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Ping spikes December 2023

Davosi — Fri, 29 Dec 2023 23:13:17 GMT

Hi,

For about two weeks now I have been experiencing ping spikes, I play games online which is how I noticed it. I’ve had Bt broadband for 2.5 years with no issues and generally the ping was running at about 7-10ms on ping testing cmd on my Mac. I have FFTC

I’ve had three engineers out, including an openreach one. They all say the same thing, the connection into my property is perfect, no issues.

I have tried everything to fix this issue. New router, new cables, try with everything disconnected. Same result.

The only two things which coincide with my issues are digital voice was a new service which was turned on. Im not sure if this could cause an issue for ping?

The other thing is I have seen that there was new firmware for the router this month, possibly a bug with that?

Otherwise I am totally stuck and bt support don’t seem to be able to help or offer any useful information.

Are there any other gamers out there with similar issues, or anyone who knows what is happening?

Thanks.

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

FIZZYLP — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 08:01:07 GMT

Hello,

does this happen at the same time everyday?

does this effect your wired or WiFi connection or both?

High ping doesn’t necessarily mean fault on the line and it’s completely possible to have a perfect line.

could be WiFi congestion because other routers from other internet providers use the same frequency and channels this can effect your WiFi performance as well.

way to fix this would be either finding a quiet channel and fix your hub to that channel or enable automatic channel scanning where it finds a less congested channel itself both can be done in the hub manager settings.

If it happens at peak time everyday (sametime) this is what’s known as over subscribing where too many customers are being served from the cabinet then what it can handle using slow speeds to all customers connected to the cabinet, this isn’t classified as a fault and would require Civil’s and not SFI engineers to attend.

When you experience this dropping in connection does the hub light drop to orange or remain blue?

digital voice won’t effect your broadband service as it’s not run from the hub it’s run from a server (cloud) and not from the hardware of the hub just requires internet to connect to the digital voice IPEX network.

Have you tried using the test socket behind the face plate of your master socket?

some faults are hard to find by engineers or BT due to his complex they are, to see a drop in connection which isn’t a network drop can be very hard to provide support.

hope this helps.

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Davosi — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 10:14:10 GMT

Hi Liam,

Thanks for your reply.

The connection is effected all day, I haven’t noticed any particular patterns, however it’s not necessarily really bad all the time, it’s gets worse but this seems random to me. It’s been very bad in the morning and also very late at night when you would expect the less congestion.

This issue is the on both a wired and a wifi connection.

When the ping is spiking, the router stays blue. However about a week or two ago the router was completely losing signal and going orange, however this has now stopped.

I will try the test socket, not something I knew was there. Thanks

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Davosi — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 10:33:04 GMT

Can’t see a test socket. The only other connection I can see is one where I would have to split the internet cable down to three separate cables.

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

countrypaul — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 10:58:11 GMT

Could it be related to the time of year with any other gamers playing over the holiday period? I it possible that your location has more gamers on the same shared link (before distribution to individual premises) than average?

Have you updated any software on you machine that could, for example, be running checks for updates when you are playing?

What servers are you running ping checks against, and how are you running ping?

My son had similar symptoms, the ping time checked from within one game suggested around 200ms, but from the command line gave 10ms, problem was traced to a PC at home carrying out cloud updates.

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Davosi — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 11:52:29 GMT

Hi thanks for the reply!

yes I also thought there being more gamers using the internet could be the issue, but that’s never been a problem in the last 2.5 years I’ve been here. Most of the people in the flats I live in are in their 20s-30s and head back to parents for Christmas so I would have thought it would be less congested.

I ran tests with a brand new router before connecting all the devices to make sure it wasn’t being caused by something doing updates or similar. I use my Mac book to test using command prompts. I ping Google.co.uk or bbc.co.uk

its very odd, and I can’t find any sort of pattern for this. I’m doing tests now and it’s been happily chugging along between 6-12ms for 10 minute or so and then suddenly flys up to 50ms for about 5 seconds before going up to 450ms and then coming back down to 7-12ms. It does this throughout the day. Basically makes playing any sort online of game unplayable.

Any sort of update or upload would cause the ping to be consistently high, rather than spiking randomly throughout the day.

Im totally stuck and don’t know what to do.

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

gg30340 — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 12:04:55 GMT

Has the problem by any chance coincided with any Christmas lights being put up in your property or lights nearby out side?

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Davosi — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 12:41:08 GMT

We’ve had huge Christmas lights put right out front of our window. We’ve also put some of our own up, nothing major. Could this really be the issue?

