OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

Hi All,

I have been having sporadic issues with my internet. A couple of times a day, when we are streaming on demand TV, it will pause and the buffering circle appears. After a minute or so it will sort itself out and continue.

I have noticed that when this happens, pinging the Google DNS server (8.8.8..8) I get massive ping times usually between 1,000 and 5,000 ms! Looking at this in more detail over the past few days I have run a couple of tests
1. Continually ping'd 8.8.8.8 over 24 hours. Looking at the log, the issue seems to happen a few times an hour
2. I have run traceroute 8.8.8.8 for a few hours and I have a few instances of the long ping times. I have pasted the traceroute for the 3 occasions below (changed my internal addresses to "MYIP")
First instance
Mon 3 May 11:39:18 BST 2021
traceroute to 8.8.8.8 (8.8.8.8), 64 hops max
1 MYIP1 0.172 0.151 0.159
2 MYIP2 0.615 0.692 0.686
3 * * *
4 213.121.98.129 2362.102 * *
5 * 213.121.98.128 138.378 *
6 87.237.20.138 3360.186 2716.418 2742.804
7 87.237.21.174 2935.524 * 110.855
8 * * *
9 8.8.8.8 2998.063 * 582.409

Second instance
Mon 3 May 12:09:57 BST 2021
traceroute to 8.8.8.8 (8.8.8.8), 64 hops max
1 MYIP1 0.212 0.17 0.149
2 MYIP2 0.689 0.683 0.682
3 * * *
4 * * *
5 * 213.121.98.128 560.209 2635.551
6 * 87.237.20.138 7.975 *
7 87.237.21.174 2589.703 2794.373 2955.29
8 * * *
9 * 8.8.8.8 482.195 *

Third instance
Mon 3 May 13:49:45 BST 2021
traceroute to 8.8.8.8 (8.8.8.8), 64 hops max
1 MYIP1 0.188 0.146 0.139
2 MYIP2 0.71 0.741 0.479
3 * * *
4 * * 213.121.98.129 376.329
5 * 213.121.98.128 272.967 2467.027
6 87.237.20.138 1047.391 * 286.63
7 87.237.21.174 2626.708 1960.504 1646.555
8 * * *
9 8.8.8.8 8.795 8.91 9.195

As you can see they vary a little and also the impact of the overall ping differs (e.g. the third one has a good end to end ping time but the intermediate ones are poor)

Anyone have any ideas how to trouble shoot this? When I spoke with the ISP, they said that they can not work on ping times only run the line tests. I am trying to get to a point where I can give them something concrete to go on. Also, are there any good forums out there for these sorts of issues?

Thanks

Lee.

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

wrote:

Anyone have any ideas how to trouble shoot this?

Download a demo version of pingplotter, it does the same as ping, but
with miles better presentation, e.g. you might the huge delays occur
once an hour, or that they correspond with route changes within or
between ISPs

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

Andy Burns wrote:

pingplotter, it does the same as ping

Actually despite the name, it does the same as traceroute.

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

On Mon, 3 May 2021 06:54:31 -0700 (PDT), "
wrote:

Hi All,

I have been having sporadic issues with my internet. A couple of times a day, when we are streaming on demand TV, it will pause and the buffering circle appears. After a minute or so it will sort itself out and continue.

snip

Also, are there any good forums out there for these sorts of issues?


alt.telecom.broadband might be as good a place to try as any?

Cheers, T i m

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

When texas had that extremely bad weather a lot of streams seemed to have
this issue, though quite why so many might have been going via Texas eludes
me. However it could be that local route around were maxing out the systems
here due to the lack of connectivity via the normal route and it was just
too many people with too much data unexpectedly.

I also guess it depends what isp you are on as to how they might mitigate
such things.
Brian

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This newsgroup posting comes to you directly from...
The Sofa of Brian Gaff...

Blind user, so no pictures please
Note this Signature is meaningless.!
"Andy Burns" wrote in message
...

wrote:

Anyone have any ideas how to trouble shoot this?

Download a demo version of pingplotter, it does the same as ping, but with
miles better presentation, e.g. you might the huge delays occur once an
hour, or that they correspond with route changes within or between ISPs

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

On 03/05/2021 14:54, wrote:
Anyone have any ideas how to trouble shoot this?


change your ISP
The problem is with them somewhere

--
Canada is all right really, though not for the whole weekend.

"Saki"

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

On Monday, 3 May 2021 at 16:39:12 UTC+1, Brian Gaff (Sofa) wrote:
When texas had that extremely bad weather a lot of streams seemed to have
this issue, though quite why so many might have been going via Texas eludes
me. However it could be that local route around were maxing out the systems
here due to the lack of connectivity via the normal route and it was just
too many people with too much data unexpectedly.

I also guess it depends what isp you are on as to how they might mitigate
such things.
Brian

--

This newsgroup posting comes to you directly from...
The Sofa of Brian Gaff...

