*READ FIRST* Vodacom Problems: Slow Throughput, Trying to Connect, DNS, High Latency

Vodacom network problems? - Urgent

Have any other users experienced this problem in the last 2 days? Yesterday and tday while connecting to the internet, we are getting DNS errors, and as a result, no websites can be found. I did a dignose, and I got a message saying that the DNS server 196.207.32.83 was unresponsive when the OS did a Ping.

Nothing has changed in my wife's or my configs - and this problem has been recoccuring on and off for the second day now. This morning I have not been succesful in connecting at all. I tried an MTN connection through my cell phone and have experienced no issues, so this tells me that its the network and not anything on our pc's? Right? :confused:

Please let me know via feedback, and if anyone from Vodacom lurking here - please note this and fix?

Cheers.
 
I did ... last night could only get GPRS. I tried all evening till midnight, then just gave up.
 
I've been having 3G connection issues in the Linden area since last night. Don't know if its related.
 
Auckland Park - Vodacom consumer woes

Steinie said:
TODAY IS DAY #29 !!!!!!!!


:mad::mad::mad:
Click to expand...

Hi,

Mostly technically incompetent newbie here. Genuinely nearly shed a tear when I read Steinie's vodacom problem history. Like your mate, seemingly I also live down the road from you. I'm also on Vodacom 3g. I've been unable to do any s/w updates or YouTube-ing for about a month now here. This I reported to my Service Provider - who escalated to their "exec helpdesk" - to no avail. Their techie came out - to no avail.

In brief: Same problems as reported by Steinie. Seemingly good signal (3/5 to 5/5). Continuous changes between 'HSDPA' and 'WCDMA'. Blips of good throughput power, quickly trickling to slower than dial-up speeds. After copious research got 2642kbps download & 359kbps upload on Vodacom site. Gave up on accessing Speedtest page after appr. 20min wait.

Downloads time out. Systems report that my firewall/proxie (???) could be acting up. Have tried re-installing what I can. Was just shy of taking the machine in for a check up (at my huge expense - no doubt). Meanwhile, it's been Vodacom's fault all along. Why, oh why, didn't they drop me an sms into the interface inbox - they inundate me with their unsolicited junk sms's daily after all?!

Saving the cost of checking the machine in has come at the expense of my hours (no doubt amounting to days by now). Never mind productivity, it'd be interesting to assess the electricity cost of keeping my machine and lighting going well into the evenings. Maybe LeadSA would be interested to see how socially responsible our leading Cellular provider is?

I find it utterly deplorable how big business is raping the consumers of this country. I give up with Vodacom! I've never assessed broadband competition as I've always 'cruised'. But... that's come to an end now! Thankfully my Vodacom contract has long expired so I'll be voting with my feet asap.

Thanks for nothing Vodacom. I sincerely hope that my most recent monthly sub was of more use to your shareholders than it was to me, your ex-subscriber.

P.S. Nice vent - gave it my all. The no-frills page to subscribe to this forum only took about 10 minutes to open. But hey...... who's still counting the minutes.
 
The Thug said:
I've been having 3G connection issues in the Linden area since last night. Don't know if its related.
Click to expand...


Well if you are in the Cresta, Linden, Northcliff, Northcliff Corner, Albertsfarm, Albertsville, Greymond, Bergbron area, you will have a lot of problems, because the towers in these areas are very overloaded. I have reported it about 18 months ago, and Vodacom told me that these areas are overloaded and they have to add new towers, but untill now, nothing have been done. It start to come to a point that I have to drive outside these areas to make calls, because it is impossible to make or receive calls, send sms or to use the internet. Vodacom could have prevent this situation, but it seems that our complains was ignored. If you look at the Greymond and Northcill area, the amount of people that have moved in here have trippled and more are on their way to move into this area with the new complex and shopping centre that will come to being in the next 3 months. I hope that vodacom will listen to their clients and start to look at problem areas. I know that it is not easy to put up a new tower and it take a lot of planning and envornment studies, but why did vodacom alow this to deteriorate to the level where we have nearly no service at all.
 
Orvor said:
Have any other users experienced this problem in the last 2 days? Yesterday and tday while connecting to the internet, we are getting DNS errors, and as a result, no websites can be found. I did a dignose, and I got a message saying that the DNS server 196.207.32.83 was unresponsive when the OS did a Ping.
Click to expand...

I used to just keep disconnecting and reconnecting until it came right when that happened to me. Usually it won't need to be done much more than three or four times...
 
