR Margin Down=5.4dB, Up=6.0dB
11:29:28, 14 Jun.    (162041.210000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=42719Kbps, Up Rate=7154Kbps; SNR Margin Down=6.1dB, Up=6.0dB
10:22:34, 16 Jun.    (330824.540000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=43057Kbps, Up Rate=7193Kbps; SNR Margin Down=6.2dB, Up=6.0dB
01:06:33, 23 Jun.    (902259.520000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=43057Kbps, Up Rate=7193Kbps; SNR Margin Down=6.0dB, Up=5.3dB
16:23:22, 24 Jun.    (1043666.550000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=37241Kbps, Up Rate=7020Kbps; SNR Margin Down=6.1dB, Up=5.9dB

2nd June - engineer visit. Wiring worked on. Connect speed increases.

12th June - Engineer visit. Wiring worked on and Master Socket replaced (again) . Connection speed increases back toward where it was on the 2nd

14th of June was when the BTOR did whatever he did

16th June - No idea .. this is one of the times when PTM seems to go down for no reason

23rd of June was when the VLAN was changed - which as you'd expect didn't do anything to the sync speed.

Then on the 24th the line speed just drops by 13% and apparently that's perfectly normal?

I just feel that I'm being given the run-around here by both Plusnet AND BTOR....

[#5]

I appreciate your frustration but we're simply passing on information we've received from our suppliers.

To clarify, the engineer from the 12th June left those job notes. My colleague contacted BTW for an update on the 13th June, and they advised us that the work is in progress.

On the 22nd June 20th June, I copied and pasted the job notes for you as requested. I contacted BTW yesterday and they advised the work was completed on the 14th June.

Speed estimates can drop from time to time and unfortunately there's little we can do to investigate that. As you're still having problems with your IPTV service, it's likely we'll need to arrange another engineer visit.

Our faults team should get back to you shortly.

I hope this helps clarify things.

[#6]

1:09pm, Monday 26 Jun 2017

Dear Mr Atty,

Thanks for contacting us via our community forums

.......

We'd expect an update within the next 4 hours. Our faults team will aim to pick up this ticket within 24 hours.

So 48 hours later.....

[#7]

And yet another engineer visit is needed.....

This has now reached the point of total farce...

[#8]

I'm really sorry for the inconvenience caused and the ongoing nature of the fault.

I've been updated unsuccessful to book the appt for the requested date, I've updated your ticket with more info.

[#9]

It will be interesting to see what BT feedback PN get.

Engineer turned up mid afternoon and did another set of line tests which produced no faults - line in good condition.

Notes on the ticket say :

Previous Work actioned:	TV fault VLAN moved and Errors reduced
Current Work to be actioned:	Lift and shift and E-side change needed

So he goes off to do a Lift and Shift... only to find out one has already been done a couple of weeks ago.... So it looks like that's another afternoon at home wasted...

But apparently he talked to someone who has seen this ticket and they said its a Multicast Issue (like I've been saying for ages) but PN have never raised it as a Multicast issue....so it's never "gone to the right team"

Last night the connection dropped and the red light came on on the router (I've NEVER seen it do that) and the Hub 1 was stating it had NO connectivity at all. Then when it came back after about 3 minutes I couldn't even get the IPTV channels to do anything at all:

I'm really not sure what the bleep was going on after the line came back up

I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion that there is a multicast issue and also something fundamentally faulty somewhere and BT and PN are never going to find it... unless someone leaves something connected to my line 24/7 monitoring it for issues.

[#10]

I think come Monday I will be looking at cancelling my PN services unless someone at PN / BTOR can actually fix my problem... I now have an unstable line:

15:48:49, 08 Jul. (157893.140000) PPPoE is down after 1394 minutes uptime [Waiting for Underlying Connection (WAN Ethernet 2 -​ Down)]

17:21:55, 08 Jul. (163478.860000) PPPoE is down after 90 minutes uptime [Waiting for Underlying Connection (WAN Ethernet 2 -​ Down)]

17:44:08, 08 Jul. (164811.970000) PPPoE is down after 20 minutes uptime [Waiting for Underlying Connection (WAN Ethernet 2 -​ Down)]

Interestingly enough we were watching something on the NOW App on the Youview Box and it didn't even notice any of these 2+ minute disconnects....so it obviously has a very large buffer!

