This topic

Lower speeds and different IP

prasadm — Sun, 27 Sep 2020 16:26:38 GMT

I have an Infinity connection and has had more or less a stable connection since the BT engineers cleaned up my connection and replaced the faceplate over an year and a half ago. My HH6 router is directly at the master faceplate and has no spurs from it.

I had a small issue early this year in April when the speed dropped but got sorted (I guess it may have been a loose connection at my router, but anyway the DLM brought the speed back to normal in few weeks as expected.)

My usual stable connection speed was around 44 Mbps, which since the above incident remained stable (42-43)

Suddenly about a week ago my speed dropped to 37. I checked quiet line test, no noise, but noticed an IP change from my previous and usual 86.x.x.x address to 109.x.x.x. I had seen this IP before occasionally when the DLM was correcting my line earlier this year. But when the line stabilised the IP also came back to 86.x.x.x. I would normally ignore the change of IP had it been a few days thinking it as probably due to network tests/diagnostics.

The problem I see now is, the speed still remains at 37, and the DSL checker page has also updated the speeds showing my max speed on the line dropping from 50 to 40 and handover speeds correspondingly dropping.

Attached please find the relevant screenshots. Please can anyone let me know if my line is being banded, if so why overnight drop of 5 MB speeds where my line is still capable of 43+. If it is a temporary phenomenon when system is performing tests, then I am prepared to ignore this, but if it is permanent then it is a bit concerning. Technically I do not understand the connection between the speed and the IP address (I assume the difference only shows I am being connected via a different network). I have not included the IP page screenshots, but can provide if required. Default gateway has always remained the same. As I gather from various internet sources, the VDSL noise margin is 6dB, but as you can see below, even after 7 days, the NM is above 6 and the maximum data rate is 47+ which has remained consistent all throughout by the way since early 2019.

My HH6 Statistics.

The DSL Checker data as it is shown now. I have marked the concerning bits in red.

DSL Data as previously shown

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

Keith_Beddoe — Sun, 27 Sep 2020 16:45:33 GMT

More people have been connected to your cabinet, so the crosstalk has increased, which will reduce your speed. The database values have been updated to show the new expected speed range.

The change of IP address will not affect your actual connection speed.

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

prasadm — Sun, 27 Sep 2020 16:56:28 GMT

Aah, ok, thanks. I always thought the speed seen at router was linked to physical network ( ie, linked to the distance from the exchange) , and the speeds that we get using various speed tests was linked to traffic over the network . My issue is speed at router. So if that has dropped overnight then it must be that BT has put on whole load of traffic in one go into the network that I am in now ? Why would they do that ? Otherwise we would have seen gradual decrease, right ?

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

licquorice — Sun, 27 Sep 2020 18:04:26 GMT

Try just ONE reset of your connection to see if you sync at a higher speed. I suspect it won't change but worth a try, I would think you were previously syncing with a 3dB margin but DLM has decided that your line isn't stable at that so has reverted you to 6dB margin.

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

Keith_Beddoe — Sun, 27 Sep 2020 18:04:37 GMT

It could just be one or two customers, with poor quality lines, which have increased the crosstalk. Copper wires were never designed to carry high frequencies.

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

prasadm — Sun, 27 Sep 2020 19:50:12 GMT

Hi licquorice, My line has never been on 3dB NM (well not as seen from the router info page). I was reluctant to do reset before I learn more, in case I upset the DLM and drop speeds even further. Actually I have had a 14 day reset which is done automatically by BT , and the last one still kept the same speed at 37, which is another reason why I was concerned. At the rest the NM was if remember correctly at 6.3, whereas I would have thought the reset should by default use 6.0.

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

prasadm — Sun, 27 Sep 2020 19:59:09 GMT

Hi Keith, if that is indeed the case does it mean we will have to wait until those customers complain and then BT to fix ? I am assuming you are referring to potentially some of the customers on the same cabinet, right ?

edit : Sorry Keith, if this is a cross talk issue, wouldn't it also affect the uplink speed ? This does not seem to have been affected at all. Or are they both independent ?

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

licquorice — Sun, 27 Sep 2020 19:51:42 GMT

One reset will not affect DLM

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

prasadm — Sun, 27 Sep 2020 20:05:13 GMT

Oh, okay, maybe I will try that then.

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

prasadm — Thu, 01 Oct 2020 05:04:42 GMT

I was waiting for the weekend to reset, as I didnt want to cause issues with my work and then this happens.

The other thing I notice is that when I check my IP on the web on a portal, the 86.x.x.x address show as it is, but when it was on the 109.x.x.x adress, the same page shows an IPV6 address, but the IPV6 address is not visible in the router. Anyway it looks like this was a network reconfiguration from BT and not an issue at my physical line .

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

licquorice — Thu, 01 Oct 2020 07:39:06 GMT

It looks as though DLM probably reset your line 3hrs 57min prior to your screenshot (the system uptime is meaningless, it is just the time the hub has been powered). The line reset would have caused the change of IP address as you would have picked up a different address from the pool, all as expected.

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

prasadm — Thu, 01 Oct 2020 08:27:07 GMT

Hi licquorice

The system uptime I have noticed is not really the time hub has been powered in my observation. It may of course be linked to the kind of resets done remotely, but my router has never been powered off for months. Usually the 14 day resets by BT resets the system uptime as well, and any restarts in between ( like the one happened this morning) usually do not reset the system uptime, and update only Network uptime. At least that is my observation on my router. And the resets do not always pickup a different address as I have noticed, although that is possible of course.

