Australian (ASX) Stock Market Forum

Cyberspace is filling up

Jump to new
cutz said:
Thanks maffu,

I think i've hit the end of the line with telstra, 3rd day in a row, rang up tech support, they got me to do speed test via a telstra download which seemed to download O.K. but everything else is not O.K, iress is at a crawl, it took me 10min to roll a couple of contracts:eek::eek:
Click to expand...

Cutz, we had a very similar problem with Telstra a couple of years ago. It dragged on for quite a while. Sometimes we had acceptable speed, other times it was down to a crawl. We told them we would be closing the account. Miraculously, things improved. :D I think someone told us that Telstra probably put us on a higher priority (or something along those lines).

Might be worth giving them another call and let them know you will be finding another provider unless they improve ASAP.

Goodness - Telstra must have ESP - just went off line as I was typing this:eek: Back on again now - I hope!
 
Thanks Sails,

It's back up but it was hairy, problem with these intermittent faults is it’s hard to prove and telstra won't admit they have a problem at their end, and i can see what would happen if i book a technician, miraculously no faults will exist.

I'm actually now thinking about going adsl with another provider and downgrading my cable plan to a minimum as a backup, (also would save me the trouble of changing all my email addresses).

On a side note TWS seems to handle the outages/slowdowns really well, bit slower to get the order to the exchange and back but OK nevertheless, must be light on system resources.
 
cutz said:
can see what would happen if i book a technician, miraculously no faults will exist.
Click to expand...

I have ADSL via Westnet. Twice in the last five years I've had periods of being repeatedly dropped out, automatically reconnected, dropped out........ etc
After a few days of this contacted Westnet who are apparently obliged to do their "troubleshooting" routine, i.e. disconnect this, connect that, wherein I was running around the house connecting and disconnecting phones, computer connections etc etc. Nothing made any difference.

Eventually they agreed to call Telstra, warning me I'd be up for sizeable fee if the fault was traced to my equipment. At that stage I didn't care!

Within hours of them placing the request to Telstra the problem was fixed.
No Telstra rep came anywhere near.

All was good for a couple of years and then the exact same thing happened again. Drew Westnet's attention to what had happened last time and asked for Telstra to be notified. No. Wehave to go through the trouble shooting all over again, on three separate days. No progress. So again they agree to contact Telstra. And again all is fine within hours of this happening.
 
Julia said:
I have ADSL via Westnet. Twice in the last five years I've had periods of being repeatedly dropped out, automatically reconnected, dropped out........ etc
After a few days of this contacted Westnet who are apparently obliged to do their "troubleshooting" routine, i.e. disconnect this, connect that, wherein I was running around the house connecting and disconnecting phones, computer connections etc etc. Nothing made any difference.

Eventually they agreed to call Telstra, warning me I'd be up for sizeable fee if the fault was traced to my equipment. At that stage I didn't care!

Within hours of them placing the request to Telstra the problem was fixed.
No Telstra rep came anywhere near.

All was good for a couple of years and then the exact same thing happened again. Drew Westnet's attention to what had happened last time and asked for Telstra to be notified. No. Wehave to go through the trouble shooting all over again, on three separate days. No progress. So again they agree to contact Telstra. And again all is fine within hours of this happening.
Click to expand...

Thirdparty providers usually don't have the luxury of passing on the actual cause of these type of outages, the problem you have described is a very common one , its usually caused by hardware and software upgrades from the upstream provider and in most cases just exchange issues.

here are some basic steps to follow to avoid future problems.

ADSL modems.

1. Restart your computer.
2. Restart modem.
3. Check for adsl sync.
4. Use different modem if you have a spare.
5. Switch off modem for at least 10mins and turn back on to recreate profile.

make sure you switch off your modem when not in use.
for intermittent dropouts you could always ask your provider for your connection to monitored by the upstream provider.
 
mayk said:
With adsl you get a dedicated line, no sharing. With cable you have to usually share the upstream channel (which means the things you send out to the world, like uploading videos etc.)

What are your current specification for cable, like Download/ Upload speeds and quotas? You can potentially get a 20MbpsDown/1MbpsUP with an ADSL2+, depending on the distance between the exchange and your house.
Click to expand...

yes the phone line is dedicated but the actual internet bandwidth is still shared.
Ratio/Shaping can still affect your connection and these are set by the provider.
Whirlpool is probably the best site to Flame about ISP.;)

you will also notice some slow connections during these hours.

8am - 9am 10am when people are just starting work.
3pm - 4pm when kids get home.
6pm - 7pm when everyone gets home and use the web again.
 
xyzedarteerf said:
ADSL modems.

