Fibre Optic Broadband - Tips on Optimising

We went fibreoptic a couple of months ago when it became available.  Just the outside the house bit, not within the house itself.  BT Infinity Broadband.

Seemed OK at first, but with occasional dropouts and the Mac and iPad displaying messages about the Orange light on the router having come on.  Ignored this for a week or so, as apparently there can be problems for the first 10 days or so (why?).   This was with both wifi and wired connections.

I contacted the BT help people, and did everything they suggested, after they had done their on-line checks.   After a few days it was obvious that nothing had improved and I contacted the on-line help desk again.  They then tried to make me redo all the things I'd done on the first call, and the only extra was to change the router setting to for the wifi to force the higher rate transfer for capable devices.

Still didn't cure it, and this time I rang the appropriate BT telephone number, saying, could I have a new router as this one appears to be faulty.  They told me that it was usually not the router and arranged for an Openreach engineer to call.   He came, looked at our house telephone system (4 extension sockets), and then traced the problem to the master socket.  He opened it up and said something to the effect of 'who wired this socket up?'  My reply was that it was the same socket as had been there when we moved into this house 30 years ago.

Apparently it was wired completely incorrectly, especially the earthing.  He asked if we had any problems with crackling on telephone calls, and we said 'yes, sometimes'.  Checked the download speeds and said we were only getting 10 and should be getting up to 40.

To cut a long story short, he replaced the master socket, which immediately raised the download speed to 39.6!

Now, we have no longer have problems with wired connections, although I still seem to have the occasional instance of wifi stalling when downloading a webpage on my iPad3.  I think this is a problem with Safari on the iPad, as when I try the same page with a Windows 10 laptop, the pages are dowloading OK.

I know how to (temporarily) cure the iPad Safari.  This is to switch the iPad wifi connection off and then on again.  I have tried every solution I can find on t'interweb, but none of them seem to provide other than a temporary cure.   Just wish Apple would pull their finger out and solve that issue.

Our only broadband option is a rather limited 4 to 5MB service. However, the newish Panasonic TV still works pretty well over WiFi from an Airport Extreme for iPlayer etc. I have a spare port for the TV on my switch, but decided to leave it on WiFi to isolate it from the audio gear. If you want to stream HD stuff, it might be a different story, but regular catch-up TV services work fine for us on this simple setup. 

Congratulations Mike - I hope you have better luck than us.

We switched to fibre and our speeds promptly halved! After a month of BT struggling to fix it they declared we were too far from the cabinet and we are now back on copper (which seems to be less flaky when it gets to a mile or so away from the cabinet). At least the HH5 we got is a massive step up from our old HH3.

Maybe next year...

Mike - out of interest are you referring  to fibre broadband - like a Fibre To The Premise product or VDSL such BT's Superfast broadband which is via copper to the local cab from which its fibre to the exchange?

Anyway to your question - the 802.11ac access to your TV should be fine subject to throughput and / or link rate. Do you know what rate your TV is connecting the wifi router at? If there is little else on that SSID then you should be able to get 60%+ throughput on the link rate.

If you have good connectivity - then another tip to increase throughput is to select short preamble as opposed to the typical default of long preamble (assuming your wifi router supports it)

Dungassin posted:

..............    arranged for an Openreach engineer to call.   He came, looked at our house telephone system (4 extension sockets), and then traced the problem to the master socket.  He opened it up and said something to the effect of 'who wired this socket up?'  My reply was that it was the same socket as had been there when we moved into this house 30 years ago.

That sounds very familiar;  I had a similar issue,  BT help desk were next to useless & it went on & on .........  but with help from www & a guy down the pub who was an ex BT wireman I diagnosed it as too many extensions & potentially poor connections,  the outside of the house was a wiring mess anyway & it looked as bad as it performed.  Because we no longer had 2 phone lines, fax & telex (remember those) & as all the phones were now wireless & the property inlet point was not in a good place,  I had BT remove all the surplus wiring & run a new cable to a new inlet point.  Engineer also changed HH3 to a HH4 & never looked back since.  (I wonder when BT will realise the help desk is not a great customer experience & a single engineer is worth a score of that service)           So I'm hoping the problems you had,  I have already fixed.    

ChrisSU,  thanks for input,  it gives me hope I can avoid digging up the room to install ethernet

Hi Simon ........... VDSL,  yes its dear ol' BT.  The local area cabinet is very close so its minimal copper. 

Not sure about the TV as that has yet to be selected  ........

err  .......     select short preamble  .......   Je ne comprends pas

Dungassin posted:

Seemed OK at first, but with occasional dropouts and the Mac and iPad displaying messages about the Orange light on the router having come on.  Ignored this for a week or so, as apparently there can be problems for the first 10 days or so (why?).   This was with both wifi and wired connections.

This is due to the modem training whereby it is looking for the optimal line speed

It will drop the line a number of times during the process but usually only over the first few days

In the last place I lived, we had fibre optic into the house, but limited to 16mb/s by the provider.

I set up a wireless range extender using two cisco wap 4410n (one configured as a wap, the other as a range extender) - the setup worked OK, but one or other of the units needed re-booting every couple of weeks. Be aware that this set up halves the wireless bandwidth.

In my current apartment, I use just one of the cisco wap 4410n (i.e. no range extender) and can stream hd movies to the TV over wireless without problems.

