Afrihost Business Uncapped Feedback

[AfriMan]

A guy in another thread ditched Afrihost because they ignored his problem for over two months. It's possible Afrihost is going through a bout of terrible service. Their call centre and live text support (and MyBB presence of course) seems to work, so use that where possible.

That shouldn't be the case. If we left someone hanging for that long - that's really horrible. I can imagine the guy was pretty p-ed off. I hope that we were able to help in the end. Would you please PM me a link to that thread so I can try to get him some assistance if not?

We are constantly striving to improve our performance. As a growing company we are constantly trying to keep up staff wise, however we don't want to make sure we bring in the right people (with the right skills) so we keep the Afrihost culture. I think once we move into our new premises (in a month or so) it will also be easier to bring in more people.

 

[Bryn]

Thanks, as AfriMan says - nothing that jumps out as horribly wrong
Did you experience the same symptoms again last night while posting?

HD BBC iPlayer streaming was impossible again tonight. SD streamed just fine, but it was annoying that we couldn't manage HD with our 8Mbit Business account. I ran the usual tests while not streaming and the stats seem normal:

C:\WINDOWS\System32>tracert www.google.com

Tracing route to www.google.com [74.125.230.241]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 10.0.0.2
2 7 ms 7 ms 7 ms 105-236-8-129-esr-lo.mtnbusiness.co.za [105.236.8.129]
3 62 ms 26 ms 25 ms ipc-recieve-tb-1a.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.53.150]
4 25 ms 24 ms 39 ms tb-dca-2.za--qux-a.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.184.28]
5 25 ms 25 ms 24 ms compj-cpt-1.mtnns.net [196.44.18.2]
6 169 ms 168 ms 169 ms ls-cr-2.uk--tb-cr-1.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.113]
7 175 ms 202 ms 175 ms ls-pr-2.uk--ls-cr-2.uk-a.mtn.net [209.212.111.187]
8 168 ms 168 ms 168 ms rb-ad-1--msbm-rbg-1-a.mtnns.net [209.212.99.13]
9 * * * Request timed out.
10 169 ms 168 ms 168 ms 209.85.250.169
11 175 ms 175 ms 175 ms par08s10-in-f17.1e100.net [74.125.230.241]

Trace complete.


C:\WINDOWS\System32>tracert www.afrihost.com

Tracing route to www.afrihost.com [197.242.144.102]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 10.0.0.2
2 7 ms 7 ms 7 ms 105-236-8-129-esr-lo.mtnbusiness.co.za [105.236.8.129]
3 32 ms 33 ms 32 ms 41.181.201.94
4 25 ms 24 ms 24 ms tb-dca-2.za--qux-c.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.198.188]
5 25 ms 24 ms 25 ms compj-cpt-1.mtnns.net [196.44.18.2]
6 25 ms 25 ms 25 ms ct-cr-2.za--tb-cr-1.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.134]
7 54 ms 72 ms 57 ms rb-cr-1.za--ct-cr-2.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.69]
8 53 ms 54 ms 53 ms jh-dca-2.za--jh-cr-1.za-a.mtnns.net [196.44.0.221]
9 55 ms 54 ms 53 ms 196.31.220.12
10 46 ms 59 ms 46 ms 196.31.220.25
11 46 ms 45 ms 46 ms 196.31.63.206
12 53 ms 53 ms 52 ms vl9-ah-ha-2.za.mtnbusiness.net [196.30.42.133]
13 48 ms 50 ms 48 ms cms-gm.afrihost.com [197.242.144.102]

Trace complete.


C:\WINDOWS\System32>tracert www.cracked.com

Tracing route to gp1.wac.edgecastcdn.net [93.184.220.20]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 10.0.0.2
2 7 ms 7 ms 7 ms 105-236-8-129-esr-lo.mtnbusiness.co.za [105.236.8.129]
3 25 ms 24 ms 24 ms ipc-recieve-tb-2a.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.54.86]
4 17 ms 17 ms 17 ms tb-dca-2.za--qux-a.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.184.28]
5 19 ms 17 ms 17 ms compj-cpt-1.mtnns.net [196.44.18.2]
6 161 ms 161 ms 169 ms ls-cr-2--tb-cr-1.uk-b.mtnns.net [196.44.31.113]
7 171 ms 170 ms 170 ms am-cr-1.nl--ls-cr-2.uk-a.mtnns.net [196.44.31.183]
8 177 ms 177 ms 177 ms am-tpr-1.nl--am-cr-1.nl-a.mtn.net [209.212.111.141]
9 170 ms 170 ms 169 ms xe-4-1-0.edge5.Amsterdam1.Level3.net [212.72.41.89]
10 177 ms 177 ms 177 ms vl-3604-ve-228.csw2.Amsterdam1.Level3.net [4.69.162.157]
11 177 ms 177 ms 177 ms ae-240-3616.edge6.Amsterdam1.Level3.net [4.69.162.254]
12 170 ms 169 ms 170 ms NTT-level3-4x10G.Amsterdam.Level3.net [4.68.63.218]
13 220 ms 214 ms 214 ms ae-5.r03.amstnl02.nl.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.4.186]
14 170 ms 214 ms 214 ms edgecast-0.r03.amstnl02.nl.bb.gin.ntt.net [81.20.69.146]
15 208 ms 206 ms 206 ms 93.184.220.20

Trace complete.

