Cable Forum - View Single Post - Very long running intermittent connectivity problems

ChrisJenkins · 09-05-2007, 20:09

Hi all, I'm almost at my wits end so thought I'd ask for ideas from this forum's collective wisdom. I'm afraid this is a bit of a long story so apologies for that in advance...

I have had NTL (and now VirginMedia) cable broadband since 2000. As speed upgrades have come along I have always upgraded and I'm currently on the 10 MB service. At first all was good but after about 18 months, I started getting intermittent losses of connectivity. These typically last around 10 minutes give or take and if left to its own devices normally starts working again. The strange thing is that during these period the cable modem lights still show it as online etc. just no traffic can flow upstream or downstream. Restarting the modem invariably clears the problem. Sometime the problem occurs just once or twice a day, at other times it can happen 5 times in an hour. it seems random - I have not been able to spot any correlation with time of day etc. I have exhaustively tested my own equipment (on numerous occassions) to rule out any faults there.

Without even beginning to go into the fun I've had with (non)customer service, the basic cycle that repeats every few months is as follows:

1. I persuade them to send an engineer.
2. He comes, fiddles with signal levels, tweaks something in the cabinet at the end of the road or replaces my cable modem (I'm on my 5th one now...)
3. Things seem much better for a while and then it all starts over again.

This week they sent the Principal Service Engineer for my region to see me (I had gotten really cross with them...). He listened to my detailed description and all the diagnostics I have done and looked at the modem log etc. He said it was not a fault with the modem and was likely something further upstream. He promised to investigare and get back to me...

He called today while I was out and spoke to my wife. He basically said that he *thought* it was due to traffic shaping and that it should get better when my are is upgraded to 20 MB.... Well, that does not stack up at all on so many fronts. And how come he doesn't *know* if it is due to traffic shaping or not (don't they have logs and traces to look at!). Of course I don't have any 'phone number for this guy to speak to him myself and when I called the service centre they basically told me they did not have any 'phone number for the engineering department nor any way to pass a message to them. Even when I spoke to a supervisor the story was the same. Unbelievable!

This is all so utterly unacceptable that I don't know what to do next other than start some heavyweight complaining.

Anyone got any technical ideas regarding this issue and/or any suggestions on how to get some proper attention from VirginMedia?

Thanks, Chris

09-05-2007, 20:09	#1
ChrisJenkins Inactive Join Date: May 2007 Location: Berkshire, UK Age: 65 Posts: 10	Very long running intermittent connectivity problems - any ideas? Hi all, I'm almost at my wits end so thought I'd ask for ideas from this forum's collective wisdom. I'm afraid this is a bit of a long story so apologies for that in advance... I have had NTL (and now VirginMedia) cable broadband since 2000. As speed upgrades have come along I have always upgraded and I'm currently on the 10 MB service. At first all was good but after about 18 months, I started getting intermittent losses of connectivity. These typically last around 10 minutes give or take and if left to its own devices normally starts working again. The strange thing is that during these period the cable modem lights still show it as online etc. just no traffic can flow upstream or downstream. Restarting the modem invariably clears the problem. Sometime the problem occurs just once or twice a day, at other times it can happen 5 times in an hour. it seems random - I have not been able to spot any correlation with time of day etc. I have exhaustively tested my own equipment (on numerous occassions) to rule out any faults there. Without even beginning to go into the fun I've had with (non)customer service, the basic cycle that repeats every few months is as follows: 1. I persuade them to send an engineer. 2. He comes, fiddles with signal levels, tweaks something in the cabinet at the end of the road or replaces my cable modem (I'm on my 5th one now...) 3. Things seem much better for a while and then it all starts over again. This week they sent the Principal Service Engineer for my region to see me (I had gotten really cross with them...). He listened to my detailed description and all the diagnostics I have done and looked at the modem log etc. He said it was not a fault with the modem and was likely something further upstream. He promised to investigare and get back to me... He called today while I was out and spoke to my wife. He basically said that he thought it was due to traffic shaping and that it should get better when my are is upgraded to 20 MB.... Well, that does not stack up at all on so many fronts. And how come he doesn't know if it is due to traffic shaping or not (don't they have logs and traces to look at!). Of course I don't have any 'phone number for this guy to speak to him myself and when I called the service centre they basically told me they did not have any 'phone number for the engineering department nor any way to pass a message to them. Even when I spoke to a supervisor the story was the same. Unbelievable! This is all so utterly unacceptable that I don't know what to do next other than start some heavyweight complaining. Anyone got any technical ideas regarding this issue and/or any suggestions on how to get some proper attention from VirginMedia? Thanks, Chris