Blind user, so no pictures please
Note this Signature is meaningless.!
"Andy Burns" wrote in message
...

wrote:

Anyone have any ideas how to trouble shoot this?

Download a demo version of pingplotter, it does the same as ping, but with
miles better presentation, e.g. you might the huge delays occur once an
hour, or that they correspond with route changes within or between ISPs

Looking at the IP addresses which seem to be causing the long times in traceroute, they seem to be either BT ones or EE (my ISP) ones.

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

wrote:

Looking at the IP addresses which seem to be causing the long times in traceroute, they seem to be either BT ones or EE (my ISP) ones.

do you get *any* non-slow hops once it leaves your network? If not,
it's likely just to be dodgy DSL connection to cabinet or exchange

does your router give you any line stats? tried reboot router? noise oon
phone line? try calling your own line from mobile

leave pingplotter running for a few hours to try and spot patterns

BT and EE are one and the same ...

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

On Monday, 3 May 2021 at 17:45:24 UTC+1, Andy Burns wrote:
wrote:

Looking at the IP addresses which seem to be causing the long times in traceroute, they seem to be either BT ones or EE (my ISP) ones.
do you get *any* non-slow hops once it leaves your network? If not,
it's likely just to be dodgy DSL connection to cabinet or exchange

does your router give you any line stats? tried reboot router? noise oon
phone line? try calling your own line from mobile

leave pingplotter running for a few hours to try and spot patterns

BT and EE are one and the same ...

Yes most of the time the ping times are fine it is just sporadically I get the problem and the whole thing grinds to a halt for about a minute. I had an issue a couple of weeks ago where the router kept disconnecting and reconnecting. Openreach came out and fixed it by redoing some of the connections between me and the cabinet and tested the line afterwards and it was fine. I had the ping issue before this though so suspect this is a different issue and would imply it is after it hits the exchange. I wonder if the first server on the traceroute is the IP address of the kit in the exchange (it is owned by BT apparently) or it is somewhere downstream of the exchange - not sure how these things work TBH

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

wrote:

most of the time the ping times are fine it is just sporadically I get the problem and the whole thing grinds to a halt for about a minute.

Have you excluded wifi issues by connecting PC via ethernet to router?

random, or always bad same time within the hour? or same interval
between good/bad periods?

I had an issue a couple of weeks ago where the router kept
disconnecting and reconnecting. Openreach came out and fixed it by
redoing some of the connections between me and the cabinet and tested
the line afterwards and it was fine. I had the ping issue before
this though so suspect this is a different issue and would imply it
is after it hits the exchange.
Presumably you did a traceroute "-d" to avoid DNS lookups, doing it
again with DNS will give some clues from device names along the way

I wonder if the first server on the traceroute is the IP address of the kit in the exchange

traceroute will only show routers, not switches, so you'll never have a
full picture.

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

On Monday, 3 May 2021 at 18:30:36 UTC+1, Andy Burns wrote:
wrote:

most of the time the ping times are fine it is just sporadically I get the problem and the whole thing grinds to a halt for about a minute.
Have you excluded wifi issues by connecting PC via ethernet to router?

random, or always bad same time within the hour? or same interval
between good/bad periods?
I had an issue a couple of weeks ago where the router kept
disconnecting and reconnecting. Openreach came out and fixed it by
redoing some of the connections between me and the cabinet and tested
the line afterwards and it was fine. I had the ping issue before
this though so suspect this is a different issue and would imply it
is after it hits the exchange.
Presumably you did a traceroute "-d" to avoid DNS lookups, doing it
again with DNS will give some clues from device names along the way
I wonder if the first server on the traceroute is the IP address of the kit in the exchange
traceroute will only show routers, not switches, so you'll never have a
full picture.

No I didn't use "-d" but given I was pinging the IP address directly, would it make a difference?

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

wrote:

No I didn't use "-d" but given I was pinging the IP address directly, would it make a difference?

just that your traceroute consisted entirely of non-responding hops wih
asterisk, or responding hops with only an IP addr, but no hops where the
name could be resolved, but then if getting to 8.8.8.8 is difficult not
to unexpected, try settin DNS to BT's local server for a while?

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

On Monday, 3 May 2021 at 19:32:35 UTC+1, Andy Burns wrote:
wrote:

No I didn't use "-d" but given I was pinging the IP address directly, would it make a difference?
just that your traceroute consisted entirely of non-responding hops wih
asterisk, or responding hops with only an IP addr, but no hops where the
name could be resolved, but then if getting to 8.8.8.8 is difficult not
to unexpected, try settin DNS to BT's local server for a while?

The DNS on the router is not set to Google's it was set by EE so assume the primary and secondary are their ones. I have added them to my pingplotter list now and they seem to have the same long ping times as google's and at the same time. If I ping an IP address though wouldn't this bypass the DNS servers?

