Pho3nix
The Legend
Not fighting @AfriNatic, especially since you acknowledged the issue and resolved it on the other thread.
Maybe a suggestion, isn’t it possible to just have 2 APNs for Afrihost to give the users choice VS sending you a request.
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Not fighting @AfriNatic, especially since you acknowledged the issue and resolved it on the other thread.
Maybe a suggestion, isn’t it possible to just have 2 APNs for Afrihost to give the users choice VS sending you a request.
This sounds like such an elegant solution. I hope theres no technical limitation in doing so
Do you offer fixed public IPs on Afrihost's mobile service?
There are a number of challenges with regard to changes that need to happen to accommodate this. I was thinking that the best way forward is to NAT by default and clients that require a public IP can request it however this also comes with a challenge in the form of NAT box capacity. With IPv4 resources getting stretched and fibre speeds increasing NAT boxes are required to meet the capacity demands. This has a significant financial impact in terms of hardware required and hosting costs in the DC.
The other option is managing Public vs NAT based on service and demand. If a client has a capped sim we mobile-nat by default and public to uncapped or high-capped packages. This requires some dev time to implement.
Unfortunately another APN is not an option.
I will bring this up again in the agenda to see what solution we can find and once I have solid feedback on a way forward I will advise accordingly.
In the meantime we deal with these requests on a case-by-case basis and clients can send a dm to @Afrigirl to assist.
Not sure I can agree with your logic here. When a person goes out to expect a public IP, at least they will know when it doesn't work, this port scan issue is 'invisible' because everything seems to work as it should, as you know it's hard to pinpoint battery drain, so people will most likely just accept some other thing as the cause of the problem.
Did I did get a notification, sms, email or anything to notify me that I might be affected by severe battery drain because I'm using your LTE service? No, I did not. If I had not been active on mybb I would have probably never figured it out. The net result of changing to MTN is huge by the way, without changing usage patterns I now wake up with a battery that is around 50-59% instead of 20-29%. I am quite a bit surprised that you expect customers to follow up with you in order to address this problem if I'm honest.
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Dave
Honorary Master
It's also a bit weird that it apparently only affects one provider, is their setup so different from the rest of the providers (and even internationally).
Ok – haven't set it up yet, but played around a bit with the iPhone 14 Pro Max, that arrived this morning.
Initial observations:
1.) The camera cluster looks like it should be the head of some battle-droid, somewhere. I might be watching too much TV.
2.) Sure the camera cluster is big, but if it helps to take pretty pictures, then so be it.
3.) Size is not much bigger than the ordinary versions (iPhone 12/iPhone 8+) – and whilst the Speck cover I bought today is a bit slippery, know it will be just fine to handle.
4.) It's noticeably heavier. I will get used to it.
Initial observations:
1.) The camera cluster looks like it should be the head of some battle-droid, somewhere. I might be watching too much TV.
2.) Sure the camera cluster is big, but if it helps to take pretty pictures, then so be it.
3.) Size is not much bigger than the ordinary versions (iPhone 12/iPhone 8+) – and whilst the Speck cover I bought today is a bit slippery, know it will be just fine to handle.
4.) It's noticeably heavier. I will get used to it.
To be honest, I find their response ridiculous, blaming 'unsecured' phones now...But I guess I'm in the minority with regards to that opinion, or maybe I just don't know enough about the topic, which is possible. I just wonder how many people are out there not knowing that their batteries are being clobbered, or for how long it has been an issue. Regardless, I've moved on
mugikhan
Senior Member
100% agree here. No acknowledgment of a problem on their side, just straight deflection. @Afrigirl @AfriFella @AfriNatic I am disappointed.
To be honest, I find their response ridiculous, blaming 'unsecured' phones now...But I guess I'm in the minority with regards to that opinion, or maybe I just don't know enough about the topic, which is possible. I just wonder how many people are out there not knowing that their batteries are being clobbered, or for how long it has been an issue. Regardless, I've moved on
If I may just say this. We are not hiding or deflecting anything. There is nothing wrong with our APN or the service as it stands.
Afrihost APN high battery drain - EXPLAINED (not solved)
I'm finding the battery drain even with mobile data turned off and solely connected to Wifi. I should maybe do a test this weekend with the SIM removed and see what the drain is like then.
mybroadband.co.za
There is some more info in this thread regarding the issue.
When we launched Air Mobile we only provided public IP's. We have since started to enabling Mobile NAT mainly because we are managing the IP resources we have vs the number of new subscribers on both fibre and mobile/FLTE.
The drain is caused by a lot of connections on the internet that are part of botnets that continuously scan IP subnets for vulnerabilities. Mobile phones when allocated a public IP respond to these packets either with messages that the packets aren't meant for it or simply send an icmp reply. This keeps the LTE radio of the phone active causing the drain. Similar to an app you enable a "keep phone awake" option. This is not something we can control. It happens all over the world and it's unfortunately just the way the internet works.
