Weird BT Line

[Vin047]

OK first time poster so bare with me (and yes i did search the forums but couldnt find anything similar)

Got O2 Broadband today, im signed up to 20meg broadband but was quoted that my line was only capable of 14meg. I used to have Sky Broadband and when i first signed upto it (last year) i was quoted only 6meg (they upgraded the lines to ADSL2 now i think).
Anyway with Sky i only got 3meg connection speed, and now today on O2 i seem to still be on a mere 3meg connection speed!

Rang O2 and they told me to locate master socket and use test socket etc. Now heres where things get odd. Before i go further i feel i should mention that my dad did some telephone rewiring in the house years ago, but i was too young to understand it then and have no idea what he wired (simply made extensions or moving master socket, i have no idea what he did) and i cant ask him now as he suffered a brain injury recently and lost parts of his memory.

Anyway identifying them by their appearance (bigger box with horizontal line, NTE5 i believe), i think i found the master socket (located downstairs). When i remove the lower part of the box all the other sockets in the house get disconnected so that seems right. However my test socket doesnt receive any dial tone! But the weird thing is, if i connect the router to the test socket i do get a broadband connection (but its very low speed like 1meg).

The wiring for the (apparent) master socket is as follows. 1 brown with white stripes and 1 white with brown stripes are connected to A and B. Theres a green with white stripes wire connected to terminal 2 and white with blue stripes connected to terminal 3. Theres also a white with orange stripes wire thats disconnected.

Any ideas as to what the possible problem is or what I should do? Im trying to contact BT but getting different responses each time (first time told to ring openreach tomorrow and arrange an appointment, and 2nd time i was transferred to sales team and told it would cost £130 for engineer!)

Ideally I'd like to try and redo the wiring from scratch myself so i know wats going on etc. The outside telephone wire seems to connect to my roof so looks like id have to go in loft though.

 

[Lectrician]

All you can do is find where the line enters, and follow the single pair through.

Best bet would be to borrow the NTE5A socket and take this to the loft, or the first place you can connect this to where the cable enters the building. Test for dialtone and test for ADSL speed. If this is better you can start to look at permenently moving the master and recabling your extensions, using a master filter on the NTE5A.

This is the first google - I am not saying it is the cheapest.
http://www.tel-ext.co.uk/shop/index.php/adsl-equipment/c_38.html

 

[Vin047]

Thanks for your reply and sorry for my late reply.

I managed to trace the cable and luckily it dont go into the loft but comes straight into my porch (at least Im pretty sure).

However turns out it connects to a juncton box (very old looking, with no socket, has a T with a circle and is rectangular). From there the wiring goes into my house.

To try and cut the "messy" wiring of my house out of the problem I did as you suggested and put a NTE5A socket there instead, connecting a White wire to A and Orange wire to B (correct?)

Using test socket, tested for dial tone, worked. Tested ADSL, quickly connected to broadband but my connection speed still at 3-4 Meg

Rang BT earlier on and they confirmed I should be capable of at least 6 meg. So this means connection fault at BT side of wiring surely?

 

[Lectrician]

You have connected the NTE directly to the line correctly by the sounds of it, so thats your speed.

You may or may not succeed in getting an engineer to visit in regards this. You have service, and thats usually all they worry about. There is no guarantee on speeds on the max type packages.

 

[Vin047]

ah... but isnt that, really unfair? I mean I was told I should be getting at least 6meg by BT. Im signed upto O2 Broadband and they said my area is under ADSL2+ which is why they quoted me at 14meg speed! I know BT are the ones who should be relied on here but then why did O2 give me false information? My O2 router also says im disconnected on ADSL but connected on ADSL2+...

Im on O2 20meg connection speed plan, but they said due to distance from exchange etc I was estimated at only 14meg. I assumed it would be even lower, perhaps 10meg? Not 3meg! Had I known my line was only going to be doing 3meg I would have signed onto Virgin Broadband instead....

(I know it sounds like im ranting, and I suppose I am, I just feel like ive been cheated big time)

 

[Vin047]

well after ringing up O2 the technical advisor said they'd have to run some diagnostic tests but i acidentally disconnected. Rang back again and another technical advisor told me to connect to the test socket again so they could run tests. Upon connecting to test socket, my line speed jumped to 10meg!

Ive tested back at normal socket and its down to 4meg so its internal wiring on my side thats mainly at fault. However i cant help have this nagging feeling that the first technical advisor started something that may have "triggered" my higher speed? Or perhaps just needed time to configure the speed (since I moved to BT Line rental today and my O2 broadband only activated a few days ago)? Who knows...

