Re: 2nd home hub 5, Infinity still keeps disconnec...

Question

Hi Everyone..
Hopefully someone could shed some light on this wierd issue I'm having.. and in a way I'm glad to see its not just me having the same issue as Jamesvolvo...
After three engineer visits, well actually two visits as the 1st engineer was booked out between 8am and 1pm slot, but turned up after 3:30pm when I'd gone back to work.
As far as I can tell, this dropout problem became more noticeable within the last 4+ weeks where suddenly getting shouts from the family 'has the broadband gone down' and when checking the hub 5 seeing it with its blinking orange/red light and a red/orange B symbol (the light eventually returning to green and then blue) and the dropout consistency ranging from a few minutes uptime to a few hours uptime.
Also on top of the hub5 loosing it's WAN link on a few occastions I noticed that when the broadbad went down/up, I was unable to hear a dial tone when trying to call out on the landline and a phonecall from a mobile to the landline number would after allow me to hear a dial tone (where there was none before).
So 2nd engineer came out, nice chap.. and looked at the wiring at the infinity master socket, the socket at the front door and the splitter/bridge connection (which was put in when I went from BT ADSL to Infinity by BT contractors) etc.. and told me that it'd all been wired up wrong and was impressed that anything was working. So he made the necessary re-wirings and tested the line and the broadband and found no faults.
So the next day or so I then get a call from the wife informing me that she can't dial out on the landline and that there was no dialtone. So when I got home from work I then went round (again), powercycling the phones and making sure that they were connected into the sockets correctly and even tested (as per BT line fault diagnostic process) into the infinity enpoint test socket.. still no dial tone.. so again I dialed the landline from my mobile and after the phone rang and I hung up, I then found I got a dial tone. (yay).
Checking the hub5 WAN syslogs I saw the same behaviour as jamesvolvo - (see below - ive filtred out all the other lines just to show the up/down/up/down cycles)
08:24:10, 29 Apr. (60063.610000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=38274000Kbps, Up Rate=9999000Kbps; SNR Margin Down=16.3dB, Up=14.1dB
08:23:19, 29 Apr. (60012.570000) PTM over DSL is up
08:22:41, 29 Apr. (59973.970000) PTM over DSL is down after 963 minutes uptime
08:22:41, 29 Apr. (59973.960000) PPPoE is down after 963 minutes uptime [Waiting for Underlying Connection (WAN Ethernet 2 -​ Down)]
08:22:35, 29 Apr. (59968.290000) PPP LCP Send Termination Request [User request]
16:19:35, 28 Apr. ( 2187.920000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=39952000Kbps, Up Rate=9999000Kbps; SNR Margin Down=16.6dB, Up=14.2dB
16:11:06, 28 Apr. ( 1679.170000) PTM over DSL is down after 13 minutes uptime
16:11:06, 28 Apr. ( 1679.160000) PPPoE is down after 12 minutes uptime [Waiting for Underlying Connection (WAN Ethernet 2 -​ Down)]
16:11:01, 28 Apr. ( 1673.900000) PPP LCP Send Termination Request [User request]
15:58:10, 28 Apr. ( 902.870000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=39952000Kbps, Up Rate=9999000Kbps; SNR Margin Down=16.5dB, Up=14.1dB
115:56:41, 28 Apr. ( 814.350000) PTM over DSL is down after 6 minutes uptime
15:56:41, 28 Apr. ( 814.340000) PPPoE is down after 5 minutes uptime [Waiting for Underlying Connection (WAN Ethernet 2 -​ Down)]
15:51:19, 28 Apr. ( 492.570000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=39952000Kbps, Up Rate=9999000Kbps; SNR Margin Down=16.3dB, Up=14.1dB
15:49:52, 28 Apr. ( 405.600000) PTM over DSL is down after 0 minutes uptime
15:48:35, 28 Apr. ( 328.270000) PTM over DSL is down after 2 minutes uptime
15:48:35, 28 Apr. ( 328.260000) PPPoE is down after 1 minutes uptime [Waiting for Underlying Connection (WAN Ethernet 2 -​ Down)]
15:48:30, 28 Apr. ( 323.290000) PPP LCP Send Termination Request [User request]
15:46:58, 28 Apr. ( 245.670000) PPPoE is up -​ Down Rate=22400000Kbps, Up Rate=4789000Kbps; SNR Margin Down=6.4dB, Up=5.6dB
So I called out BT again and again got the BT fault manager leaving me a voicemail saying not to worry but they had found 'something' on the local network and would also send an engineer to the CAB and test my connection from there saying that the engineer wouldnt need access to my home as the previous engineer had already done the re-wiring and tested it all ok.
Wouldnt you believe it, the engineer needed access to my home so I had to dash back from work to meet the engineer who was in the process of re-wiring the connection in the street. He'd found some water in the black cylinder under the pavement, so cut the wiers and put on new connectors etc and then went inside the house to test the line and broadband (again). And as with previous tests, no fault found.
He did give me a heads up as to not to keep calling BT (openreach) out, as the line tested ok and if i kept doing this, BT would no doubt start charging me for the callouts.
This kind of leaves me in a bit of a wierd position as where do I go from here? he suggested that I get BT to change the hub 5 from the mk1 to the mk2 that had just come out to see if that would fix the issue, but could not tell me straight why I was having this issue, I even showed him a video I took on my phone of the problem when I lost he dial tone and the testing I did, (BT phone LCD showed NO LINE) as if thats not enough proof that I have an intermittent problem!! and showed him the WAN syslosg to which he agreed "something definately wasn't right" and just re-iterated that it woudl be worth getting the latest hub 5 out of BT's doors.
So im having to post here to see if anyone has an answer as I'd hate to incur any costs from BT.. (£139??) Hopefully this forum moderator will see the issues we're having and help us out.. (other than making a seperate/new thread with the information I already posted in here)..
Regards
DeltaOskarMike