1. Restart your computer.
2. Restart modem.
3. Check for adsl sync.
4. Use different modem if you have a spare.
5. Switch off modem for at least 10mins and turn back on to recreate profile.

r.
Click to expand...
Thanks for advice xyzedarteerf. Routinely did all the above except I don't know what No. 3 is. Could you explain how to 'check for adsl sync'.
Sorry to be so technologically illiterate.

Here's another question. This morning I turned the computer on as usual.
Nothing. Dead. Tried another couple of times. Still dead. All is plugged in properly. Cursed some. Later noticed although still nothing happening the level of 'noise' is same as when all is running normally. Pressed Restart button and it starts. All has been fine since.
Any explanation for this?
 
Julia said:
Thanks for advice xyzedarteerf. Routinely did all the above except I don't know what No. 3 is. Could you explain how to 'check for adsl sync'.
Sorry to be so technologically illiterate.

Here's another question. This morning I turned the computer on as usual.
Nothing. Dead. Tried another couple of times. Still dead. All is plugged in properly. Cursed some. Later noticed although still nothing happening the level of 'noise' is same as when all is running normally. Pressed Restart button and it starts. All has been fine since.
Any explanation for this?
Click to expand...

No 3. Sync may also be referred to as Link/Acct light depending on your modem, this light should always be green and not amber.

as for your second question, this may be early signs of Monitor failure, Power Supply or Video card issues worst case motherboard. When you say Dead you mean the screen has no display but the power lights on the computer are still on? How old is the PC by the way?
 
Hi,

You guys that are on ADSL, how much downtime and dropouts do you average a month? Sounds like even you guys have your fair share.

BTW, a technician came round this morning and found a corroded connector in the street pit, fixed it so hopefully things will be now be OK, he also mentioned that the company is the process of upgrading equipment which may cause some downtime/slowness, something phone support didn’t mention.
 
cutz said:
Hi,

You guys that are on ADSL, how much downtime and dropouts do you average a month? Sounds like even you guys have your fair share.

BTW, a technician came round this morning and found a corroded connector in the street pit, fixed it so hopefully things will be now be OK, he also mentioned that the company is the process of upgrading equipment which may cause some downtime/slowness, something phone support didn’t mention.
Click to expand...

No downtime for the past 4yrs, the last time was when some roadworks accidentally cut the main fiber from the street, I have my dsl since 2002 my 1.5mb plan is still serving me well, paying premium for buisness grade plan but well worth the money. Upgrades happen frequently without the user knowing as this are often done in weee hours of the morning.
 
cutz said:
Hi,

You guys that are on ADSL, how much downtime and dropouts do you average a month? Sounds like even you guys have your fair share.

BTW, a technician came round this morning and found a corroded connector in the street pit, fixed it so hopefully things will be now be OK, he also mentioned that the company is the process of upgrading equipment which may cause some downtime/slowness, something phone support didn’t mention.
Click to expand...

No problems with ADSL. Only standard Broadband ADSL. A techy told me, a year or so ago, Bigpond would soon upgrade normal ADSL users to ADSL 2+ for free. Had cable but experienced to many slow periods and outages when it rained heavily, so I got rid of it.
 
Hi nulla nulla,

Fingers crossed, since the techie came round last week and changed the street connection it's been OK, i will eventually sign up to ADSL because I feel that cable may have it’s limitations especially as the take up of internet TV speeds up.
 
xyzedarteerf said:
yes the phone line is dedicated but the actual internet bandwidth is still shared.
Ratio/Shaping can still affect your connection and these are set by the provider.
Whirlpool is probably the best site to Flame about ISP.;)

you will also notice some slow connections during these hours.

8am - 9am 10am when people are just starting work.
3pm - 4pm when kids get home.
6pm - 7pm when everyone gets home and use the web again.
Click to expand...

Of course it is shared, but up till this point, till the video boom, the bottleneck was in access links (Modem etc.). During the bandwidth scare of late 1990s Telecos deployed so much of backbone infrastructure that it was able to hold till 2005-6.



The Internet is changing, but the bandwidth provided by optical fibre would be enough to cater for human life form on earth! (maybe I should post this in the "famous last words" thread haha!)
 
cutz said:
Hi nulla nulla,

Fingers crossed, since the techie came round last week and changed the street connection it's been OK, i will eventually sign up to ADSL because I feel that cable may have it’s limitations especially as the take up of internet TV speeds up.
Click to expand...


Ha jinxed myself,

Couldn't get on to ASF and some other sites were between 12 and about 1.30 , everything else was OK.

Anyone else have trouble with ASF or was it just me?
 
OK guys,

I think i've had it with bigond cable.

Can anyone vouch for a reliable broadband provider in the inner melbourne area.

This is how a conversation with tech support goes, ring ring, voice promp stage 1, stage 2, transfer to call centre, on hold then auto hang up.:confused:

There's got to be a better way.
 
Top