Internet 5 Promo bad performance. 2gig fine. [solved]

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Linctagon

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Hello guys.

A while back I got myself the 8ta 2gig + 1gig promo to test it out as I was looking for a new network and my Cell C has been dropping in speed and my contract with them ended anyway. I was very impressed with the performance of the 8ta 2gig promo package and on average got speeds ranging between 4-10mbps. My pings were just wonderful for 3g coming in at between 25-45ms ping. Never anything higher than 45. Seeing as how I use my internet solely for gaming 8ta was the wayn to go.

Going on that I decided to get the Internet 5 promo contract as 10gig per month at R199 is a great deal. I still had some data left on my 2gig promo and decided to test the two sims. The results were more than displeasing. Over 10 speedtests with my 2gig promo sim I got an average of 8mbps with 35ms ping. Never anything below 5mbps and nothing higher than 45ms ping. I switched over to my Internet 5 Promo sim in the EXACT same stick and the EXACT same location. My results were more than 50% worse. I never got anywhere near 4mbps and never got below 85ms ping. On the contrary, I more often than not got pings up of the 100s which means gaming will be almost impossible as a 100ms latency will kill you.

I did switch these sims back and forth in the stick and the results stay the same. Compared to the 2gig promo the Internet 5 Promo is just plain terrible. I don't understand this since according to the coverage map both use the exact same coverage. I live in Witbank by the way.

Can anyone possibly explain to me how and why this is the case? Do they throttle contract users? Did they put me on a tower further away from my home? How can one sim perform perfectly and another abysmally if they are both on the same network and coverage? What can I do, if anything, to sort this out?

Any answer would be very much appreciated. Thanks guys. Have a good night.
 
Since you were able to repeatedly get this result, it does seem quite worrying.

I assume you used the same speedtest server each time?

What you can maybe also do is perform a few traceroutes and check your IP address to see if the routing is different on the two sims.
You can do e.g. tracert www.speedtest.net
Also check your IP address by ipconfig /all
 
Anything else I can do or try?

This is really getting on my nerves and this Internet 5 promo is absolute garbage.

I just want the cause behind it. The why. Why do I get perfect performance on the 2gig promo sim and the I5 one is trash? I can't understand it.

I think 8ta intentionally screw their contract users over by throttling them or something of that nature in favour of their pre-paid data users who pay more for the data.

I should have known 10gig for R199 was too good to be true. But everything is garbage so might as well pay for the cheapest garbage.

Can't even play local games on this right now where with the prepaid sim I always hosted and had no lag.

I'm done.
 
Re: Internet 5 Promo bad performance. 2gig fine.

Maybe the 8ta support person here can shed more light on your findings. Would be very interested in his views.
 
logank said:
Maybe the 8ta support person here can shed more light on your findings. Would be very interested in his views.
Click to expand...

That is what I am hoping for.

I just want a simple explanation and a solution to the issue. That's all.

I am hoping it is just a simple thing like they put me on a tower further away from my home than the one my 2gig sim connects to. Then the problem can be easily rectified by putting me back on the correct tower.

However, if it comes to light that 8ta does indeed shaft contract users and throttles connections somehow I will be very upset. I have heard of another 8ta user in PTA who had the exact same experience. 2gig is amazing, Internet 5 not so much. Perhaps all 8ta I5 users can purchase 50mb of prepaid data and do a few speed tests and compare. But 10mbps 25ms ping to 2mbps 120 ping is a massive dissapointment.
 
I think you should do more testing. With MDMA you can see such details like operator ID, Cell_ID and roaming indicator. Just note this information when doing testing. This part would eliminate possibility that your contract SIM have been mistakenly provisioned for roaming.
If it is a case of 8ta network in both cases, trace routing tests would be needed to compare how packets are traveling in both cases.
In Windows open CMD window and type
tracert mybroadband.co.za [Enter]
Use any destignation you see speed difference and want to compare path and post results here.
 
I will post up speed test results on both sims and I will post the MDMA and trace results when I get home from work this afternoon.

Hopefully the problem is fixable and not what I think it is.
 
u guys better not mention throttling. 8ta gets a bit ansy. but i find no other solution. they will deny it however.
 
akescpt said:
u guys better not mention throttling. 8ta gets a bit ansy. but i find no other solution. they will deny it however.
Click to expand...

Well, you know what they say about truth and the reactions those truths can draw out.

I personally know one other person situated in PTA that did a test on my request by buying data on prepaid and testing and comparing it to his I5 bundle. His results were much the same. And if people can repeatedly get the same result under the same circumstances then that speaks for itself. If in fact 8ta does shaft contract users I will be very upset and I must say that people will not be impressed with such a disgusting bussines tactic. I put nearly R10 000 in 8ta's pocket and they give priority to someone who pays 150 and gets 3 times my performance? That's disgusting.