Anyway all's well that ends well 😀

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

prasadm — Sun, 04 Oct 2020 06:33:24 GMT

Here is the reboot logs that happened today. The reboot was performed by BT remotely I think using ACS. The system time and Network time was reset. But everytime these remote reboot occurs, the speed seems to drops a little bit. From what I understood from the experts in this forum in various posts that the remote reboots should not generally affect the sync speed. But speed drops do happen in my instance when it is connected to the same network (if I can call it?). As I said, not so much as to complain, but it does seem to happen. Could be there is a genuinely different reason for it. Maybe if it is left alone, it may pick up, but that probably would be weeks away.

Just posting it here if someone can make sense of it all and maybe useful to someone else. Not complaining though

Take care everyone 🙂

System uptime reset and a small drop in speedLogs showing the reset

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

licquorice — Sun, 04 Oct 2020 07:38:44 GMT

The reboot in itself won't cause the drop in speed but if the line has deteriorated, the hub will resync at a lower speed to maintain stability.

Re: Lower speeds and different IP

Starwire — Sun, 04 Oct 2020 11:11:45 GMT

Yeah, as Keith said I would agree it’s Crosstalk.

Its becoming a major issue in DSLAMS as they’ve increased capacity in them. Openreach now even consider a Connection Rate of 72mbps at the cabinet as being in the acceptable range.

Main issue is Openreach used ordinary 0.5 Copper Cable in them for the tie pairs between the DSLAM and PCP when they should’ve used at least CAT5e. The all in one Huawei PCP/DSLAMS that come prebuilt from the factory have CAT5e for the tie pairs.

Openreach have said all new DSLAMS will use CAT5e and some of the existing worst performing DSLAMS, most probably the ECI ones have been earmarked for the tie pairs to be changed out, although they’re either not saying which ones or just haven’t released the info yet.

Re: Line speed dropped by system

prasadm — Tue, 03 Nov 2020 06:20:35 GMT

ok, so my Sync speed went upto 41+ as was posted earlier, and was stable for about 6 weeks. Then the upgrade happened, and the sync speed dropped to 37. At the time of the upgrade I could see 2 restarts of the router from the logs (whether linked or not I cant be sure as that fell on the routine 14 day restart schedule.). But after the upgrade the line attenuation went up by about 15 db , but the noise margin was about 6.9 or so, so I assumed, after the next restart the line would come back with 41+ sync speed as it has happened in the past. But today it restarted on schedule, and the speed has not recovered. I understand that BT does not cap speeds. But it certainly seems suspicious that at one time my speed - again, I am always referring to the sync speed on the router. dropped somehow to 37 and the BT database has the speed range of my line dropped from VDSL Range-A from 50/32.8 to 40/30.7. So one failure I assume cannot change the database overnight, so why in my case the speed range dropped overnight ? The 50/32.8 was there since I signed upto BT few years ago. I have has occasional issues, and early 2019, I had a engineer visit who fixed my issues and the line test then showed ~44 Mbps which is what I was getting until the current saga. As you can see from my previous posts even though the system database was showing that my line was on 40/30.7 I was getting sync speeds of ~42 for over 6 weeks. I have complained to BT and I have an engineer visit arranged for tomorrow the 4th, I hope it will fixed.

But I also have a nagging suspicion that the engineer will refer to the database and tell me that is what my line is designed for (this is what I was told in 2019 and I accepted that). If it is anything other than my fault then I would expect BT to restore my speeds to what the line is capable of.

Re: Line speed dropped by system

pippincp — Tue, 03 Nov 2020 10:04:49 GMT

The engineer is not interested in what another companies database says, he works for an infrastructure provider not an ISP.

Re: Line speed dropped by system

prasadm — Tue, 03 Nov 2020 10:21:40 GMT

Aren't both BT ? Or are you refering to BT Wholesale and BT Openreach ? The engineer request was made by the BT support on chat when I complained. In any case I will see what happens, as I still think the overnight change of line speed range for my line is suspicious. I am more than happy to be proved wrong .

Re: Line speed dropped by system

pippincp — Tue, 03 Nov 2020 11:35:47 GMT

BT Openreach does not exist. Openreach is run as an independent company under OFCOM rules. The engineer will make sure your line falls within spec.

Re: Line speed dropped by system

prasadm — Wed, 04 Nov 2020 06:30:50 GMT

Aah, sorry I was not aware of that subtle difference, I thought they were both BT but separate companies. Anyway, back to the issue with my line. The engineer is supposed to visit today evening. However, early this morning, there was a restart of my connection initiated by ACS, and the speed went back to 42MB, which I think is reasonably close to the speed that I would have expected to get. It shows there was possibly some reconfiguration done at the broadband network (it's an assumption based on what I saw and not anything else) and not the physical line. Strange though all the other values seems the same including the attenuation that has gone up 15dB; makes you wonder what that figure does.

I think I will cancel the field engineer visit, keep him safe :). I do not believe this is a physical line issue

Thanks for all your advices and help

Getting actual 42 whereas the database says 40. I hope now this will be updated as well.