unreliable DSL in Washinton DC

I live in a neighborhood that is not served by FiOS because it is in Washinton DC - one mile from the vice Presidents House. Go figure. So I have a DSL link and it crashes occasionally - sometimes it runs for a month but some periods it crashes frequently. The most recent period of crashes began about a month ago. I do have a fix - reboot the router - but that gets tedious. The router is always up and available when the link is down so I feel quite comfortable that the problem is the link and not the router. I called support - telephone works OK even when DSL is down - and they gave me the usual spiel about checking my line. It was working fine b/c I rebooted the router so they saw no problems. Since 2 Aug I have been keeping track of the problem and one no day have I not had to reboot. That is, 9 days I had to reboot at least once and on six of those days I had to reboot twice in one day. I reboot whe I see it is down, mornings and evenings generally, but that probably is an artifact of my work schedule. I considered writing a script to ping somewhere every 10 minutes to track when the link goes down to see if there is a pattern to when the local switch reboots their DSL interfaces and leaves me hanging. I've also considered using the neighborhood chatlist to see if any other people are having problems with their Verizon DSL service.

Anyone else have any ideas for getting reliable Verizon DSL service in the nation's captal?

Accepted answers

slownet

You are right - thanks. The line went down again this morning and I checked the transceiver stats before rebooting. The downlink noise margin was 0.-3 (sic) when it usually is around 6. After rebooting it was back to 6.

Thankyou for the help.

All comments

Telcoguru

Is the DSL light going out when you lose your internet connection? Please post your modem stats it would help to see if anything is wrong with the line.

dslr595148

If you have no idea on what "Telcoguru" meant, the brand and model of your router would help...

slownet

The light that reads "Internet" has changed to red from green. All other lights remain green and active.

slownet

Whew, for a while there I thought I'd have a day without a lost connection. The "internet" light doesn't turn red, it goes off when the link is lost. The "DSL" light remains green as does "power" and "E1." "Wireless" also remains green. In other words, the only visible difference between connected and disconnected is that the "internet" light goes out. As seen from my computer, the router also remains fully accessible with no signs that it has suffered an internal malfunction.

Next time it is down I'll go through the system logs to see if they add any useful data although I have little doubt that the problem lies between my Westell 5700 and the local c/o. Looking at the logs now just tells me what happened after I rebooted.

Appreciate the assistance.

Telcoguru

Please post your modem stats from this page. http://192.168.1.1/transtat.htm

dslr595148

Since I now know what modem you are talking about...

The correct path might be System Monitoring -> Advanced Status -> Transciever Stats.

^

slownet

I had hoped to include stats for the transceiver when the link was down but have not had a crash since the morning of the 13th. These are the stats for the transceiver while it is working fine.

Transceiver Revision A2pB020b3.d19d

Vendor ID Code 4D54

Line Mode ADSL_G.dmt

Data Path INTERLEAVED

Transceiver Information Down Stream Path Up Stream Path

DSL Speed (Kbits/Sec) 2944 832

Margin (dB) 6.8 9.0

Line Attenuation (dB) 40.0 25.0

Transmit Power (dBm) 18.8 11.9

This weekend I expect to run a test to compare the logs from a physical line failure to those from a logical line failure. As far as I can read the logs above and the lights, my problem is a logical disconnection rather than a physical one since the DSL link remains up but the internet connection drops. Similarly, the error logs only refer to logical problems rathe than physical problems. Of course, that is where I started, seeing the problem as being high in the OSI stack and on Verizon's end rather than in my modem or DSL path, but I don't usually spend my days troubleshooting modems, so YMMV.

Telcoguru

Your stats look bad. I suspect that there is a line trouble somewhere. Try to test from your NID if you can. If not call DSL repair. Your download noise margin is too low causing disconnects.

slownet

Thankyou for the help.

Telcoguru

You may be too far from the C.O. for 3Mb service. You need to be about 12,000ft or less otherwise downgrading to a lower tier will fix your problem.

slownet

You are right but the connection is generaly steady and then has periods, this is the longest one, when the service is unreliable. It has gone for months with no hiccups and then suddenly there is a period when it can't remain alive.

Yesterday we had a huge rainstorm and that did not bring the service down although it did lower the noise margin - on the downlink only - which reduces the chances that the cause is environmental. Yesterday I also started logging the exact time that the link went down, based on the logs. So far I've had three crashes since yesterday afternoon, 16:42, 05:31 and 08:37. Since the rains remain in the area and there are showers off and on, that may be a correlation though I still loose the link when it is completely dry.

We'll see. With any kind of luck the five day monitoring cycle will give the c/o staff something to work with.

slownet

So, it has been one month, 30 disconnections, 9 "solved" trouble tickets and the problem persists.

I've spoken to a significant number of very polite Indians who all have to say "don't worry - we will solve your problem." {please keep your posts courteous}

Who does one call: Better Business Bureau to complain about fraud? The FCC to complain about false advertising and monopolistic behavior?

Welcome any ideas.

FieldT

Try demanding a tech come out to your house, bad numbers almost can never be fixed without someone coming out and fixing the problem.

slownet

Thanks to all contributors for the help. You were right that the answer lay in a new pair. Sometime about a week ago I call Verizon for the umpteenth time, spoke to numerous supervisors, rejected their argument that my problem was the modem, and got them to promise that a tech appointment would be scheduled (although they did have to see the link crash one more time). Last Thursday I got a modem in the mail, which worried me somewhat, but I had reconfigured the wireless part of my network both to improve throughput and to take those duties off the Westell unit, so replacing the modem was relatively trivial and accomplished in 30 mins. Then on Sunday I got a call saying that the tech would be at my house no later than 1700 on Monday.

He did contact me a little after 1700 and came a little later. Once I explained the problem he agree that the problem was not in my house and began investigating the wiring from my house to the street. After some mucking about he confirmed that the measurements on my pair were very erratic and that he would switch them. He promised that the work at the co would be done no later than 1000 the following morning. A quick, efficient and courteous visit although it took months to get it.

He left, the line went down and was not up when I went to work the following morning. That evening, when I got home, it still wasn't up and I called the tech who promised to fix it directly. In the end, the DSL link and my phone were dead for 72 hours and I got to talk to a lot more Verizon employees.

This evening I came home, spotted a ladder truck and found that I had actually managed to get Verizon to fix the problem without waiting for me. The problem seems to have been that my pair is not on the pole it is listed at and that my pair spans two poles. I suspect that the tech and the co switched two different pairs.

I now have good values on the transceiver stats and I hope that it won't crash tomorrow morning. The people I have spoken with at Verizon have been uniformly nice but as far as I can tell the corporate values of Verizon are to avoid doing anything that costs money as long as possible. My very first trouble call identified the problem as being between the co and my home and it still took over a month of very energetic calls to get it fixed.

Telco deregulation seems to have done more for the telcos than for the consumers.