Okay so my house has many many ethernet devices attached which makes this so difficult to figure out.
Ill start by explaining the general physical setup:
adsl modem + routerboard (connecting to ptawug with this) connect to a 32 port switch
into that same switch goes 4 pc's and a laptop (on occasion for the laptop)
that switch then goes over a longer distance (about 25metres) to another switch a 16 port switch
that switch then connects to a wireless hub (to which a laptop connects, my grandfathers at his flatlet, for about 3 to 4 hours a day)
from the wired switch: there are 2 cables: 1 goes to my grandfathers flat to his popcorn hour
the other goes to another switch about 30metres further away: this is to my fathers back office and here there are 3 to 7 pc's connected at anyone time.
hopefully that is clear enough to give an indication of the layout, now for the internet setup
10mbit adsl line (this never loses sync, which is part of the mystery of the adsl problems)
since i have an mweb uncapped account that does one connection only the setup is as follows
my routerboard dials the internet connection and then on the routerboard i setup a vpn account
each of the (many) pc's in the house dial the routerboards vpn to gain internet access.
This setup worked perfectly, and infact had 30 days internet connections with no problems.
Then 3 months ago it all went to crap and the problems havent gone away since then.
There were no changes to the network layout (not even minor ones, no new pcs etc) but heres the issue:
The internet disconnects on the routerboard or individual pc's dialing their own accounts (Reason for the pppoe setup - different isps too: so its not an mweb issue) and it cant connect again for a few minutes.
It does this up to 15 times a day, the adsl itself is not losing sync.
I have replaced the adsl modem and called telkom to no avail (they reset the port but it didnt solve anything) - but i dont think its a line problem itself, but rather a problem on the network.
It seems to disconnect with higher frequency the more devices are active, however even when there are very few of us actively using anything it still happens (afterhours, its waaaaaaay less frequent but still occus, and it damaging my starcraft 2 and wow time)
The problem is incredibly infuriating as i cannot isolate the problem, in addition to replacing the modem i have changed ALL the wired switches (and temporarily disabled the wireless one by unplugging it) to no avail.
Does anyone have any idea why a problem like this might occur? Where the adsl line has not lost sync -
the error it gives when trying to dial during that time is "the modem has reported an error" (which is why i replaced the modem)
but my personal theory is that something is taking priority over the modem (the network functions 100% even when the internet goes down) and then instead of finding the model when we try to redial it cant - cuz some other device is taking preference over this.
So basically i think its as if the modem isnt "visible" on the network, this seems like it could be the case for me, especially given the fact that when u dial a pppoe account u never specify the modem IP it just sort of knows its there type of thing.
Any help will be appreciated and infact if someone can solve my problem I might be relieved enough to give a small cash bonus
It honestly feels like the only solution to this problem will be to move... but that isnt a practical solution
Ill start by explaining the general physical setup:
adsl modem + routerboard (connecting to ptawug with this) connect to a 32 port switch
into that same switch goes 4 pc's and a laptop (on occasion for the laptop)
that switch then goes over a longer distance (about 25metres) to another switch a 16 port switch
that switch then connects to a wireless hub (to which a laptop connects, my grandfathers at his flatlet, for about 3 to 4 hours a day)
from the wired switch: there are 2 cables: 1 goes to my grandfathers flat to his popcorn hour
the other goes to another switch about 30metres further away: this is to my fathers back office and here there are 3 to 7 pc's connected at anyone time.
hopefully that is clear enough to give an indication of the layout, now for the internet setup
10mbit adsl line (this never loses sync, which is part of the mystery of the adsl problems)
since i have an mweb uncapped account that does one connection only the setup is as follows
my routerboard dials the internet connection and then on the routerboard i setup a vpn account
each of the (many) pc's in the house dial the routerboards vpn to gain internet access.
This setup worked perfectly, and infact had 30 days internet connections with no problems.
Then 3 months ago it all went to crap and the problems havent gone away since then.
There were no changes to the network layout (not even minor ones, no new pcs etc) but heres the issue:
The internet disconnects on the routerboard or individual pc's dialing their own accounts (Reason for the pppoe setup - different isps too: so its not an mweb issue) and it cant connect again for a few minutes.
It does this up to 15 times a day, the adsl itself is not losing sync.
I have replaced the adsl modem and called telkom to no avail (they reset the port but it didnt solve anything) - but i dont think its a line problem itself, but rather a problem on the network.
It seems to disconnect with higher frequency the more devices are active, however even when there are very few of us actively using anything it still happens (afterhours, its waaaaaaay less frequent but still occus, and it damaging my starcraft 2 and wow time)
The problem is incredibly infuriating as i cannot isolate the problem, in addition to replacing the modem i have changed ALL the wired switches (and temporarily disabled the wireless one by unplugging it) to no avail.
Does anyone have any idea why a problem like this might occur? Where the adsl line has not lost sync -
the error it gives when trying to dial during that time is "the modem has reported an error" (which is why i replaced the modem)
but my personal theory is that something is taking priority over the modem (the network functions 100% even when the internet goes down) and then instead of finding the model when we try to redial it cant - cuz some other device is taking preference over this.
So basically i think its as if the modem isnt "visible" on the network, this seems like it could be the case for me, especially given the fact that when u dial a pppoe account u never specify the modem IP it just sort of knows its there type of thing.
Any help will be appreciated and infact if someone can solve my problem I might be relieved enough to give a small cash bonus
It honestly feels like the only solution to this problem will be to move... but that isnt a practical solution
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