Mystified

AlanYork · 17-01-2005, 23:41

Hi

For a while now I've been using a proxy server as NTL and MSN have both been blaming each other about why I cant get into my hotmail and keep getting the dreaded error 404. The proxy, which isnt an NTL one seemed to sort it out. OK so far.....

Get up today and for no apparent reason sites wont open and if they do they dont open properly. Grrrrrr. First question....my PC has no viruses and no Trojans and is pretty much clutter free. Why oh why does this happen for no reason at all? Talk to NTL and its 10 different Indians with 10 different answers.

So I take off the proxy server and it makes no difference. Unplug the cable from the modem and after a couple of attempts, slowly but surely it corrects itself. Sites now open fine, if anything its quicker! Second question...Why?

Third question....So do I need a proxy server? Is a proxy a bad thing? I was with AOL before and though the service was poor at least it worked. When NTL works, it's great, when it doesnt its awful and I refuse to spend 45 minutes in a call queue to talk to a foreigner in a call centre who cant help me and tells me it must be a problem with my pc! And before I am slated I should say my girlfriend is foreign (American) and I work in a call centre too!

At present I feel as though my service is very unreliable. Sites open ok now...BUT FOR HOW LONG?????? I can access hotmail, which was the original problem, but again, FOR HOW LONG? It's proxy server on, proxy server off, it's back on again etc and I feel like I'm constantly firefighting and I've had my pc checked, it's clean and is working fine. I never had these kind of problems with AOL, it was slow but it worked. Right now its literally a case of I log off and I dont know whether I'm going to be able to get online or not in the morning and frankly, as a customer, I think I deserve better.

Sorry to moan but I'd value any answers, feedback etc and if anyone feels I'm talking utter rubbish, please do say. I'm not very tech aware and I expect to be emigrating to the US later this year but in the meantime, is 8 months of trouble free computing really too much to ask?

paulyoung666 · 17-01-2005, 23:50

one point , what time during the day do you spend 45 minutes in a call queue to speak to an 'indian' , tbh i have never spent more than 5-10 minutes in a queue and as far as i know i have never been connected to india , if i have then they have always sorted out my problems quickly and efficiently

, anyway , where in the country are you for a start ???? , are you using usb or ethernet ????? , how about a bit of basic system specs etc to start with , it might be something that you might consider trivial that may be a big problem

AlanYork · 17-01-2005, 23:56

Yes sorry, I wasnt clear. I run Windows XP home, I live in York and I use an Ethernet. Time of day is a bit hit and miss. I dont have a problem with anyones nationality as long as they can help. What I will say is that the excellent service I have had has come from the Welsh and Scottish call centre staff, the poor stuff from Asian call centre staff. I make no comments about that whatsoever, it is merely a statement of fact.

DieDieMyDarling · 18-01-2005, 13:57

You're very lucky Paul! I've waited MUCH, MUCH longer, and got no help in the end, at times. Not had to phone for a while though.

Stuart · 18-01-2005, 14:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by AlanYork

Hi

<snip>
So I take off the proxy server and it makes no difference. Unplug the cable from the modem and after a couple of attempts, slowly but surely it corrects itself. Sites now open fine, if anything its quicker! Second question...Why?

Third question....So do I need a proxy server? Is a proxy a bad thing? I was with AOL before and though the service was poor at least it worked. When NTL works, it's great, when it doesnt its awful and I refuse to spend 45 minutes in a call queue to talk to a foreigner in a call centre who cant help me and tells me it must be a problem with my pc! And before I am slated I should say my girlfriend is foreign (American) and I work in a call centre too!
<snip>

TBH, I personally find proxies to be more trouble than they are worth. I run my connection without proxies enabled as I find it it more reliable.

Error 404 normally means that the page is not found, but it can be caused by a misconfigured proxy

Proxy servers are supposed to provide a local cached copy of a web page, to minimise use of the network's connection to the Internet, and should, theoretically provide faster access to those pages. Howeever, a misconfigured or malfunctioning proxy just causes more trouble than its worth.

I'd try running without them for a while. See what happens..

Toto · 18-01-2005, 15:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by scastle

TBH, I personally find proxies to be more trouble than they are worth. I run my connection without proxies enabled as I find it it more reliable.

