Hi, here's something for the more experienced to ponder.
Gerard_Sr
Enthusiast - Level 3

Hi, here's something for the more experienced to ponder.

As of the past week or two my service has been taking nose dives periodically.
The telephone service has also been affected. (noise and static like squeals)
This is not a new problem, it has been ongoing for three years.
I have repeatedly asked for a new pair (copper) to no avail.
We went the route of replacement modems, data rate changes, Verizon presidential appeals and the problem "seems" to correct itself with cooler weather in the fall.

I called repair service for the telephone just Friday and met with an understanding person on Verizon's end. She heard the noise on the line and listened patiently to my internet troubles. She assured me that she could schedule someone to fix the problem on Saturday, 6/16/2012 I thanked her and let it go for Friday.

This morning at about 9:00 AM I got a call from a Verizon representative, not about the  problem, but rather about how the representative at repair service handled the call. I said the call handling was a ten on their scale. But when the question was asked about if I would recommend Verizon to someone, I had to ask that it could be repeated because of the noise on the line.

It's pretty obvious that I didn't give a good mark as the answer to that question.

But to the technical side of this to get people to ponder on this, here's my PRESENT Transceiver Statistics, copy and pasted for you to ponder....

Transceiver Statistics
Transceiver Revision     A2pB020b3.d20h
Vendor ID Code               4D54
Line Mode                        ADSL_2plus
Data Path                         FAST

Transceiver Information    Down Stream Path    Up Stream Path
DSL Speed (Kbits/Sec)                    358                         747
Margin (dB)                                     16.0                         9.9
Line Attenuation (dB)                      62.5                        38.3
Transmit Power (dBm)                    15.5                         12.4

( NO EDITING WAS DONE TO THE NUMBERS ABOVE, Formatting was done, adding spaces, to attempt to make it clearer to read. )

I did not make any rude or crude remarks, because I think I may be on a watch list as my last two messages were edited and then deleted. But the bottom line is that I am not a "happy camper".

Further food for thought; my filter is located in the demarcation box, from there to the modem is a home run with approved wire. An additional filter is installed after the "voice line" comes into the house from the demarcation box for the whole house.

Line to the pole is new, maybe three pair, I don't remember. Distance to the central office is about two miles, BUT there is some sort of device installed in the lines between here and there, according to what was said by previous repair personnel.

This is the third year with these problems.

Any thoughts?, anyone?

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Re: Hi, here's something for the more experienced to ponder.
Gerard_Sr
Enthusiast - Level 3

Well, Mr Smith, thank you for trying to help, you are a true gentleman.

But after my last "attempt" to get any help from the technical support line, I have come to the conclusion there is no help available. They said they would call back, and never did.

I'll be transitioning my email accounts over the next week as well as my telephone service to a cable company. It sort of hurts to have to do it, but I have no other option. After havening land-line service with the Baby Bells since 1972 and then Verizon, well it truly is a shame...

Good luck to you all.

Gerry

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Re: Hi, here's something for the more experienced to ponder.
smith6612
Community Leader
Community Leader

If you're getting static on the voice end of the line, regardless of the modem being on or off (but even moreso on), it's a problem for Voice repair to fix. You need to give them a call from another line that is not seeing issues and report that you are having loud static on your phone line. The Verizon Rep will need to run an MLT test which can only be performed when your line is not in use. If the tech comes back reporting a problem, it's an instant dispatch. Don't mention DSL and call from a different, working line, that's the tip 🙂

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Re: Hi, here's something for the more experienced to ponder.
Gerard_Sr
Enthusiast - Level 3

Well Mr. Smith,

I did that and they came by today. But let me back up for a moment.

A short time after I posted that original message, the static on my voice lime mysteriously went away!

Now back to the "VOICE" technician's visit. He could find nothing wrong and would not hear of any problems with DSL. He put me on a different pair for a few blocks, but since the situation corrected itself before then, who knows what the real outcome will be. Right now the voice line is quiet.

At the end I asked if this will have ant effect on the previously "trimmed" line. He said it shouldn't, but when I went on to describe that sometimes untrimmed lines operate like a "T" filter for the frequencies of DSL, he looked at me if I was speaking in tongues.