To answer why other carriers are not affected. Vodacom, MTN and Cellc has always had carrier grade NAT (CGN) from the start and their reasoning for this is likely to prevent exploits or to manage IP resources. It's not possible to give 45.4 million devices a public IP. You can't get that many IP's even if you wanted to. Afrihost as an ISP had access to these IP's and since we had lower mobile subscribers and with ADSL slowly being discontinued these resources freed up. We also aquired more IP resources over time as the subscriber number grew until it was no longer possible/feasible.
Telkom not so long ago also started implementing NAT. If you use the Telkom unresticted APN you will face a battery drain too.
Why international carriers don't suffer? Asia, Europe and North America are the very first regions that ran out of IPv4 address space. These carriers had never deployed public IP's on a device level ever so there has been no motivation for mobile device manufacturers to build in some sort of firewall that will prevent incoming connection and allow the radio to sleep.
Myself and @Afrigirl are swamped with queries to assist clients and we have not once told a client we will not assist. We are working on compiling a report and working with Dev to find a solution. We have NAT setups currently that are in place that addresses the issue.
If anyone has any questions feel free to send me a message. I'm happy to answer any questions.
FiestaST
Honorary Master
iPhone 14 Plus production halted, Apple to reassess demand, iPhone 15 Plus still planned - 9to5Mac
iPhone 14 Plus should be a hit product by all accounts. It’s the lowest-priced big screen iPhone that Apple has...
9to5mac.com
Tsepz_GP
Executive Member
Yikes, things really not working out with the 14 Plus.iPhone 14 Plus production halted, Apple to reassess demand, iPhone 15 Plus still planned - 9to5Mac
iPhone 14 Plus should be a hit product by all accounts. It’s the lowest-priced big screen iPhone that Apple has...
I think if Apple had made a little more effort the 14 Plus would have been a hit with enthusiasts who want a big premium phone under $1000.
The biggest gripe I’ve seen everyone having with 14 Plus is 60Hz screen, which I do agree, I think Apple could have pushed that up to 90Hz, call it Motion+ Display or something and made this device more competitive with the likes of Pixel 7 and S22+, possibly also given it a A16 chip but maybe with 4 GPU cores, make this the “iPhone Air” of sorts.
Hopefully they are more intent and committed with 15 Plus.
One other thing that is disappoint with 14 Plus is that despite the large battery and 60Hz screen, it’s battery is still mostly around the same as 14 Pro Max in some instances and in some instances it’s less, so the whole “best battery life iPhone” thing is not really working out either, the numbers are pointing to rather spending the extra and just getting the 14 PM.
FiestaST
Honorary Master
Mostly agree with you. Even if they kept ProMotion on the Pro line only It would be "fine", I feel the main issue is the "poor value pricing", if the vanilla models were 50 to 100 USD less it would allow an ample gab of "do I really need the extra benefit of the Pro line or can I rather pocket the bucks".
The major price hike in all markets besides the US also stings.
That is my 2c on the 14 Plus model in particular.
Foxhound5366
Honorary Master
Ok so after three weeks of struggling with Vodacom, my iPhone 14 finally managed to activate mobile service on my Watch Series 8. It was a Vodacom issue that looked like this:
But then Vodacom’s IT team finally fixed the issue:
And now all is happy with the world:
So now you know, if you’re on Vodacom you need to ask for them to log an IT ticket and request a “Network Synchronization”. I was told they’d helped out two other clients today with the same issue, so I can just imagine there are probably a lot of other sufferers out there.
But then Vodacom’s IT team finally fixed the issue:
And now all is happy with the world:
So now you know, if you’re on Vodacom you need to ask for them to log an IT ticket and request a “Network Synchronization”. I was told they’d helped out two other clients today with the same issue, so I can just imagine there are probably a lot of other sufferers out there.
Keanu Leeves
Senior Member
- Joined
- Jul 29, 2018
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yes, you can get prepaid E-sims from Telkom/Cellc
I am currently on MTN and need an Alternative, as during load shedding, the MTN signal is non existent
Keanu Leeves
Senior Member
- Joined
- Jul 29, 2018
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I would suggest you browse the Telkom/Cellc websites and type in your address on the coverage map this will give you an idea of the service you will receive...Vodacom and Mtn don't do prepaid E-sims. That being said, if Mtn's signal is non-existent during load shedding, I don't have high hopes for Telkom/Cellc. Might have to get fibre/enable wifi calling.
Stay in a rural area, no fibre, Vodacom does have signal during load shedding by MTN drops signal 2 minutes before load shedding