Mike

http://routerguide.net/preamble-type-short-or-long/

Cheers

Simon

robgr posted:

Dungassin posted:

Seemed OK at first, but with occasional dropouts and the Mac and iPad displaying messages about the Orange light on the router having come on.  Ignored this for a week or so, as apparently there can be problems for the first 10 days or so (why?).   This was with both wifi and wired connections.

This is due to the modem training whereby it is looking for the optimal line speed

It will drop the line a number of times during the process but usually only over the first few days

So ... should I do a Factory reset on the router to make it do the modem training again now that I have have a much improved connection speed with the new telephone master socket?

Yes, it always worth every now and then to power cycle the router as sometimes it will renegotiate at a higher speed (a factory reset is not required)

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

Mike

http://routerguide.net/preamble-type-short-or-long/

 

Thks Simon,  something new to read up on,    but BT HH's don't have the ability to change this..  

I can't give you a technical answer but I went down a similar route a few months ago and decided that a wired ethernet connection was the best bet. Although wifi extenders did work there were quite a few dropouts/loss of signal (internet TV as well as the ipad) even though I was using the Apple Airport Express extenders (gave up on the TP link over mains approach).  I suspect it depends a lot on the construction of your house, as we have some pretty solid walls in the way, and as said above, the extenders do seem to reduce the internet speed anyway (only checked using an app in the iphone - but that tallied with the results I was getting).

In the end I invested in a set of crimpers and some Cat5 cable from one of the internet suppliers 9so I could get away with the smallest holes when installing the cable) and despite not being a network engineer I found after a few practice sessions I could wire up the cables without problems to exactly the length and route I wanted (mind you, some magnifying spectacles helped getting the colour coding right!).

Mike-B posted:

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

Mike

http://routerguide.net/preamble-type-short-or-long/

 

Thks Simon,  something new to read up on,    but BT HH's don't have the ability to change this..  

Yes this did cross my mind, I had a quick google for 'HH5' and 'preamble' and there was nothing showing... not to worry.. Bear in mind for a future wifi access point...

Simon

john s posted:

In the end I invested in a set of crimpers and some Cat5 cable from one of the internet suppliers 9so I could get away with the smallest holes when installing the cable) and despite not being a network engineer I found after a few practice sessions I could wire up the cables without problems to exactly the length and route I wanted (mind you, some magnifying spectacles helped getting the colour coding right!).

Good for you.. a wired Ethernet connection is almost always going to win out on reliability and performance when you can use it... and most network engineers won't make up thier own cables.. They leave that to the sparkies 

Simon

john s posted:

.............   Although wifi extenders did work there were quite a few dropouts

In the end I invested in a set of crimpers and some Cat5 cable 

Thanks for the feedback -  I have a wall, but its not the problem,  there is a stone fireplace to get around or thru or up & over.  I have no problems doing it as I used to do it for a living  (mostly in big boats) when Noah were a lad,   Its not impossible,  but I would just rather not as its gonna make a mess no matter which route I choose.      I also have no problems with routing & terminating ethernet & have the tools,  but I will most likely try wireless first.      

Hi Mike

Can you receive virgin broadband in your area?

I have been using this for about a year with no issues.

I have just done a speed test 51mb download speed on a wireless laptop.

Good luck with it.

Trev

Hi Trev,    yes I can get Virgin,  & on the surface they look to be a good deal,  but after the new customer intro offer has run its time,  its not quite so attractive.  Plus I know people who wish they hadn't,  so I'm not going that way.     The only other service is BT - & yes I know Talk-Talk, PlusNet, Sky & Vodafone, - problem is they all use BT (OpenReach) fibre/cable infrastructure & a relative with TT has been without for over a week,  so not going that way either.  And yes I know some peeps on this forum will tell you horror stories about BT but I'm staying with them simply because since I had them remove old wiring & install all new,  the service has been solid as a rock,   plus its costing the same + peanuts,    so why jump to another unknown.

Virgin are a victim of their own success - I've been with them for a very long time and had rock solid 150/160mb day in day out until around 18 months ago when it dropped off.  After lots of complaints it became clear that the have saturated their network in the area through new customer deals etc and no longer have the capacity to deliver at full speed.  I've been refunded every month for around 18 months and the latest update on capacity being back to what is required is start of April - I'm not holding my breath

I have my ISP router WiFi disabled, and an Airport Extreme for wireless. This is an ac router, and my TV has n. They are fine without a range extender, despite having a thick stone wall between them. I do have 2 other Airport Express to extend the network through the house, but the TV is happy without being attached to them.

FWIW I moved from Talktalk to Sky last year. There was a big improvement in reliability, and their customer service has been much better too. The temptation to jump ship for the next cheap deal is always there, but at the moment I'm tempted to stay put. 

Mike indeed with BT's VDSL Superfast service you should be transformed with your access speeds.. very envious.. Our village is getting its own mini cab scheduled 2017/18 .. so still a wait.

Now to your access point.. I am wary of many extenders.. I have just had poor experiences... But devices supporting meshes are usually a lot more effective. I am not sure of the HH5 ability here.. I'd be tempted to have the HH5 focus on 2.4GHz or disable wifi, and then look at wiring a device like a Cisco WAP371 to your switch and running 802.11ac from that.

You can add multiple 371s together to form a radio mesh.. and these devices are small business devices so you have proper support of protocols.. and also not too expensive if you shop around.

Simon