He did look at my modem and it was deathly slow to lock up. My only comment was "welcome to my world".

Upon accessing the modem he said that in the contract they have the right to send me what level of speed they want because of conditions.

I showed him the past weeks download speed as registered at "Sam Knows" for my internet connection. He tried to tell me that is dependent on my computer and I stopped him in his tracks when I showed him the modified router that does testing every two hours and reports back to a server database. As to the past week's speeds...

image

You can see how in a weeks time it dropped from 2.41 Mbps to an average of 1.89 Mbps.

Also as for other testing, here is a screen grab of the history file from "speedtest.net"...

image

Please note that on 10/20/2011 my speed was 2.53 Mb/s  And today, 6/16/2012 it's 1.81 Mb/s.  I really wonder how copper can go so bad in less than a year. To me it looks like intentional throttling...

By the way, since it seems I did get tghe image insert to work in here, the following is my present Transceiver Statistics.

image

I hope the images come through otherwise I'll have to jump back in here and edit this message.

Bottom line, I still am an "unhappy camper", and I am looking into alternative sources for my voice communications as well as my internet connections.

It's a pity one can't just call up and get something fixed or get information "locally"...

Thanks for your time again, Mr Smith. Smiley Happy

Cordially,

Gerry

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Re: Hi, here's something for the more experienced to ponder.
smith6612
Community Leader
Community Leader

You're welcome. Has your service improved any since the Static went away and since the pair change took place? I'm just waiting on a moderator to approve the attachments to your post so I can see them.

I've had to deal with similar issues before for some people in my area. Static issues, especially intermittent problems that come and go tend to take a few truch rolls and calls to catch. MLT tests help as they often can help a technician pinpoint the source of the problem based on the results returned, but on some really bad lines it might take several trips to get the line repaired to usable condition again for both DSL and phone. Every time you hear static, call them from another line and get them to come out. Chronic issues will eventually get someone's attention (or get you moved to FiOS if it's in your area).

I can't say that this issue would be due to intentional throttling, as copper lines can degrade rather quickly. Copper doesn't take long to corrode and if animals are the reason your line is going bad as quick as it is, that's something to consider. Out where I am, squirrels and other animals enjoy chewing on the lines. They have no issue chewing through Coaxial lines from the Cable company (which they apparently love to nom on), Fiber cables for Verizon FiOS, or damaging telephone lines (also a huge favorite especially at splice boxes) to the point where a pair needs to be re-spliced. Even then, if the lines are older, they do tend to become more brittle and as such, are more prone to failure from movement, temperature, or nature. Lots of things to consider and with the copper network being left to run with less maintenace than in the past, it just further increases the rate at which service goes downhill.

If Verizon were throttling, to be honest they would be going after users such as I who run their connections full bore routinely. Now of course, throttling wouldn't cause bad modem stats to appear. You'll just see your sync speed creep down during maintenance hours.

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Re: Hi, here's something for the more experienced to ponder.
Gerard_Sr
Enthusiast - Level 3

Sorry Mr. Smith,

I was not aware of a "moderator" approving my attachment, I couldn't find anything on that in the TOS. Smiley Surprised

It "does" appear online to me, but that would naturally be. I'll have to log out and see if the attachments are visible.

It may not get approved. If that is the case, I'll have to try and get them to you via private message or a link in private messages.

As for the DSL, Well for one, the need for rebooting has stopped. And the gradual daily creep to a lower speed has seemed to have stopped. If they are not throttling, then some sort of automatic throttling had occurred when the line was noisy. If you can see the "attachments" you may be able to imagine the scenario.

Unfortunately I may not be able to get them to "reset" their end. Or to manually provision me for a higher speed. Come Monday I will give it a good attempt to get to someone and have it reset. Some places in the forum it was mentioned that if one calls the service number during normal business hours, one can get connected to a location that English is their first language rather than a off-shore contractor. If that doesn't work and if there is no way it looks like I'll have to switch providers of my voice and data to the the alternative.  (I won't mention the alternative's name here as it won't get past a moderator.)

