GWISA=SCREAMER

[wow4life]

There seems to be big *h&t going with Telkom at the moment relating to some software upgrade gone wrong. The said, having had experience with Screamer's (ex-GWI) support and customer responsiveness, I wouldn't touch them with a bargepole.

40-50% packet-loss on the upstream network atm whilst Screamer's network is fine ...

Ping statistics for 196.15.204.81:
Packets: Sent = 20, Received = 9, Lost = 11 (55% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 33ms, Maximum = 54ms, Average = 41ms

 

[Playoff]

40-50% packet-loss on the upstream network atm whilst Screamer's network is fine ...

Ping statistics for 196.15.204.81:
Packets: Sent = 20, Received = 9, Lost = 11 (55% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 33ms, Maximum = 54ms, Average = 41ms

Your latency is better than mine but I am not getting any packet loss.

Ping statistics for 196.15.204.81:
Packets: Sent = 48, Received = 48, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 50ms, Maximum = 82ms, Average = 71ms
Control-C

 

[murray654]

Open letter to Harrismith Branch

Hi ,

It has been long enough for Screamer to sort out any issues with the Vodacom connection, and we still are experiencing a significant decrease in performance.

Before
Download 0.49 Mb/s
Upload 0.35 Mb/s
Ping 206ms
http://www.speedtest.net/result/662398023.png

After
Download 0.60 Mb/s - an improvement
Upload 0.26 Mb/s - a decrease of 26%
Ping 323ms - this shows that the performance of our connection is worse than before
http://www.speedtest.net/result/721754026.png

Despite the increase in download speed, the higher latency and slower upload speed has resulted in a worse experience for us and our guests. Only one out of ten speed tests runs to completion without errors. This shows that there is a serious problem with this connection.

Pingtest.net shows 82% packet loss this morning.
http://www.pingtest.net/result/10759300.png

Unfortunately I don't have a historical test to compare that to. The grade given to our connection is F. Unless you can rectify this I have to start using dial-up again.

79% packet loss in pingtest to Dar es Salam - to confirm the result above:
http://www.pingtest.net/result/10759644.png

Often we have to reload pages, because they stop loading without an error. No doubt because 3/4 of the data from the internet never gets here.

I have received many complaints from our guests about the Internet since you changed to Vodacom. Before, we received few complaints.

Please advise how you intend to rectify this.

Kind regards,
murray

 

[ciruis]

Hi ,

It has been long enough for Screamer to sort out any issues with the Vodacom connection, and we still are experiencing a significant decrease in performance.

Before
Download 0.49 Mb/s
Upload 0.35 Mb/s
Ping 206ms
http://www.speedtest.net/result/662398023.png

After
Download 0.60 Mb/s - an improvement
Upload 0.26 Mb/s - a decrease of 26%
Ping 323ms - this shows that the performance of our connection is worse than before
http://www.speedtest.net/result/721754026.png

Despite the increase in download speed, the higher latency and slower upload speed has resulted in a worse experience for us and our guests. Only one out of ten speed tests runs to completion without errors. This shows that there is a serious problem with this connection.

Pingtest.net shows 82% packet loss this morning.
http://www.pingtest.net/result/10759300.png

Unfortunately I don't have a historical test to compare that to. The grade given to our connection is F. Unless you can rectify this I have to start using dial-up again.

79% packet loss in pingtest to Dar es Salam - to confirm the result above:
http://www.pingtest.net/result/10759644.png

Often we have to reload pages, because they stop loading without an error. No doubt because 3/4 of the data from the internet never gets here.

I have received many complaints from our guests about the Internet since you changed to Vodacom. Before, we received few complaints.

Please advise how you intend to rectify this.

Kind regards,
murray

Dear Murry,

You have a number of choices in ISP's. Lets face facts based on these forums, we all have picked the wrong one...screamer.......

 

[buffalobill]

Same s%$t, different year.

 

[Kraai2009]

Hi ,

It has been long enough for Screamer to sort out any issues with the Vodacom connection, and we still are experiencing a significant decrease in performance.

Before
Download 0.49 Mb/s
Upload 0.35 Mb/s
Ping 206ms
http://www.speedtest.net/result/662398023.png

After
Download 0.60 Mb/s - an improvement
Upload 0.26 Mb/s - a decrease of 26%
Ping 323ms - this shows that the performance of our connection is worse than before
http://www.speedtest.net/result/721754026.png

Despite the increase in download speed, the higher latency and slower upload speed has resulted in a worse experience for us and our guests. Only one out of ten speed tests runs to completion without errors. This shows that there is a serious problem with this connection.

Pingtest.net shows 82% packet loss this morning.
http://www.pingtest.net/result/10759300.png

Unfortunately I don't have a historical test to compare that to. The grade given to our connection is F. Unless you can rectify this I have to start using dial-up again.

79% packet loss in pingtest to Dar es Salam - to confirm the result above:
http://www.pingtest.net/result/10759644.png

Often we have to reload pages, because they stop loading without an error. No doubt because 3/4 of the data from the internet never gets here.

I have received many complaints from our guests about the Internet since you changed to Vodacom. Before, we received few complaints.