If it matters, I have ClearOS installed which acts as a gateway. The internal network is on one subdomain and the external EE router on a different one. The latter only has the EE router on it so everything goes via ClearOS.. I believe this means that ClearOS has the router as it's gateway and therefore all external DNS goes via the DNS servers configured be EE on the router?

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

On 14:54 3 May 2021, said:

Hi All,

I have been having sporadic issues with my internet. A couple of
times a day, when we are streaming on demand TV, it will pause and
the buffering circle appears. After a minute or so it will sort
itself out and continue.

I have noticed that when this happens, pinging the Google DNS server
(8.8.8.8) I get massive ping times usually between 1,000 and 5,000
ms! Looking at this in more detail over the past few days I have run
a couple of tests 1. Continually ping'd 8.8.8.8 over 24 hours.
Looking at the log, the issue seems to happen a few times an hour
2. I have run traceroute 8.8.8.8 for a few hours and I have a few
instances of the long ping times. I have pasted the traceroute for
the 3 occasions below (changed my internal addresses to "MYIP")

You could sidestep your problem with Google's 8.8.8.8 and look for other
fast servers. DNS Benchmark can check their speeds for you. You
download it and it runs without installation.

https://www.grc.com/dns/benchmark.htm

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

On Monday, 3 May 2021 at 21:23:31 UTC+1, Pamela wrote:
On 14:54 3 May 2021, said:

Hi All,

I have been having sporadic issues with my internet. A couple of
times a day, when we are streaming on demand TV, it will pause and
the buffering circle appears. After a minute or so it will sort
itself out and continue.

I have noticed that when this happens, pinging the Google DNS server
(8.8.8.8) I get massive ping times usually between 1,000 and 5,000
ms! Looking at this in more detail over the past few days I have run
a couple of tests 1. Continually ping'd 8.8.8.8 over 24 hours.
Looking at the log, the issue seems to happen a few times an hour
2. I have run traceroute 8.8.8.8 for a few hours and I have a few
instances of the long ping times. I have pasted the traceroute for
the 3 occasions below (changed my internal addresses to "MYIP")
You could sidestep your problem with Google's 8.8.8.8 and look for other
fast servers. DNS Benchmark can check their speeds for you. You
download it and it runs without installation.

https://www.grc.com/dns/benchmark.htm

Thanks Pamela. My DNS servers are set to the ones EE set them to rather than the Google one. I was just using 8.8.8.8 as something on the internet to ping as I knew the IP address

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

On Mon, 03 May 2021 11:58:08 -0700, wrote:

On Monday, 3 May 2021 at 19:32:35 UTC+1, Andy Burns wrote:
wrote:

No I didn't use "-d" but given I was pinging the IP address directly,
would it make a difference?
just that your traceroute consisted entirely of non-responding hops wih
asterisk, or responding hops with only an IP addr, but no hops where
the name could be resolved, but then if getting to 8.8.8.8 is difficult
not to unexpected, try settin DNS to BT's local server for a while?

The DNS on the router is not set to Google's it was set by EE so assume
the primary and secondary are their ones. I have added them to my
pingplotter list now and they seem to have the same long ping times as
google's and at the same time. If I ping an IP address though wouldn't
this bypass the DNS servers?

If it matters, I have ClearOS installed which acts as a gateway. The
internal network is on one subdomain and the external EE router on a
different one. The latter only has the EE router on it so everything
goes via ClearOS. I believe this means that ClearOS has the router as
it's gateway and therefore all external DNS goes via the DNS servers
configured be EE on the router?

For some reason my connection started slowing down to ~1MB/sec recently,
so I connected directly to the modem and now the speed is back up to ~8MB/
sec.

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

On 03/05/2021 17:57, wrote:
just sporadically I get the problem and the whole thing grinds to a halt for about a minute.

Sad to say this happens even on FTTP.

Whether it is router flap at the ISPs boundary or crap BT backhaul I do
not know


--
"First, find out who are the people you can not criticise. They are your
oppressors."
- George Orwell

OT - Troubleshooting internet issues
 

On Tuesday, 4 May 2021 at 12:32:44 UTC+1, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 03/05/2021 17:57, wrote:
just sporadically I get the problem and the whole thing grinds to a halt for about a minute.
Sad to say this happens even on FTTP.

Whether it is router flap at the ISPs boundary or crap BT backhaul I do
not know


--
"First, find out who are the people you can not criticise. They are your
oppressors."
- George Orwell

I started a thread on uk.telecom.broadband as Tim suggested (https://groups..google.com/g/uk.tele.../c/5ZmWljFw7AU) which has more info although it was hijacked by someone trying to get help with their unrelated issue. Spoke with EE earlier and based on my traceroute results they are sending out a Qube engineer (whatever they are) on Thursday to take a look. Hoping to get as much info ready by then to hopefully prove the issue - difficulty with intermittent ones is that it may not occur when they are here :(