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Davosi — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 12:50:30 GMT

We are talking about high street level Christmas lights as we are right on the Main Street and they plugged them in outside our window.

not sure how this could effect cable connection though

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

gg30340 — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 12:50:06 GMT

They could be causing REIN interference. This generally would only be an issue with your wireless connections.

If you now suspect that it could be the cause of the problem you could try turning all the Christmas lights off and unplugging them to see if it helps.

Obviously there would be nothing you can do about the out side lights unless you put them there but you could try moving your BT hub as far away from them as possible.

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Davosi — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 12:51:28 GMT

Thanks but it’s not just a WiFi issue. Everything connected by lan cable is also experiencing the issue.

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

countrypaul — Sat, 30 Dec 2023 15:03:28 GMT

You said you have FFTC which I take you mean FTTC (Fibre to the Cabinet) if so how is that supplied, underground, via poles, across the front of buildings, or some other way? Just wondering if it comes via poles/other buildings whether the cable could be picking up interference, when, for example, Christmas light flash.

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Spammy2 — Tue, 02 Jan 2024 11:57:50 GMT

I've created a post with an identical problem as yours, just had an engineer out this morning who said the same thing as yours and had no clue what the issue could be. I noticed I had a firmware update on the evening of 11th December which is the same day I started to notice this issue and it hasn't stopped since even with a new hub and all new equipment.... Seeing this post is a sigh of relief that it isn't just me and that this is looking to be a firmware update problem surely.

I play competitive games and notice this also and haven't really been able to play properly since the 11th because of this problem. I've also been with BT for just over 2 years and my 7ms on cmd now turning to 11-12 with spikes is identical to your issue. I hope this problem can be sorted asapppp

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Davosi — Tue, 02 Jan 2024 12:26:18 GMT

Spot on. Glad it’s not just me. Surprised there’s not more people complaining if it is a buggy update. Im tempted to buy a 3rd party router and try that.

I also play competitive games and was hoping to get stuck in over my two week break.

The most frustrating part is bt and open reach not even testing for ping. How are they supposed to report back an issue with somthing if they arnt even going to look.

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Spammy2 — Tue, 02 Jan 2024 17:13:56 GMT

I’m going to try and bring up to them on the phone today or tomorrow to make sure they’re aware of the issue and it’s affecting I assume many users but not noticeable on a relaxed level of playing games or using the internet casually.

I have a 3rd party hub im going to give a go also to see if rerouting the traffic will help as I noticed the transmission of data is creating problems when it hits BT Servers so i’ll see if I can avoid that somehow haha. Long shot but I guess make them aware and wait for a inward update, just seems dodgy routing of data or one of their servers is playing up

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Spammy2 — Tue, 02 Jan 2024 18:16:00 GMT

I've just called and spoken to a team based in Birmingham form which the guy spoke to his manager and as far as I know has raised this issue. For now they're sending me a hub with the previous Firmware on before this update in December and fingers crossed this solves it.

I tried to state that others are experiencing this issue with this firmware update also which by process of elimination it has to be a firmware issue due to the timings of our faults and engineers confirming it's not a physical problem to say the least.

However, he said they can only note this issue as a ME problem and not anyone else. He's leaving this as a "fault" on my account which should then be looked at or attended too in the future I suppose to help sort this error/bug/routing problem for the hub itself.

I'm going to give this "old hub" they send me a run, if it works I can only recommend you try to get the same and I guess wait a few months before switching back to the newer hub as they may have fixed it by then? Idk. Otherwise stick with the old hub.

If it doesn't work then honestly It might just be a waiting game unfortunately and hope they sort this routing error in their servers in the next firmware update.

Keep in touch man 🙂

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Davosi — Tue, 02 Jan 2024 18:50:23 GMT

Glad they have at least sent you another router to try. Won’t it update automatically when you plug it in though?

If it works let me know!

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Spammy2 — Tue, 02 Jan 2024 18:52:22 GMT

that's what I asked and he said it is an older version which doesn't have automatic updates on I suppose. He assured me it is not on the newest firmware version. I had a new hub sent out last week which was on the latest as expected so fingers crossed this isn't and won't update 🙂

I'll let you know

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Spammy2 — Fri, 05 Jan 2024 16:46:33 GMT

The firmware was downgraded but still the same result. I’m stumped. I don’t know what to try anymore.

Re: Ping spikes December 2023

Davosi — Fri, 05 Jan 2024 17:10:24 GMT

ah no really! They’ve sent me one as well. They’ve also booked another engineer because they have found a fault somewhere.