Could the problem be Unotelly's SA servers during peak viewing times? Or maybe it's a BBC problem, seeing as it's also prime time in the UK. 1080p Youtube is loading well ahead of the live point.

 

[whatwhat]

Could the problem be Unotelly's SA servers during peak viewing times? Or maybe it's a BBC problem, seeing as it's also prime time in the UK. 1080p Youtube is loading well ahead of the live point.

If you are just using Unotelly DNS they are just used for domain lookups, they don't carry your traffic (unless you using UnoVPN)

 

[Bryn]

If you are just using Unotelly DNS they are just used for domain lookups, they don't carry your traffic (unless you using UnoVPN)

Even so, only my WD Live TV box is configured with UnoTelly's settings. The router has Afrihost's DNS.

 

[Bursty-dude]

I have given up trying to watch Youtube vids at 720p or 1080p on fullscreen....
I now watch at 480p and even then the buffering is sometimes terrible with a 6MB connection.

 

[TomasW]

I have given up trying to watch Youtube vids at 720p or 1080p on fullscreen....
I now watch at 480p and even then the buffering is sometimes terrible with a 6MB connection.

Talking about YouTube, I have a 20Mbps Business account and YouTube is set on "Auto".

Why does it default automatically to 480p? I mean it is a 20Mbps line after all.

 

[Bursty-dude]

Talking about YouTube, I have a 20Mbps Business account and YouTube is set on "Auto".

Why does it default automatically to 480p? I mean it is a 20Mbps line after all.

I have a 6MB line and it defaults to 144p on 99% of Youtube vids.....

 

[PurSpyk!!]

Youtube has been problematic lately, seems to default to very low quality, and buffers all the time. This never used to be the case, I have issues with Supersport and dstv, but never Youtube. General browsing also seems to be slow, speed tests show no issues. 8MB Business Uncapped Account.

 

[AfriMan]

HD BBC iPlayer streaming was impossible again tonight. SD streamed just fine, but it was annoying that we couldn't manage HD with our 8Mbit Business account. I ran the usual tests while not streaming and the stats seem normal:

Could the problem be Unotelly's SA servers during peak viewing times? Or maybe it's a BBC problem, seeing as it's also prime time in the UK. 1080p Youtube is loading well ahead of the live point.

In terms of HD streaming, to be more specific 1080p, different players have different recommended settings. It really depends on the compression they use. Generally I would say that 8Mbps (or even 6Mbps) should be fine for 1080p, 4Mbps should be fine for 720p.

Everything looks perfect stats wise from the disgnostics. Maybe there is latency or load on the BBC's servers, also depends on how they server their content.

 

[AfriMan]

Youtube has been problematic lately, seems to default to very low quality, and buffers all the time. This never used to be the case, I have issues with Supersport and dstv, but never Youtube. General browsing also seems to be slow, speed tests show no issues. 8MB Business Uncapped Account.

Sounds like generally performance is poor, if streaming and browsing are poor. What other diagnostics have you run so far? Which DNS settings are you using?

 

[AfriMan]

If you are just using Unotelly DNS they are just used for domain lookups, they don't carry your traffic (unless you using UnoVPN)

DNs definitely can have an effect on general speeds. If the DNS servers are slow or located overseas, you will definitely see a slow down in services in general.

 

[PurSpyk!!]

Sounds like generally performance is poor, if streaming and browsing are poor. What other diagnostics have you run so far? Which DNS settings are you using?

Hi

I have run various speed tests, dns I have used OpenDNS, Your DNS, and Google, no difference.

 

[AfriMan]

Talking about YouTube, I have a 20Mbps Business account and YouTube is set on "Auto".

Why does it default automatically to 480p? I mean it is a 20Mbps line after all.

Not sure if that is set to your line. I haven't tried, but surely you can load some preferences on your YouTube/Google account?

 

[Hummercellc]

DNS servers have gone paws up again.....

Takes forever to resolve names, Changed over to Google DNS and sites are flying again

 

[Bryn]

DNS servers have gone paws up again.....

Takes forever to resolve names, Changed over to Google DNS and sites are flying again

I haven't noticed any problems browsing?

 

[AfriGuy]

DNS servers have gone paws up again.....

Takes forever to resolve names, Changed over to Google DNS and sites are flying again

No issues on our end.
Do you have any traceroutes that I can look at?

 

[Hummercellc]

No issues on our end.
Do you have any traceroutes that I can look at?

Seems to be working again, Strange....
However I have noticed packet loss to the IS network?

 

[Rohan]

Internet speeds extremely slow on afrihost tonight - only on international. Getting less than 1m speeds on 10m line. Yet WA is running full speed...

Tested now with an account from critical care and getting the exact same poor result of 1m.

 

[kohlhtor]

Speed Slow in pe Speed up and down

 

[killerbyte]

Its been a while since I've done any sort of upgrade... but can anyone tell me; if I do an upgrade to my bundle will they hold off on the billing till next month (ie. the billing run on 25 Aug which debits of your account on 1 Sept)? Or will they go and debit my account sooner?