[#11]

Connection stability such as this rather points to an intermittent line fault or REIN.

If this were ADSL I'd be recommending running router stats to constantly plot snrm.

[#12]

Router stats is running .... there was quite a drop for a while before the first disconnect... and no I've no idea what the spike up to 7 is at the start of the graph. And I've no idea why the SNR recovers when the line drops for the first time.

Line has traditionally been stable. When I've had drops before they've usually lasted a few seconds between PPPoE going down and coming back up. Now they take 2 to 3 minutes.

17:46:16, 08 Jul.	(164940.410000) WAN operating mode is VDSL
17:46:16, 08 Jul.	(164940.410000) Last WAN operating mode was VDSL
17:46:15, 08 Jul.	(164938.830000) PPP IPCP Send Configuration ACK
17:46:15, 08 Jul.	(164938.830000) PPP IPCP Receive Configuration Request
17:46:14, 08 Jul.	(164938.500000) PPP IPCP Receive Configuration ACK
17:46:14, 08 Jul.	(164938.490000) PPP IPCP Send Configuration Request
17:46:14, 08 Jul.	(164938.480000) PPP IPCP Receive Configuration NAK
17:46:14, 08 Jul.	(164938.440000) PPP IPCP Send Configuration Request
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164937.090000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=42484Kbps, Up Rate=6875Kbps; SNR Margin Down=5.9dB, Up=5.9dB
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164937.070000) CHAP authentication successful
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.920000) CHAP Receive Challenge
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.920000) Starting CHAP authentication with peer
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.920000) PPP LCP Receive Configuration ACK
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.910000) PPP LCP Send Configuration ACK
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.910000) PPP LCP Send Configuration Request
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.910000) PPP LCP Receive Configuration Request
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.620000) CHAP Receive Challenge
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.620000) Starting CHAP authentication with peer
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.620000) PPP LCP Receive Configuration ACK
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.620000) PPP LCP Send Configuration Request
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.610000) PPP LCP Receive Configuration Reject
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.610000) PPP LCP Send Configuration ACK
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.610000) PPP LCP Receive Configuration Request
17:46:13, 08 Jul.	(164936.610000) PPP LCP Send Configuration Request
17:44:37, 08 Jul.	(164841.570000) PTM over DSL is up
17:44:08, 08 Jul.	(164811.990000) PTM over DSL is down after 21 minutes uptime
17:44:08, 08 Jul.	(164811.970000) PPPoE is down after 20 minutes uptime [Waiting for Underlying Connection (WAN Ethernet 2 -​ Down)]
17:44:05, 08 Jul.	(164809.090000) PPP LCP Send Termination Request [User request]

Connection Speed

Max Data Rate

Line Attenuation

[#13]

Beautiful!

This does look
Like RFI - some spike switching event. The reason the the SNRM 'recovers' is that it sets to the TARGET for the line at a slower synch speed.

What's the sample interval? 10 seconds is really good for detailing the transgressions. Keep up the monitoring and see if you can correlate the drops with the use of electrical equipment - CH / fridge / freezer / lighting going on / off.

Will look at this again when I'm next on my PC.

[#14]

What's the sample interval? 10 seconds is really good for detailing the transgressions. Keep up the monitoring and see if you can correlate the drops with the use of electrical equipment - CH / fridge / freezer / lighting going on / off.

Its what ever the default is set to..... which was 30 seconds so I've put it down to 10.

There is no correlation and the Hub 1 is powered from a large mains filter  .. nothing has changed in the house and since yesterday its been stable (I've had it go several weeks without dropping and even with all the engineer visits and things going on its usually at least 5 days between drops) .

Does the PTM over DSL going down have any significance or is that just part of the PPPoE stack going down?

It would be interesting to know if anyone else on Cabinet 84 in Cheltenham is having similar issues

As part of the investigation in to packet loss and multi-cast break up I've actually had everything in the house turned off apart from the router, Youview box, TV and laptop. So if it is RFI then its coming from somewhere else.

This is what the SNR normally looks like (this is the last hour and a bit):

I also find the jump to 7 towards the start odd - that would imply that something got significantly better on my line for a very short while....

[#15]

Well I've found some of the problem

The Master socket (which has been replaced twice) is broken - the clips on one side don't work so the whole thing can wobble which means I can do this just by touching it :