Info needed on Fixed Broadband

User217

User217

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The Willows, Pretoria
Guys,

I need some help please. I want to switch from ADSL to Fixed Wireless, but I need someone to tell me what their experience with a setup like this is. The equipment alone will cost me a pretty penny so I cannot afford to be wrong about this.

Right now I have a 10Mb ADSL line with Telkom and Afrihost. I have a LOT of noise on my line and Telkom seems to be unable to fix it. Things have progressed to such a state that I have my own dedicated support person at Afrihost and a permanently open ticket on this fault! Complains about line noise is going in every few days as my modem drops the line. The noise is so bad, that I cannot even hear the people who phone me. The problem started after the floods of October 2012 in the Cape and it has been ongoing since!

Needless to say, I cannot keep it up anymore. I work from home and I need a stable connection if I am to make any money to stay afloat at the end of the month!

I have been negotiating with Comtel since the beginning of last month. I am interested in their 4Mb Economy Uncapped package which will cost me R906 per month. My ADSL package is faster, but i need to look at cost as well.

Something they told me this morning makes me wonder... They guarantee speeds of up to, but the actual speed may be much lower. This is the same with ADSL where I pay for 10Mb, but I only get 8Mb if I am lucky! I was also told that my experience will be much different than ADSL... Can someone who has fixed broadband please elaborate? Does that mean that the speed varies during the time of day?

I would like to hear your opinions please.

Kind Regards,
 
Here's my take:

  1. You need to post your ADSL line stats. If you're syncing at 10mbps, your line can't be that bad. Post the stats so we can see how good/bad it is. Simply dropping your sync rate from 10mbps to 8mbps could make all the difference.
  2. Have you looked for other culprits that might be causing noise on your line? It might not necessarily be the line itself, but something affecting it.
  3. If your modem is only dropping the line every few days, you should consider yourself lucky. That is not so bad at all. Other people experience these drops several times a day. When your line does drop, how long is it down for?
  4. You could purchase an ADSL modem that supports 3G (via an external dongle, or with an internal 3G modem). You can then set up the 3G connection as your failover link. So when your ADSL drops, 3G kicks in, until your ADSL comes back online again. You can even set it up to notify you via email when failover and fallback occur. Use a prepaid SIM card for 3G, or get an Afrihost month-to-month capped 3G account.
  5. Check the link in my signature. There are some good guidelines to help you figure out what is going on.
  6. If you're willing to take some financial risk, I would suggest applying for a new Telkom voice line, activating ADSL on it, and then checking how it performs. Do this while your first line is active. Reason for this, is that Telkom will be forced to supply you with a new copper pair from the exchange, all the way to your house. They will also put you on a different port on the DSLAM. If you first cancel your existing line, then apply for a new one, chances are very likely that you will be connected via the same copper pair, and even the same port at the exchange. You'll be paying for 2 Telkom lines, but it will only be for about a month at most. That's an extra R165 + R425 = R590. You can use your some data package on both lines, obviously only one at a time because it's uncapped. You can then test to see if the new line performs any better. If it does, then cancel your old line. Ask Telkom to transfer your old telephone number to the new line, if you still need it.

I'd try all of the above first, before investing in all the hardware for a fixed-wireless solution, which will inevitably come with its own issues and instabilities. Do check out the link in my signature. Some very good pointers.
 
Last edited:
Thank you for that detailed explanation!

This is what I got from the Afrihost control panel:

ADSL Router Results (Telkom Exchange to Your Location)
Downstream sync - 4096 kbps
SNR - 21.0 db
Attenuation - 11.1 db

DSLAM Results (Your Location to Telkom Exchange)
Current Downstream Sync - 507 kbps
SNR (Signal-to-Noise Ratio) - 27.0 db
Attenuation - 27.0

A speedtest I have done confirms these results.
Download Speed - 3.44 Mbps
Upload - 0.44 Mbps

It seems that I am paying for 10 Mb, but I am only getting 3.5 Mb... My line drops several times during the day. It can be as little as four times for the entire day or well over ten times for the day. When the line drops, it takes about 30 seconds to reconnect, but sometimes it drops right after reconnecting again. The worse it every was, was five drops in succession right after reconnecting. Most of the time it drops twice in succession.

Regards,
 
OK so your line stats are good. You are syncing at 4mbps, and achieving throughput of 3.5mbps. That's normal. With those line stats, you should be able to comfortably sync at 10mbps with no issues.

Regarding the frequent disconnects, I don't think it is related to the copper line itself. It sounds like something external is causing interference, somewhere along the line. It could be anywhere between the exchange and your house.

First thing is to check within your home for any culprits. Have you tried replacing the ADSL filter? Have you tried another modem? If possible, try to borrow/swap modems with a friend or colleague, for a few days. See if it makes a difference.

Tell me, what modem do you currently have, and how long have you had it for? Also, for how long have you had ADSL, and for how long has this issue of frequent disconnects been with you?

BTW - did you read through my blog post?
 
Hi,

I have a TP-Link ADSL 2+ ethernet modem, a real cheapie. I don't need anything more expensive as I have a TP-Link N750 Dual Band router that runs my home network, print server and NAS drives. I only need the ADSL modem for the feed to the router. From here the ADSL feed is split wirelessly to my PC's, Laptop, tablets and phones. My modem and router is two years old.

I have had and ADSL feed at this premisses for almost 14 years. Back then the fastest connection was 512Kb/s and it was expensive as hell! It could be the POTS filter, because it is as old as that!

The issue fist started in October 2013, shortly after the flooding in Cape Town where many of the streets where flooded. Over here the flooding reached knee level! It took me three weeks to get Telkom to do something about it. The finally fixed it by giving me a new line. That was the end of the problem until the beginning of April, shortly after the first rain. It's been ongoing since.

Every time I complain, they go to the exchange and do their thing there. That fixes the problem for two days and then it starts out again. It takes about two weeks for the problem to become so severe that I do not have any access. Then I complain again and the cycle starts all over again. The issue seem to be aggravated by rain and cold.

At the moment everything seem to be running ok. I have high latency from time to time, but that is it.

Regards,
Nico Visagie
 
OK... try swapping filters, as well as the modem. If they're both as old as you say they are, the issue could be with one or both of them. Especially if the problems started with floods. It's likely that something in your modem or filter, was damaged by a surge/short caused during the floods.

If swapping them out doesn't fix your problem, then you might be connected to a faulty port at the DSLAM. You should ask Telkom to change the port you're on. They will give you an uphill battle to do this, but if you make buddies with the techies that come out to check the line, you can ask them to do it.
 
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