I am darn close to doing that now, but the only thing holding me back is the nuisance of changing numerous email addresses from Verizon to the alternative. Some places frown on addresses from a free provider like G-mail, they and others frown on email addresses on personal domains as well. So it was unpractical setting up email for those contacts on anything but a national recognized provider. Make that a "paid ISP".

I'll have to start another thread about the DSL modem and it's potential capability of operating as a router with wireless capabilities. It seems like it should be possible as the Westell A90-750015-07 has the E1 port marked as an "uplink"...

Thanks again for your communication on the subject.

Cordially

Gerry

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Re: Hi, here's something for the more experienced to ponder.
smith6612
Community Leader
Community Leader

The attachments are showing instead of a yellow triangle. The "throttling" you're seeing is the nature of ADSL. If the line is set for a higher speed than what the line itself can handle, the modem and the DSLAM negotiate the best mode and speed to use. It may not choose the highest speed period, but it will choose the highest stable speed at the time of synchronization. The speed you have now doesn't match anything Verizon sets their DSLAMs to, so the automatic decision making of ADSL is apparent. Verizon does have a system that runs periodically from ASSIA which optimizes the ADSL provisoning profile you're on to defined speeds by Verizon, and you'll often find it runs towards the night time hours.

Speeds the ASSIA Optimization system chooses from for both the Virtual Private Circuit/Edge router config and line card speeds are as follows from my memory. If your speed is not +/- 3kbps of these ranges it's not Verizon's doing.

Downstream: ( --- denotes I am not sure of what the optimized speed is, but there is one. I'll need to check a DSLAM with 15Mbps allowed on it to get them).

640, 864, 1184, 1221, 1540, 1792, 2112, 2528, 2944, 3360, --- , ---, 5580, ---, 7616, 7840, ---, (10Mbps), --- (15Mbps)

Upstream:

90, 160, 448, 640, 864, 1184

You still seem to be having a line problem if you were previously at 3Mbps. Keep an eye on things.

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Re: Hi, here's something for the more experienced to ponder.
Gerard_Sr
Enthusiast - Level 3

Thanks Mr. Smith.

It's been a long time since I actually had 3 Mbps, since they switched me to DADS_2plus the best I would get was around 2.6 to 2.8 Mbps as a modem lock with actual throughput being slightly less.

We'll see on Monday what they can do about it. I'll hope I get to talk to someone in "America".

Whether or not, I'll attempt to convince them there is a line problem or equipment problem on their end.

I will try my best to be polite, but if they go into that spiel about turning the modem off and waiting 30 seconds etc, I may loose it. LOL

I know my end is correct, as for the modems, two of them do exactly the same thing, I sort of believe that rules them out. In any event, I am preparing to "do the deed" of switching both my telephone service and internet service to a cable company. Preparing as such as changing important email addresses to a neutral service like G-mail. Hate to do it as I have been a customer of Bell systems and then Verizon since 1972, but if they won't co-operate, well I may just have to.

Fpr what it's worth, here is my Transceiver Statistics as of a few minutes ago...

image

Now I have to go over and see about another thread...

Cordially,

Gerry

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Re: Hi, here's something for the more experienced to ponder.
Gerard_Sr
Enthusiast - Level 3

Well, Mr Smith, thank you for trying to help, you are a true gentleman.

But after my last "attempt" to get any help from the technical support line, I have come to the conclusion there is no help available. They said they would call back, and never did.

I'll be transitioning my email accounts over the next week as well as my telephone service to a cable company. It sort of hurts to have to do it, but I have no other option. After havening land-line service with the Baby Bells since 1972 and then Verizon, well it truly is a shame...

Good luck to you all.

Gerry

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Re: Hi, here's something for the more experienced to ponder.
smith6612
Community Leader
Community Leader
I understand, Hope everything goes smoothly with your new provider 🙂
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Re: Hi, here's something for the more experienced to ponder.
Gerard_Sr
Enthusiast - Level 3

Thanks Mr. Smith,

I'll try and get back in after the dust settles and let you know how it goes.

If I can't, thanks again!Smiley Happy

Gerry