Afrihost - Pure Fibre Feedback Thread Part 2

chrisGolf said:
Hi,

I know Afrihost has a good and positive reputation among the online community, but I've not had a good experience with them since joining in Jan. (previously a CISP customer, but also had poor service with them for most of 2022 - decided to try afrihost...)

1. International latency; this was poor, I was told to try request a PPOE account, which AFrigirl and afrinatic struggled with, something to do with getting Vuma to approve the IP range?
The issue was acknowledged, and some solution was promised but with no timeline or no commitment.
I see Afrinatic is working on providing a PPTP VPN but no JHB solution yet, and this may help gamers, but I have a UK VPN for work, so not sure how suitable PPTP is going to be for WFH.

2. International Upload; this has been poor since joining. Afrinatic and co have logged messages to vuma, subsequently vuma reset my line then close the ticket. Afrinatic claims this is Vuma/FNO issue, but I've seen posts where ex-Afrihost users have moved to different ISPs and the download and upload are a lot more stable, so I suspect it's not a FNO issue. This is based only on one or two posts.

3. Poor service; using whatsapp or client zone is usually a complete waste of time. every time the support agent will copy and paste a response. ask for things I've already mentioned in the initial ticket. ask things that are not relevant and further evidence that my initial query has not be read. among other things like asking to reset the router etc.. it's annoying, wasting time, and if I comply I will eventually be told something like it's my router and I should replace it... (I see there are a few posts where people have complained about the same thing)
Initially I had good-ish response from the AFrihost representatives on this forum, but of late, there are been no or little responses to any of my queries. So in conclusion, I have no channel to get good support.

4. Stability; intermittent drops on occasion, very difficult to get afrihost to troubleshoot. difficult to pin point if it's a ISP issue or FNO. To make matter worse; I'm unfortunate to have multiple service partners that make up my fibre infrastructure, DFA, SADV and Vuma. There are no alternatives at the moment. I understand that moving ISPs my not resolve my stability issues. Also throw in load shedding, in conclusion difficult to see where the issue is.

I've been looking for an alternative ISP now for the last month, initially I've seen a post that recommended Atomic - I believe they are mid-sized and more expensive (100/100). Based on forum feedback the performance was good, and I don't mind paying in a bit extra if it means avoiding the above mentioned points. so started looking into this, unfortunately they only available in the cape.

tl;dr, is there another similar ISP like atomic, but available in JHB ?
(not CISP please)

Regards,
Chris
Click to expand...
Maybe you can organise a test account with :

Home Fibre - Web sQuad

Get uncapped, reliable fibre and great service for your home! Web sQuad home fibre is unlimited and fast, up to 1 Gbps fast.
websquad.co.za websquad.co.za

mybroadband.co.za

websquadza

mybroadband.co.za mybroadband.co.za

Web Squad ISP

Downdetector does seem a bit higher than the norm too
mybroadband.co.za mybroadband.co.za

As an example, their price for the cheapest package on the only FNO available in my area is only about R30 more than Afrihost's.
 
chrisGolf said:
Hi,

I know Afrihost has a good and positive reputation among the online community, but I've not had a good experience with them since joining in Jan. (previously a CISP customer, but also had poor service with them for most of 2022 - decided to try afrihost...)

1. International latency; this was poor, I was told to try request a PPOE account, which AFrigirl and afrinatic struggled with, something to do with getting Vuma to approve the IP range?
The issue was acknowledged, and some solution was promised but with no timeline or no commitment.
I see Afrinatic is working on providing a PPTP VPN but no JHB solution yet, and this may help gamers, but I have a UK VPN for work, so not sure how suitable PPTP is going to be for WFH.

2. International Upload; this has been poor since joining. Afrinatic and co have logged messages to vuma, subsequently vuma reset my line then close the ticket. Afrinatic claims this is Vuma/FNO issue, but I've seen posts where ex-Afrihost users have moved to different ISPs and the download and upload are a lot more stable, so I suspect it's not a FNO issue. This is based only on one or two posts.

3. Poor service; using whatsapp or client zone is usually a complete waste of time. every time the support agent will copy and paste a response. ask for things I've already mentioned in the initial ticket. ask things that are not relevant and further evidence that my initial query has not be read. among other things like asking to reset the router etc.. it's annoying, wasting time, and if I comply I will eventually be told something like it's my router and I should replace it... (I see there are a few posts where people have complained about the same thing)
Initially I had good-ish response from the AFrihost representatives on this forum, but of late, there are been no or little responses to any of my queries. So in conclusion, I have no channel to get good support.

4. Stability; intermittent drops on occasion, very difficult to get afrihost to troubleshoot. difficult to pin point if it's a ISP issue or FNO. To make matter worse; I'm unfortunate to have multiple service partners that make up my fibre infrastructure, DFA, SADV and Vuma. There are no alternatives at the moment. I understand that moving ISPs my not resolve my stability issues. Also throw in load shedding, in conclusion difficult to see where the issue is.

I've been looking for an alternative ISP now for the last month, initially I've seen a post that recommended Atomic - I believe they are mid-sized and more expensive (100/100). Based on forum feedback the performance was good, and I don't mind paying in a bit extra if it means avoiding the above mentioned points. so started looking into this, unfortunately they only available in the cape.

tl;dr, is there another similar ISP like atomic, but available in JHB ?
(not CISP please)

Regards,
Chris
Click to expand...

