On 12/01/2011 00:06, Timothy Murphy wrote:
John wrote:

Actually, I have moved the modem down to the telephone inlet into the
house (joined to the microfilter by a short RJ12 cable).
This hasn't improved the ADSL service,
which still fails every hour or so, requiring the modem to be
stopped and re-started by hand.

We had a similar problem and in the end I bought a new modem - the
problem disappeared. I think it was related to when they started to
increase the speeds and introduce 2+ - the old modem just detected too
many CRC and other errors and restarted itself.

Yes, I think that is very plausible;
the ADSL connection worked perfectly for 2 years,
until 3 months ago.
The modem then stopped working altogether,
and Telecom Italia swapped the modem,
which worked after a fashion but kept dropping the connection.

I have a vague recollection that Telecom Italia
mentioned that ADSL speed was to be increased
at approximately the same time that the modem failed.

I've decided to try a new modem,
and have more or less decided on a Billion 5100S RC modem.
This is not a WiFi modem;
I plan to connect it to my desktop,
and then connect a WiFi router to the desktop.

I'm hoping the Billion will reconnect if and when the line drops
without needing to be physically re-started.

I've looked around for a forum or mailing-list devoted to ADSL,
but haven't found anything.

Is getting a modem like that a poor move? I'd always recommend a
combined router/modem, unless you're trying to do strange things. More
secure unless you're very careful, talks to anything you want it to,
will reconnect on line drops.