However, I'm not one to jump to conclusions so fast. I will see if the problem can be rectified and what the 8ta spokesperson here has to say about my question posed earlier. I am not here to pick a fight with the 8ta rep and I realise he is just doing his job and is not responsible for my issues. All I do however want is an answer.

I hope my initial theory of intentional connection throttling is wrong though. If it is proven that 8ta employs such a practice then I don't think that would go down well with current customers and potential consumers.
 
Here are my Speedtest results. Note that these tests were all done on the EXACT same stick, at the EXACT same location and at the EXACT same time of day. I have done a total of 30 speed tests with 15 fro each sim and the results stay constant.

8ta Internet 5 Promo contract sim:



8ta 3gig Go Big (2 gig + 1gig Night Surfer) prepaid sim:



According to the 8ta coverage map for these two packages http://www.8ta.com/coverage/8tanetwork/ these two packages use the exact same coverage.

Now, how is it possible that I get absolutely terrible speeds and pings on the Internet 5 sim and get fantastic speeds on the 2gig prepaid sim? That is my biggest question. Why? I can see no logical reason whatsoever that these two sims who are exactly identical other than the package have such a massive gap in performance.

There is obviously something VERY wrong here.

The tracert results will follow in the next post.

EDIT: I usually let speedtest select the server with the best ping for my tests but just to be fair here is a test to Midrand (the server the Interent 5 sim tested to) on the prepaid sim.



As you can see the performance is still more than 100% better than the Internet 5 sim. I have tested to moth Randburg and Midrand with both sims extensively and the results stay the same.
 
Last edited:
Linctagon said:
Here are my Speedtest results. Note that these tests were all done on the EXACT same stick, at the EXACT same location and at the EXACT same time of day. I have done a total of 30 speed tests with 15 fro each sim and the results stay constant.

8ta Internet 5 Promo contract sim:



8ta 3gig Go Big (2 gig + 1gig Night Surfer) prepaid sim:



According to the 8ta coverage map for these two packages http://www.8ta.com/coverage/8tanetwork/ these two packages use the exact same coverage.

Now, how is it possible that I get absolutely terrible speeds and pings on the Internet 5 sim and get fantastic speeds on the 2gig prepaid sim? That is my biggest question. Why? I can see no logical reason whatsoever that these two sims who are exactly identical other than the package have such a massive gap in performance.

There is obviously something VERY wrong here.

The tracert results will follow in the next post.

EDIT: I usually let speedtest select the server with the best ping for my tests but just to be fair here is a test to Midrand (the server the Interent 5 sim tested to) on the prepaid sim.



As you can see the performance is still more than 100% better than the Internet 5 sim. I have tested to moth Randburg and Midrand with both sims extensively and the results stay the same.
Click to expand...

Definitely something wrong there. My speeds are the same. But then again I'm still on prepaid, just bigger bundle. Although I can't create connections for big files during the day. But browsing is very fast. I come from adsl with telkom so I'm used to the day downloading restrictions but it still makes me angry because there is no official statement released about data priority. At least with telkom they said 8-6 your downloads are throttled.

8ta just denies everything.
 
Trace to MBB on Internet 5 promo sim:

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7601]
Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\Users\User>tracert mybroadband.co.za

Tracing route to mybroadband.co.za [41.203.21.137]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 * * * Request timed out.
2 453 ms 478 ms 349 ms 172.16.2.1
3 365 ms 459 ms 318 ms 172.16.2.129
4 311 ms 469 ms 469 ms 196.25.251.125
5 302 ms 539 ms 319 ms 196.43.11.234
6 380 ms 358 ms 459 ms 196.43.25.206
7 357 ms 328 ms 599 ms mtn-gw.telkom-ipnet.co.za [196.25.165.198]
8 452 ms 399 ms 439 ms tb-cr-1.za--tb-pr-1.za-a.mtnns.net [196.44.18.14
0]
9 376 ms 388 ms 428 ms ct-cr-2.za--tb-cr-1.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.134]

10 757 ms 458 ms 579 ms rb-cr-1.za--ct-cr-1.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.128]

11 522 ms 579 ms 469 ms 196.44.31.97
12 341 ms 578 ms 708 ms ge11-0-0.gw2.jnb6.za.mtnbusiness.net [196.30.1.2
2]
13 367 ms 369 ms 438 ms vlan9.hr3.jnb6.za.mtnbusiness.net [196.30.156.13
6]
14 479 ms 438 ms 449 ms core-router1.jnb2.host-h.net [196.30.213.108]
15 664 ms 499 ms 479 ms core-access-switch1-vlan1001.jnb.host-h.net [41.
72.136.53]
16 418 ms 579 ms 458 ms mybroadband.co.za [41.203.21.137]

Trace complete.