1. Same experience. PPTP isn't an ideal solution but it's better than nothing if they can get JHB set up.

2. International upload issues for me, too. 5mbps max.

3. I've experienced similar issues on WhatsApp but MyBB has always been pretty great.

4. Can't say I've had the same issues on OpenServe, Pretoria.
 
I just checked and my international speeds are identical to local, I wonder what's up with that 5Mbps max ya'll are seeing.
 
MDE said:
How come you don't peer at CINX or JINX?

Surely even a 10 / 20g port at each location will benefit users?
Click to expand...

It doesn't make sense to us because that traffic needs to get backhauled to Teraco anyways if it's not in CINX or JINX Teraco and even if it is it needs at least 2 cross connects.

From what we received from big content providers is that for example JINX does not offer an advantage like better performance vs NAP JHB.
 
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Reactions: MDE
William1102 said:
@AfriNatic

Having some YouTube issues in Durban

Speeds fluctuates so there’s buffering goes low at 5mbps to 40 to 80mb on a 100/100 line
Click to expand...

I looked at the Google servers traffic in Durban and they look good. There are quite a bit of capacity free and no losses on the cache-fill links.
 
chrisGolf said:
Hi,

I know Afrihost has a good and positive reputation among the online community, but I've not had a good experience with them since joining in Jan. (previously a CISP customer, but also had poor service with them for most of 2022 - decided to try afrihost...)

1. International latency; this was poor, I was told to try request a PPOE account, which AFrigirl and afrinatic struggled with, something to do with getting Vuma to approve the IP range?
The issue was acknowledged, and some solution was promised but with no timeline or no commitment.
I see Afrinatic is working on providing a PPTP VPN but no JHB solution yet, and this may help gamers, but I have a UK VPN for work, so not sure how suitable PPTP is going to be for WFH.

2. International Upload; this has been poor since joining. Afrinatic and co have logged messages to vuma, subsequently vuma reset my line then close the ticket. Afrinatic claims this is Vuma/FNO issue, but I've seen posts where ex-Afrihost users have moved to different ISPs and the download and upload are a lot more stable, so I suspect it's not a FNO issue. This is based only on one or two posts.

3. Poor service; using whatsapp or client zone is usually a complete waste of time. every time the support agent will copy and paste a response. ask for things I've already mentioned in the initial ticket. ask things that are not relevant and further evidence that my initial query has not be read. among other things like asking to reset the router etc.. it's annoying, wasting time, and if I comply I will eventually be told something like it's my router and I should replace it... (I see there are a few posts where people have complained about the same thing)
Initially I had good-ish response from the AFrihost representatives on this forum, but of late, there are been no or little responses to any of my queries. So in conclusion, I have no channel to get good support.

4. Stability; intermittent drops on occasion, very difficult to get afrihost to troubleshoot. difficult to pin point if it's a ISP issue or FNO. To make matter worse; I'm unfortunate to have multiple service partners that make up my fibre infrastructure, DFA, SADV and Vuma. There are no alternatives at the moment. I understand that moving ISPs my not resolve my stability issues. Also throw in load shedding, in conclusion difficult to see where the issue is.

I've been looking for an alternative ISP now for the last month, initially I've seen a post that recommended Atomic - I believe they are mid-sized and more expensive (100/100). Based on forum feedback the performance was good, and I don't mind paying in a bit extra if it means avoiding the above mentioned points. so started looking into this, unfortunately they only available in the cape.

tl;dr, is there another similar ISP like atomic, but available in JHB ?
(not CISP please)

Regards,
Chris
Click to expand...

giggity said:
1. Same experience. PPTP isn't an ideal solution but it's better than nothing if they can get JHB set up.

2. International upload issues for me, too. 5mbps max.

3. I've experienced similar issues on WhatsApp but MyBB has always been pretty great.

4. Can't say I've had the same issues on OpenServe, Pretoria.
Click to expand...

It's a daily struggle with the Vuma Villages vlan. There are constantly clients creating loops and broadcast storms on this vlan which we need to try and mitigate.

Today the same issue occurred again and started at midnight and intermittently caused a broadcast storm.

We deployed a Python hack on one of our machines that spoofs the mac address of the bad actors to blackhole the traffic which prevents broadcast storms and unicast flooding in the vlan. As an ISP we can do only so much. It's looking like for VV the only real solution is to get PPPoE working and disabling DHCP completely on this vlan.
 
@AfriNatic - I noticed today that we dropped to 144ms to London but unfortunately at 16h00 it reverted back to 175. Any reason for the change?
 
@AfriNatic fyi

Spoke to Quad9

"Hello,

PCH is announcing our prefixes at NAP Africa JoBurg, though a few months ago it was offline for some months.

PCH used to have a NAP Africa Capetown location, but it's been offline for a while and pending an equipment upgrade. I know that several members of PCH are working to get this location back online in the next few months.

We'll open a follow up ticket to inform you as soon as that Capetown location is back online.

Best regards,
Zachary"

UPDATE

Just a small clarification. PCH is present at NAP Africa Cape Town, but their network equipment is at maximum capacity, so Quad9 cannot announce there. So, while PCH's location there is active, there's not enough capacity to handle the traffic of Quad9 being active until the equipment is upgraded.

Best regards,
Zachary
 
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