Error 404 normally means that the page is not found, but it can be caused by a misconfigured proxy

Proxy servers are supposed to provide a local cached copy of a web page, to minimise use of the network's connection to the Internet, and should, theoretically provide faster access to those pages. Howeever, a misconfigured or malfunctioning proxy just causes more trouble than its worth.

I'd try running without them for a while. See what happens..

But wouldn't an ntl user be forced to use the ntl proxy servers, surely you don't have an option to turn them off?

AlanYork · 18-01-2005, 19:37

I was directed to the proxy I have been using by a friend's daughter ages ago. I used it because since MSN upgraded my e mail inbox, overnight I could not get into it. I just got error 404.

As I said in my posting, MSN said it was NTLs fault. NTL said it was MSNs fault and I was piggy in the middle. NTL then gave me a choice of 3 of their proxys. Great, but everytime I moved things from folder to folder or tried to send something, I got sent to the log on screen for hotmail and asked for the password!!! MSN said its NTLs fault (no surprises there) and the best I could get out of NTL (whose agent may or not have been Asian, in fairness I can't recall) was "Well it shouldn't be doing that".....!!! Brilliant deduction but not a whole lot of use to me! As for solutions, none. Well I'm only the customer and no I do NOT want to use NTL mail, I want hotmail thanks very much!

By this time my blood was boiling. I dont ask for much from the web, just to be able to browse, send e mails etc and I was getting nowhere. But, to cut a long story short, this particular proxy, the one recommended by my friend's daughter, solved the problem. I did ask an NTL agent if it was an NTL proxy. One Indian sounding lady said it was but when I had to call back on a diiferent matter, another Indian sounding lady said it wasn't.

That's half the problem, even if you get someone who doesn't sound as though they are reading from a script, you get past the language barrier, you get a different story depending on who you talk to.

Now, this non NTL proxy has been ditched and I'm running without one, things are fine, I can even access hotmail, but for how long? As I said, and this is purely a personal experience, when NTL works, it's fantastic, but when it doesn't its abysmal. I'm experiencing problems every other week it seems and I've had my PC checked, it's clean, no viruses, no Trojans. What's the answer, you tell me? Am I missing something obvious?

I don't ask for much, I'm emigrating this year for gawds sake!! I just want basic reliability whilst I'm still here and talking to NTL is like talking to a brick wall, and yes, sadly, you do end up waiting 45 minutes in a call queue. In fact they are sending out letters apologising for the delays in answering calls caused by "restructuring", I have 2 of them.

Before I go I'd like to reiterate I have nothing against Asian agents or any foreigners, as I said my lady is foreign and I work in a call centre myself. As long as they can do the job, where they are from or their skin colour is irrelevant. Sadly I feel, and its not just in the IT sector, Indian agents are just not up to the task in many cases. Their grasp of English and understanding of regional dialects just isn't there and I do not hold them at fault for this, I blame companies for using them as cheap alternatives to qualified European staff, but perhaps that is best saved for another thread. Maybe I will be able to access the web tomorrow, maybe I wont, good old NTL!!!!!

Tezcatlipoca · 18-01-2005, 19:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

But wouldn't an ntl user be forced to use the ntl proxy servers, surely you don't have an option to turn them off?

Yep, you can't turn them off. If you don't manually specify a proxy in IE/FF etc, then you automatically use one of your local ones transparently.

http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/article.php?a=14

Although, some of us are lucky to be in areas where ntl have turned off the transparent proxies

Quote:

Originally Posted by My nthw proxy test result

You are an ntl customer but do not appear to be using a proxy.

Toto · 18-01-2005, 23:40

I thought I'd test something.

I've never been convinced that Hotmail are fully on top of their servers ability to deal with email, so I logged into my hotmail account, and sent an email to my ntlworld email address.

A well configured web based email server (tisk, tisk ntl, you know who you are) should include the senders IP address in the full email header, in order to track the network responsible for the IP address. I would expect Hotmail to include the the correct client IP address.

I was surprised to find that they did not include my ntl IP address, but the proxy server I am forced to connect through. But in fairness, I did the same thing with ntl's webmail service, and got the same cache address, not my client IP address, so they are as bad as each other.

I can summise from this then that Hotmail also has server problems, so this may not be an ntl issue.

BTW, I've never had the 404 problem with hotmail when collecting email on the ntl network.

I know it doesn't help you Alan, but I thought it might be good to get another users perspective on this.