VF SS3 Not Working After Recent Upgrade to BT Infinity - All Diagnostic Info in Thread

[lukewestgarth]

Hi There,

So I have been using the Vodafone Sure Signal for 18 months successfully with the normal BT Internet Broadband package and the BT Home Hub 4.

I recently upgraded to BT Infinity and in doing so BT supplied me with a Home Hub 5. Since the installation the Sure Signal connection has been pretty rubbish in truth. It holds signal for a couple of hours and then i get a number of errors, normally its the flashing power light and flashing white web light.

I spoke with Vodafone last week who told me all of the ports that should be open on the router i.e.

8 TCP UDP 50 TCP UDP 53 TCP UDP 67 UDP 68 UDP 123 UDP 500 UDP 1723 TCP UDP 4500 UDP 33434 - 33445 UDP 6.

With BTs help i opened up all of these ports and added the device into the DMZ.

The error i have today is a flashing power light and two solid orange lights one for the in service and one for the phone in use. I have no idea what this means but would like to get this resolved asap. I work from home 3 days a week and all mobile devices are on the Vodafone network.

Speed Test:

Download: 53.34 Mbps

Upload: 18.36 Mbps

Ping 23ms

IP Address: 217.44.68.155

Sure Signal Serial Number: 40132628971

Ping Test:

Ping 21ms

Jitter 1ms

Traceroute results:

Tracing route to 212.183.183.177 over a maximum of 30 hops

  1   198 ms     4 ms    28 ms  bthub.home [192.168.1.254]
  2    13 ms   167 ms    11 ms  217.32.143.232
  3   105 ms    11 ms    25 ms  217.32.144.46
  4   214 ms    14 ms    28 ms  212.140.235.106
  5    19 ms   120 ms    16 ms  217.41.169.51
  6    15 ms    35 ms    13 ms  217.41.169.107
  7    22 ms    34 ms    13 ms  acc1-xe-5-1-3.sf.21cn-ipp.bt.net [109.159.251.11
7]
  8    83 ms    19 ms    28 ms  core1-te0-0-0-6.ealing.ukcore.bt.net [109.159.25
1.29]
  9    22 ms    38 ms    19 ms  peer3-te0-1-0-12.telehouse.ukcore.bt.net [109.15
9.254.239]
 10   191 ms    24 ms    26 ms  166-49-211-246.eu.bt.net [166.49.211.246]
 11    21 ms   104 ms    22 ms  be3035.ccr21.lon01.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.1
4.169]
 12   254 ms    23 ms    26 ms  be2178.ccr42.lon13.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.5
0.206]
 13    28 ms   128 ms    27 ms  be2489.ccr42.par01.atlas.cogentco.com [154.54.39
.114]
 14   249 ms    94 ms   202 ms  be2296.ccr21.zrh01.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.3
.58]
 15   265 ms   306 ms   149 ms  be2043.rcr21.mil01.atlas.cogentco.com [154.54.38
.102]
 16   178 ms    46 ms    72 ms  be2283.agr11.mil01.atlas.cogentco.com [154.54.36
.221]
 17   128 ms   186 ms   137 ms  154.25.2.134
 18     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 19     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 20     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 21     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 22     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 23     *        *     149.6.152.146  reports: Destination net unreachable.

Trace complete.

Please help

Thanks,

Luke

[Retired-Kay]

Hi @lukewestgarth,

The steps in your traceroute are too high, this suggests latency on your line. 

You'll need to speak to your ISP (internet service provider) so that they can address this for you. 

Thanks,

Kay 

[lukewestgarth]

Hi Kay,

When you say latency what do you mean exactly for when i speak to BT again ?

Thanks,

Luke

[Apple_Fanboy]

Hi Luke

What Kay is refering to is parts of your trace route. The VSS establishes a secure VPN tunnel to the Vodafone servers, part of the security for this is a "keep alive" signal is sent and is required to be recieved in a specified time if not the VPN connection drops.

What the trace route is showing is that on some of the hops the time it takes for a response is too long which would indicate an issue with your connection. VSS needs each hop to be below 100ms and there are lots of hops on yours above that and some even as high as 306ms. I have bolded the parts on your traceroute that are above that.

Your traceroute results:

Tracing route to 212.183.183.177 over a maximum of 30 hops

  1   198 ms     4 ms    28 ms  bthub.home [192.168.1.254]
  2    13 ms   167 ms    11 ms  217.32.143.232
  3   105 ms    11 ms    25 ms  217.32.144.46
  4   214 ms    14 ms    28 ms  212.140.235.106
  5    19 ms   120 ms    16 ms  217.41.169.51
  6    15 ms    35 ms    13 ms  217.41.169.107
  7    22 ms    34 ms    13 ms  acc1-xe-5-1-3.sf.21cn-ipp.bt.net [109.159.251.11.7]
  8    83 ms    19 ms    28 ms  core1-te0-0-0-6.ealing.ukcore.bt.net [109.159.251.29]
  9    22 ms    38 ms    19 ms  peer3-te0-1-0-12.telehouse.ukcore.bt.net [109.159.254.239]
 10   191 ms    24 ms    26 ms  166-49-211-246.eu.bt.net [166.49.211.246]
 11    21 ms   104 ms    22 ms  be3035.ccr21.lon01.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.14.169]
 12   254 ms    23 ms    26 ms  be2178.ccr42.lon13.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.50.206]
 13    28 ms   128 ms    27 ms  be2489.ccr42.par01.atlas.cogentco.com [154.54.39.114]
 14   249 ms    94 ms   202 ms  be2296.ccr21.zrh01.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.3.58]
 15   265 ms   306 ms   149 ms  be2043.rcr21.mil01.atlas.cogentco.com [154.54.38.102]
 16   178 ms    46 ms    72 ms  be2283.agr11.mil01.atlas.cogentco.com [154.54.36.221]
 17   128 ms   186 ms   137 ms  154.25.2.134
 18     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 19     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 20     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 21     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 22     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 23     *        *     149.6.152.146  reports: Destination net unreachable.

[travelhigh]

This is an ongoing fully acknowledged issue between BT and Vodafone.

Ever since the BT Hub 3, including the current Hub 5 the BT supplied routers have a fixed packet size MTU 1492.  The vodafone suresignal system requires a packet size larger MTU 1500 and refuses to connect with a fragmented packet link.

Either vodafone needs to adjust their VPN configuration to support smaller MTU packet sizes or BT needs to replace all of it's HUB 3/4/5/6.    It has to be Vodafone to do this sensibly as they wish to send packets over the BT network.  It is not as if BT is a minority ISP. 

You can replace the BT router to an alternative (not Draytek) but then it will not be supported by BT and you will have other issues with other internet services over the BT network.