C:\Users\User>


Trace to MBB on 2gig prepaid sim:

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7601]
Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\Users\User>tracert mybroadband.co.za

Tracing route to mybroadband.co.za [41.203.21.137]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 * * * Request timed out.
2 334 ms 288 ms 469 ms 172.16.1.1
3 304 ms 408 ms 379 ms tpr-ip-esr-6-wan.telkom-ipnet.co.za [196.25.181.
77]
4 306 ms 449 ms 539 ms 196.43.11.202
5 320 ms 428 ms 379 ms 196.43.25.138
6 435 ms 389 ms 369 ms mtn-gw.telkom-ipnet.co.za [196.25.58.18]
7 300 ms 598 ms 679 ms 41.181.139.108
8 408 ms 809 ms 518 ms 196.44.31.97
9 476 ms 399 ms * ge4-0-0.gw17.jnb6.za.mtnbusiness.net [196.30.1.3
7]
10 367 ms 449 ms 468 ms vlan9.hr3.jnb6.za.mtnbusiness.net [196.30.156.13
6]
11 304 ms 469 ms 478 ms core-router1.jnb2.host-h.net [196.30.213.108]
12 350 ms 578 ms 339 ms core-access-switch1-vlan1001.jnb.host-h.net [41.
72.136.53]
13 427 ms 469 ms 369 ms mybroadband.co.za [41.203.21.137]

Trace complete.

C:\Users\User>

I have very little idea of how to make sense of any of this. Maybe you guys in the know can pick something up from that. MDMA does not want to work with my stick so that is the best I can do for now.

On a side note. I have just now noticed on speedtest.net that my connection went from saying the server is hosted in JHB 50mi to Midrand and now it is saying that the server is hosted in CPT with 50mi to Cape Town and 800mi to Midrand. What just happened? Did I get a roaming sim or something?
 
Here is another trace after it jumped to JHB.

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7601]
Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\Users\User>tracert mybroadband.co.za

Tracing route to mybroadband.co.za [41.203.21.137]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 * * * Request timed out.
2 347 ms 409 ms 419 ms 172.16.2.5
3 373 ms 348 ms 379 ms 172.16.2.129
4 543 ms 409 ms 389 ms 196.25.4.117
5 875 ms 768 ms 558 ms 196.43.11.218
6 347 ms 349 ms 418 ms 196.43.25.206
7 395 ms 448 ms 469 ms mtn-gw.telkom-ipnet.co.za [196.25.165.198]
8 462 ms 479 ms 439 ms tb-cr-1.za--tb-pr-1.za-a.mtnns.net [196.44.18.14
0]
9 402 ms 808 ms 489 ms ct-cr-2.za--tb-cr-1.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.134]

10 655 ms 499 ms 479 ms rb-cr-1.za--ct-cr-1.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.128]

11 494 ms 598 ms 559 ms 196.44.31.97
12 1048 ms 687 ms 88 ms ge11-0-0.gw2.jnb6.za.mtnbusiness.net [196.30.1.2
2]
13 96 ms 105 ms 93 ms vlan9.hr3.jnb6.za.mtnbusiness.net [196.30.156.13
6]
14 97 ms 98 ms 99 ms core-router1.jnb2.host-h.net [196.30.213.108]
15 79 ms 78 ms 79 ms core-access-switch1-vlan1001.jnb.host-h.net [41.
72.136.53]
16 85 ms 79 ms 99 ms mybroadband.co.za [41.203.21.137]

Trace complete.

C:\Users\User>

It's like my routes just jump all over the place.
 
Okay I got my stick working with MDMA.

Internet 5 Promo sim:

internet5mdma.png


2gig Promo sim:

2gigpromomdma.png



Correct me if I am wrong, but from the trace and the MDMA results I deduce that not only are the two sims routing differently, but they also put my Internet 5 sim on a different, further away tower than the 2gig sim is currently on. The Cell ID seems to differ between the two as well as the dbm and the routing.

Can anyone in the know lay out the facts for me judging by my results please?

Then when the facts are laid out I await a response from the 8ta representative on this matter.
 
I have a sneaky suspicion that your sims are not the same. Go to an 8ta store with the sim and ask for a replacement, should take 10mins and your done. That could be a cheap fix to your problems.

I am on promo5 in PTA and have speeds between 8 and 10mbps, I have loaded a 2gig bundle on the same sim last time my bundle was finished and did not notice any speed difference, although I did not do a speed test to confirm. I highly doubt that I am being throttled.

The trace results seem to be slightly slower in the P5 sim, and the cell ID is different for the two. The 2gig has a lower RSSI value(lower is better), so it has better signal strength. I think that might be causing your troubles.

I would go for a new sim. Its cheap and quick and might work.
 