I am also on the Linden area. The DNS server must be down - I can't ping it and I canot resolve any hostnames so can't browse. I have more than a gig left on my bundle so no reason for this on my side.

VODACOM PLEASE DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS

@VodacomData - have you established the problem is yet? MY 3G is unusable - no connection for 3 days now.

Can someone out there please get this logged and sorted.
 
Orvor said:
I am also on the Linden area. The DNS server must be down - I can't ping it and I canot resolve any hostnames so can't browse.
Click to expand...
Try setting your dial-up connection to use one of the following DNS servers until the problem is solved:

OpenDNS
208.67.222.222
208.67.220.220

Google
8.8.8.8
8.8.4.4
 
Hi Alex

Excellent post!!

Meanwhile, no joy from VC, although the technician did call me this morning to confirm that they are still investigating.


Today is day #30 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


:mad::mad::mad:
 
Last edited:
Josandre53 said:
Well if you are in the Cresta, Linden, Northcliff, Northcliff Corner, Albertsfarm, Albertsville, Greymond, Bergbron area, you will have a lot of problems, because the towers in these areas are very overloaded. I have reported it about 18 months ago, and Vodacom told me that these areas are overloaded and they have to add new towers, but untill now, nothing have been done. It start to come to a point that I have to drive outside these areas to make calls, because it is impossible to make or receive calls, send sms or to use the internet. Vodacom could have prevent this situation, but it seems that our complains was ignored. If you look at the Greymond and Northcill area, the amount of people that have moved in here have trippled and more are on their way to move into this area with the new complex and shopping centre that will come to being in the next 3 months. I hope that vodacom will listen to their clients and start to look at problem areas. I know that it is not easy to put up a new tower and it take a lot of planning and envornment studies, but why did vodacom alow this to deteriorate to the level where we have nearly no service at all.
Click to expand...

I don't deny that this is the case, but why was everything fine until 30 days ago when everything just suddenly "collapsed"? Also, why are the speeds low 24 hours a day during the week? Surely the towers cannot be overloaded 24 hours per day?
 
Steinie said:
I don't deny that this is the case, but why was everything fine until 30 days ago when everything just suddenly "collapsed"? Also, why are the speeds low 24 hours a day during the week? Surely the towers cannot be overloaded 24 hours per day?
Click to expand...

Take a drive through Northcliff and the surrounding areas and you will see that most of the open spaces a year ago is now covered with town houses. Have you seen the amount of town houses around cresta? and more are on the way. I am living in this area for the past 15 years and everywhere, where there was open spaces, but now it is totally build. In greymont hills, an area of 5km by 2km once open veld is now gone and covered with town houses. private business have followed suite, so more people have moved to this area. Traffic is tripple the amount, moving through this area's main roads and it is coming to a point that you get a lot of traffic problems on the main roads, so the people spill over into the roads that run through the suburbs. Before our suburb was a very quite area, but now traffic is flowing here all the time.
 
Josandre53 said:
Take a drive through Northcliff and the surrounding areas and you will see that most of the open spaces a year ago is now covered with town houses. Have you seen the amount of town houses around cresta? and more are on the way. I am living in this area for the past 15 years and everywhere, where there was open spaces, but now it is totally build. In greymont hills, an area of 5km by 2km once open veld is now gone and covered with town houses. private business have followed suite, so more people have moved to this area. Traffic is tripple the amount, moving through this area's main roads and it is coming to a point that you get a lot of traffic problems on the main roads, so the people spill over into the roads that run through the suburbs. Before our suburb was a very quite area, but now traffic is flowing here all the time.
Click to expand...

As I said, I do not deny that this could be a contributing factor, but I still cannot believe that, one day the system worked fine, and the very next day it just collapsed. Did one new subscriber break the proverbial camel's back? :confused:

Anyway, my speeds have been great since Friday evening, but I am sure that it won't be the case tomorrow (Monday)! :mad:

 
I'd hate to jinx this, but my speeds have been pretty constant since the weekend.

Vodacom made some adjustments somewhere and it looks like they may have solved the problem, even though it took over a month! :wtf:

Just did a speed test:



Keeping my fingers crossed ... ;)
 
All I can say is that I have been with Vodacom for 3yrs and I have only had problems.

I am on now on MTN prepaid for about 3 months and I haven't had a single problem. Their connection is solid and stable.

I should have left Vodacom long ago.

Yes, the speed is slightly slower on MTN than Vodacom, but I vote for a reliable, always on connection over a speedy and very unreliable connection.
 
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