Anyway while i was told 14meg that my line was capable of im not complaining, 10meg is fine for me, just wish it had a lil more impact on actual download speed (its about twice as fast now) oh well, maybe ill get faster speeds later

Thanks a lot for your help Lectrician, really appreciate it! And of course if you have any tips on internal wiring/anything I can do to boost speeds let me know!

 

[plugwash]

The best approach is to put a faceplate filter on the master socket. Then treat the ADSL wiring and phone wiring completely seperately from there. To make a neat job get a filter that has both the unflitered (for ADSL) and filtered (for phone extentions) on terminals on the back as well as sockets on the front.

For the ADSL wiring it is best to use BT spec cable to minimise discontinuities. CAT5 is pretty good too. Don't use the cheap crappy phone cable DIY stores often sell.

 

[vitalchip]

At a guess I'd say that your wiring had been back fed on the white/brown pair but was dis one leg, broadband will still work like that but dial tone won't be there. When you re-attached the face plate the dis leg was probably completed elsewhere in the circuit, giving dial tone on the lower faceplate.

Sounds like your internal wiring is a real mess, back fed pairs and split circuits are likely and it will create merry hell with your broadband, do yourself a favour and don't reconnect any of it until you're confident that you've sorted out all the problems.

When you get a new broadband line the exchange cards progressively increase the broadband speed and monitor the stable connection speed that your line can support, then it fixes it at that speed, faults on your wiring will cause that speed to be set lower than the line could support with clean internal wiring, when you called 02 they probably reset this ( it's called a BRAS profile ) which saw your speed increase, until you reconnected the faulty wiring..

Sort out all your wiring then call 02 and have it reset again, this should get you on the way to your max speed.

Also remember that people will tell you things like "you SHOULD be able to get 6 meg" and the line speeds are all "UP TO.. whatever" there are no guarantees.

 

[blondini]

well after ringing up O2 the technical advisor said they'd have to run some diagnostic tests but i acidentally disconnected. Rang back again and another technical advisor told me to connect to the test socket again so they could run tests. Upon connecting to test socket, my line speed jumped to 10meg!

Broadband 'Max' doesn't generally give you the fastest possible speed on the initial connection date. The system adjusts speed over several days until the fastest reliable speed is determined.

 

[mattylad]

CODSWALLOP!

It is the "Connect" service that changes, the MAX service will be whatever it is supposed to be from day 1.

Information taken from the skyuser.co.uk website

Vin, a lot will depend upon how far you are fro the exchange, but a lot will also depend upon your line stats, your main socket & any extensions you have added to it.

To get the best you need to be plugged into the test socket of your first/main/NTE5 socket with nothing else connected to it I.E. no extensions.

Try that.
go to 192.168.0.1
log into the router setup pages.
then go to the skyuser website and post them there, they will be able to aid you in improving things.

 

[blondini]

CODSWALLOP!

It is the "Connect" service that changes, the MAX service will be whatever it is supposed to be from day 1.

Sounds like nonsense but it isn't.

When a user upgrades to ADSL Max the system will attempt to synchronise the user modem/router and the BT exchange DSLAM to determine the maximum stable rate (MSR). ADSL Max is rate adaptive - the BT system will record upper and lower line rates. Data will be collected for a MINIMUM of 10 DAYS before the lower line rate is rounded down and to become the MSR. The Fault Threshold Rate (FTR) will be set at a level 30% below MSR. There is likely to be some alteration to the line speed whilst the BT system undergoes 'training' to find the MSR. Once the MSR is set this will be the benchmark level for the lifetime of the connection.

 

[mellwaters100]

Hi Vin,

I have had similar problems (download speed not matching line speed) and have found several utilities that have really helped.

First suggestion is to go to http://speedteser.bt.com. Enter the phone number for your broadband line then the username as shown from your router page.

The result will display the line speed but also the IP profile speed.

On my line (I too am on O2 connect), I keep getting a lot of noise on the line which causes the IP Profile speed to drop to absurdly low figures. The noise clears but the profile does not change.

If you are getting a low profile, I then found that switching the router off (or unplugging it for half an hour) resets the profile when it reconnects.

You can also tell if you are getting noise on the line by dialling 17070 and select option 2. You should hear complete silence. Strangely, when I run this option it also seems to "clear" the line from any noise, which sorts my line sync speed. However, the IP profile is then set to a very low figure which means the unplug process!

Hope the above helps - it could be that the other extensions on the line are introduce excessive noise, thus preventing maximum connection speeds.