Linctagon said:
Correct me if I am wrong, but from the trace and the MDMA results I deduce that not only are the two sims routing differently, but they also put my Internet 5 sim on a different, further away tower than the 2gig sim is currently on. The Cell ID seems to differ between the two as well as the dbm and the routing.
Click to expand...
Let me put it in that way:
1. I don't think your SIM is roaming, with the latest beta you would have roaming indicator.
2. You are connected to the same tower the last digit is different, it means modem picks-up different sector antenna. 4dBm difference is typical in wireless, but can play important role in connection speed. I suggest to download the latest MDMA beta and watch not only dBm, but also SNR field. It is more important than dBm and reflects signal quality. Change modem orientation to pickup the sector antenna which gives the best throughput.
3. Routing. I think are the same. 5 Promo SIM goes 4 extra hops before reaching Telkom-MTN gateway (mtn-gw.telkom-ipnet.co.za [196.25.165.198]). I think it is temporary irregularity. Your test from JHB on 2Gig SIM also goes through these extra hops. If you repeat test home on 2Gig SIM I am sure it will show up. This is by example my promo SIM route to the gateway:
Code: 
  1     *        *        *     Request timed out.
  2   567 ms  1320 ms   585 ms  172.16.2.1
  3   546 ms   730 ms  1279 ms  172.16.2.129
  4   447 ms   279 ms   379 ms  196.25.4.117
  5   306 ms   350 ms   379 ms  196.43.11.234
  6   374 ms   359 ms   419 ms  196.43.25.206
  7   320 ms   400 ms   399 ms  mtn-gw.telkom-ipnet.co.za [196.25.165.198]
3. Your real problem appear to be in JHB:
Code: 
9 402 ms 808 ms 489 ms ct-cr-2.za--tb-cr-1.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.134]
10 655 ms 499 ms 479 ms rb-cr-1.za--ct-cr-1.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.128]
11 494 ms 598 ms 559 ms 196.44.31.97
12 1048 ms 687 ms 88 ms ge11-0-0.gw2.jnb6.za.mtnbusiness.net [196.30.1.22]
13 96 ms 105 ms 93 ms vlan9.hr3.jnb6.za.mtnbusiness.net [196.30.156.136]
14 97 ms 98 ms 99 ms core-router1.jnb2.host-h.net [196.30.213.108]
15 79 ms 78 ms 79 ms core-access-switch1-vlan1001.jnb.host-h.net [41.72.136.53]
16 85 ms 79 ms 99 ms mybroadband.co.za [41.203.21.137]
Your ping time jumps from 80ms to more than 1000ms and it is really bad (in JHB, not home).
 
Last edited:
Alright. So I just go to the Telkom Direct store and request a new sim? Will that sim then take over my Internet 5 contract?
 
And just to be clear, I got the Internet 5 Promo little more than a week ago and the issue has been there from day one.

I have been using the 2gig sim for months and not once has there been any drop is performance whatsoever. Not once. I have played games on weekends for 5 hours straight online with a perfect connection on the 2gig. So I doubt it is a temporary thing.

Modem orientation has also done nothing for me. I have literally been everywhere in my house and done more than 30 tests and each and every single time the 2gig outperforms the I5. No matter where I am the 2gig connects to 10401 and the I5 connects to 10404. Without fail. As I said earlier, all the results I posted here were done with the stick at the exact same stationary location. I literally put the laptop on a table and didn't move it an inch. The I5 modem simply refuses to connect the same way as the 2gig does regardless of orientation or time of day. There are no other variables there other than the sims.

If my product fails to perform and cannot, or let's say, will not, be rectified then I am done with 8ta. The problem has been identified and I KNOW that there is a simple solution to it. I see no reason why 8ta can refuse to assist a customer with a legitimate problem and intentionally leave one with and inferior service while it can be rectified and customer satisfaction assured.
 
Last edited:
Linctagon said:
I have literally been everywhere in my house and done more than 30 tests and each and every single time the 2gig outperforms the I5. No matter where I am the 2gig connects to 10401 and the I5 connects to 10404. Without fail.
Click to expand...
You can request free SIM swap at 8ta store. If it is SIM problem, it would be corrected, will see.
But I don't think 8ta would use special transmitters for I5 Promo users. More likely SIM not allowing some frequencies to be used and 10404 transmitter is using different frequency (by example 900MHz). SIM swap should fix this issue.
I guess you use E367 modem (judging from QoS field). If it is Huawei model, you can force your modem frequency and test if it still connect. Don't do it with ZTE modem! You need the latest MDMA beta, go to the band config, change to custom, deselect all except UMTS 2100MHz and see if it can register to the network. The same with UMTS 900MHz. If you can register on particular frequency with one SIM, but not with another one, we have explanation for a case.
 
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