At my wits end

[Kard]

July 2006, my old Teryon Terajet modem after 6 years of faithful service finally dies, and I'm promptly upgraded to the new ntl250 model. All worked well for about 6 weeks, then suddenly my connection speeds dropped to almost dialup levels, I had huge latency spikes and packet loss averaging 40%+.

Late August, an engineer organised a repull for me after noticing the problem wasn't just related to my modem, but also affected my digi TV services. A week later (early Sept iirc) the repull crew turned up and decided I didn't need a repull, instead they tell me my area is over subscribed and that no matter what they do the problem can't be fixed.

So until last week I put up with my 0.4mbps service and the freezing TV pictures. Then it stopped completely... Between 3pm until around 2am, my connection would almost grind to a halt, having waited almost 7 months for it to be fixed, I decide to call VM again.

An engineer shows up.. and I have to give them credit, they were brutally honest. They ordered me the repull again, but later said that they didn't think it would solve my problems, in fact they actually said I had 2 options, #1 Suck it up, #2 Switch to DSL (not an option, I live too far away from the nearest BT exchange), it was said that my problems are due to over subscription and unauthorised connections to the network in my area.

I'm stunned, NTL has taken £75 every month from me since this started, charging me for a service they knowingly can not provide, I find this wholey dishonest and disgusting. Was the £8.5k I spent with them over the last 6/7 for the 3 services I use not satifactory?

Gutted, excuse me for whining, but I couldn't find a more suitable place to share my experience.

[janipewter]

Here is a good link for you.

[bringerofnoise]

In an ideal world you should be compensated as they cant provide a service that is fit for purpose and they know it and have admitted it and you have been more than patient.

Unfortunatly thats in an ideal world.

[RUSTY]

unauthorised connections, so if ntl/vm know about this why is it not sorted?

[Kard]

Had the repull this morning, again the crew really didn't want to do it, they seemed like a genuinely helpfull duo. After some debate, the decide to do the repull anyway. They tested the line before and after, and actually got worse results after the repull

They moved me to the "top peg?" (whatever that means) but they complained that the area was configured wrong. They also wanted to attenuate my modem, but doing so killed my upstream so I'm left with a dowstream receive level of 17.1dBmV (slightly higher than before the repull) which I'm told adds to my problem.

My tests tonight indicate speeds of around 0.79 Mbps which in fairness is the best result I've had since November.

When gaming (BF2, WoW, CS) latency ranges from 700ms to 6 seconds (very heavy in BF2), I get spikes of no activity for upto 20 seconds+, which practically makes my gaming experience a no go.

Tonight, for the first time in almost 7 years, I used a dial up modem... the performance was so much better than my cable connection, sure I had 400ms latency throughout, but I had no spikes and no disconnects, 1970's technology to the rescue

I have no alternatives, so I guess I have no choice but to continue paying for a service I don't get, but on the bright side, my TV services are working properly now.

[Stuart]

Kard, I am not sure if they will be able to help, but the site maintains contacts within NTL who are usually able to resolve customer problems. If you PM me your Name, account number, postal address and a daytime contact phone number, I'll refer your case to them.

[NTLVictim]

I suspect Kard is due a refund, what he has been getting is presumably "Goods not fit for purpose" at least, as described in the Consumer Act.

[Nick_15]

Kard, I to live in Staffordshire and it's got so bad now that I'm getting in contact with BT to get a phoneline put in my house.The extra cost I will incure just so I can have a good connection. I am also tempted by the sky offer atm for £1 more I can get BB phone & TV.

[Kard]

Sun, 4 Mar 2007 17:47:52 UTC

1st 512K took 16672 ms = 30.7 KB/sec, approx 253 Kbps, 0.25 Mbps
2nd 512K took 21703 ms = 23.6 KB/sec, approx 194 Kbps, 0.19 Mbps
3rd 512K took 13578 ms = 37.7 KB/sec, approx 311 Kbps, 0.3 Mbps
4th 512K took 14938 ms = 34.3 KB/sec, approx 283 Kbps, 0.28 Mbps

Overall Average Speed = approx 260 Kbps, 0.26 Mbps



To repeat this test from the source server click here.

This week is by far the worst I've seen my connection, strangely I now get random disconnections and the modem can take upto an hour to re-establish the connection. My tracerts to the BBC looks like a warzone with timeouts on all but 3 hops.

Still no word from CS about a possible cure, and oddly on Thursday CS told me no fault had been reported on my account since November 17th 2006 which gave me a chuckle, they also said someone would call me back later that day but no one did. If I had any hair left, i'm quite sure i'd be pulling it out now

[Spooky_uk]

The sooner everybody starts shouting loud about the laughable excuse they call service the better. Too many people fobbed off and ripped off. They better get their house in order soon, times running out.

[marv69]

im too from staffordshire the net as been upand down like a yoyo today, phoned customer support and tbh would have got more sence out of my dog.
Wouldnt even send an engineer, though its not needed as its there end.

[Kard]

Still no dice for my connection, I was told the hardware in my area would be upgraded on 26th April but nothing has changed. To compound things further, CS in India have started to transfer my calls internally which always results in them hanging up on me.

A snippet from pinging www.bbc.co.uk;

Ping statistics for 212.58.224.35:
Packets: Sent = 50, Received = 39, Lost = 11 (22% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 15ms, Maximum = 152ms, Average = 53ms

and yet another speed test;

Sat, 28 Apr 2007 15:03:13 UTC

1st 512K took 40750 ms = 12.6 KB/sec, approx 104 Kbps, 0.1 Mbps
2nd 512K took 24422 ms = 21 KB/sec, approx 173 Kbps, 0.17 Mbps
3rd 512K took 14156 ms = 36.2 KB/sec, approx 298 Kbps, 0.29 Mbps
4th 512K took 16578 ms = 30.9 KB/sec, approx 255 Kbps, 0.25 Mbps

Overall Average Speed = approx 208 Kbps, 0.2 Mbps

It's rapidly aproaching 1 year since I first reported this fault, I think I shall celebrate the anniversary with a "burning of the modem" party

[Sirpingalot]

It's almost painful reading this and knowing that one day, a whole nation (those connected to Virgin media) could experience what you've had to suffer.

I'm honestly not sure what you should do (I imagine you've diagnosed it as not being your modem).

I do know you should have a dowstream receive level of at least 27 - 30 dBmV. If it goes much lower than this, performance will drop noticably.

Could you post your modem config up once more please? (Someone may be able to diagnose the problem if further detail).

---------- Post added at 06:56 ---------- Previous post was at 06:55 ----------

Sun, 29 Apr 2007 05:55:40 GMT

1st 512K took 641 ms = 798.8 KB/sec, approx 6582 Kbps, 6.43 Mbps
2nd 512K took 390 ms = 1312.8 KB/sec, approx 10817 Kbps, 10.56 Mbps
3rd 512K took 516 ms = 992.2 KB/sec, approx 8176 Kbps, 7.98 Mbps
4th 512K took 672 ms = 761.9 KB/sec, approx 6278 Kbps, 6.13 Mbps

Overall Average Speed = approx 7963 Kbps, 7.78 Mbps


Not too bad at the moment.