Answer 1

Hi Imjolly
Thanks for getting back to me.
Here's the information - although I've sanitised what I think is personal information...
ADSL Checker
BT BROADBAND AVAILABILITY CHECKER
Telephone Number xxxxxxxxxxx on Exchange THATCHAM is served by Cabinet xx
Featured Products
Downstream Line Rate(Mbps)
Upstream Line Rate(Mbps)
Downstream Range(Mbps)
Availability Date
  HighLowHighLow    
FTTC Range A (Clean)
80
64
20
20
Available
FTTC Range B (Impacted)
79.6
52.9
20
12.2
Available
WBC ADSL 2+
Up to 7
4.5 to 11
Available
WBC ADSL 2+ Annex M
Up to 7
Up to 1
4.5 to 11
Available
ADSL Max
Up to 5.5
4 to 8
Available
WBC Fixed Rate
2
Available
Fixed Rate
2
Available
Other Offerings
FTTP on Demand
330
30
Available
Fibre Multicast
Available
Copper Multicast
Available
Troubleshooting > helpdesk
1. Product name: BT Home Hub
2. Serial number: xxxxxxxxxxxxx
3. Firmware version: Software version 4.7.5.1.83.8.204 (Type A) Last updated 22/01/15
4. Board version: BT Hub 5A
5. DSL uptime: 0 days, 01:25:00
6. Data rate: 9999 / 38274
7. Maximum data rate: 22729 / 75117
8. Noise margin: 13.9 / 16.4
9. Line attenuation: 19.4 / 15.7
10. Signal attenuation: 19.4 / 15.7
11. Data sent/received: 14.4 MB / 191.9 MB
12. Broadband username:
13. BT Wi-fi: Yes
14. 2.4 GHz Wireless network/SSID: BTHubxxxxxx
15. 2.4 GHz Wireless connections: Enabled (802.11 b/g/n (up to 144 Mb/s))
16. 2.4 GHz Wireless security: WPA2
17. 2.4 GHz Wireless channel: Automatic (Smart Wireless)
18. 5 GHz Wireless network/SSID: BTHubxxxxxxxx
19. 5 GHz Wireless connections: Enabled (802.11 a/n/ac (up to 1300 Mb/s))
20. 5 GHz Wireless security: WPA2
21. 5 GHz Wireless channel: Automatic (Smart Wireless)
22. Firewall: Default
23. MAC Address: xxxxxxxxxxxxx
24. Modulation: G.993.2 Annex B
25. Software variant: AA
26. Boot loader: 1.0.0
I've not done a quiet line test but will go though that process if/when I have a problem with the no dial tone next time.
Unfortunately I dont have a corded phone but for sanity's sake will no doubt get a cheap one from somewhere 9even if its just for future line testing) to eliminate any issues with the cordless bt phone I have.
Broadband doesnt appear to drop when I recieve a call and when I have had no dial tone in th epast I still have had broadband access. Although i know that on one occasion the hub5 did its usual sidconenct/reconnect (giving me broadband) but when checking the phone - there was no dial tone.
Also the title/problem description should change as its been moved - should be "Hub 5 keep disconnecting/reconnecting frequently"
Note: Looking at the same reported behaviour on other threads I can see as a last update from StephanieG (Community manager) below...
Re: HH5 New Software Version 4.7.5.1.83.8.204
on ‎23-02-2015 12h31
Hi Guys,
We can confirm that our technical team have rolled out a fix to all affected Home Hub 5As, so your service should be back to normal. The fix is a configuration change to the current firmware 4.7.5.1.83.8.204. We apologise for this issue and thank you for your patience.
This thread will now be locked. If you are continuing to experience any issues with your broadband connection, it will be due to a problem with your own connection. Please could you start your own thread about the issue, so that the community and the mod team can look at your problem individually.
So does this mean there's an additional fix to firmware release 4.7.5.1.83.8.204 ? as it appears that the fix was on or after 23/2/15 and my last firmware update was 22/1/15..
Regards
DeltaOskarMike