Please advise how you intend to rectify this.

Kind regards,
murray

I agree with murray, about the vodacom rubbish we are now on in Harrismith. I do not get my speeds I'm paying for, browsing is piss poor, and mostly useless. I understand the bandwidth comes via openweb, so what are you doing about this reported problem to you Graig, as you did not answer my email to you about this issue.

 

[murray654]

6 Weeks ago we had a useable internet connection. Then Screamer changed their upstream provider and now we are entering our 5th straight week of trouble.

This morning its particularly bad!

Test one

Pinging screamer.co.za [196.25.27.90] with 32 bytes of data:

Ping statistics for 196.25.27.90:
Packets: Sent = 40, Received = 10, Lost = 30 (75% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 51ms, Maximum = 132ms, Average = 75ms

Test two
Pinging screamer.co.za [196.25.27.90] with 32 bytes of data:

Ping statistics for 196.25.27.90:
Packets: Sent = 40, Received = 34, Lost = 6 (15% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 45ms, Maximum = 98ms, Average = 66ms

Test 3

Pinging screamer.co.za [196.25.27.90] with 32 bytes of data:

Ping statistics for 196.25.27.90:
Packets: Sent = 40, Received = 17, Lost = 23 (57% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 94ms, Maximum = 227ms, Average = 157ms
Youd think they would listen to their customers and fix it.

After about 10 attempts I got these results

Why dont they answer their phones?

Why dont they bother to reply to my emails?

Its enough to make you SCREAM.

 

[rebel998]

Maybe its a good thing I'm not with Screamer anymore.

 

[Kraai2009]

They do not answer my mails, they do not give attention to this board anymore, I think they gave up on us, and we should just take over their network in Harrismith to sort our problems out.

 

[fernandopires]

ive been waiting to get my public ip working since about 1 December 2009 and still not working. And getting hold of them is a mission. When things go wrong there rep howzit just vanishes. The internet quality is bad. Lastweek i was on the phone with one of there support people next thing the phone goes down and they do no effort to call you back. Cant screamer become more professional like vodacom business or telkom. Plus why do they route us through a transparent cache ?? because of that i can benefit from the nice features of open dns. why why why i dont know who there main tech guy is but i think he doesnt really know what he is doing.

 

[murray654]

Harrismith Screamer

wow my connection is good today

 

[murray654]

We had a bad week 5 days down in the last 7.

I have perfected my failover connection ... an essential for anyone using these guys - why did it take me so long to implement this?

 

[murray654]

Automatic failover is not much use today - 70-80% packet loss, but netwatch keeps finding the gateway and switching back to Screamer... Harrismith technician says the wind is the cause of the packet loss.

Very wierd weather they have in Harrismith - The wind is causing massive packet loss between Mt Paul and Harrismith. There is no packet loss between Oliviershoek pass, Dumbe and Mt Paul. I guess there is no wind there?

 

[Rocket-Boy]

Have to watch out for that wind
Its amazing how wind is able to blow rf signals away from the router on the other side...

 

[deadindeeD]

I use to be anti-screamer until a month after seacom. These guys ROCK, they really cleaned up their act. Brilliant latency, and they ACTUALLY NOTIFY you when they will have downtime. Thanks screamer! Keep it up!!!!

 

[murray654]

I use to be anti-screamer until a month after seacom. These guys ROCK, they really cleaned up their act. Brilliant latency, and they ACTUALLY NOTIFY you when they will have downtime. Thanks screamer! Keep it up!!!!

What area you in?

In our area, we sometimes get notified, sometimes we dont. We had 12 days downtime in May and June (20% of the time). Since February there has been massive packet loss.

We are way out of town, so it seems that the far reaching areas of their network are vulnerable. People closer to town report that they dont suffer from the downtime or packet loss.

The thing is we have experienced better service than what we currently get:
Before Feb there was no packet loss problem.
Before May we were down maybe 2% of the previous 12 months. Winter is supposed to be a time when the network is stable, but this winter it is worse than the summer months.

The international connectivity has improved a lot since the seacom cable though. I remember when we started with Screamer (GWI in those days), we had to move our web hosting onto SA servers, because we could not collect our mail, or maintain the website. Before that we used VSAT and were able to collect mail and connect to the server overseas with FTP. As soon as we started using Screamer the mail server and ftp server were inaccessible.

 

[diebaas]

Thank goodness it has been a very long time now that i have left screamer....

 

[murray654]

Oliviershoek Tower Harrismith Region

I have been monitoring my connection for the last 6 months:

6 months = 402 hours downtime 9%
2 months = 214 hours downtime 15%

This network is going south fast.

 

[rebel998]

Oliviershoek Tower Harrismith Region

I have been monitoring my connection for the last 6 months:

6 months = 402 hours downtime 9%
2 months = 214 hours downtime 15%

This network is going south fast.

Who is your local dealer?

The guys who installed your CPE?

 

[murray654]

Who is your local dealer?

The guys who installed your CPE?

Guess what the network is down today. So I have sent in my cancellation form. Vodacom has my business for the next 12 months. Its only 1/4 of the speed, but at least I get what I paid for.