Vodafone Sure Signal

[sewell298]

This is not an initial setup of the box. I have been using it since before release, I trialed them for Vodafone. When the box used to connect within 20 minutes of being switched on. (Not left on over night.) it Worked perfectly. Now it can take 6 hours of steady power light only before second light starts to flash, which means it is unuseable for most of the day. Some days it wont connect at all. Nothing has changed with my ISP. In a different house has same fault. Occupants own VSS connects quickly. Again Vodafone appear unable to support products they sell. Last time I had a fault with my sure signal it took months to sort even replacing the box. Turned out to be an incorrect setting at Vodafone end. Please can this be fixed.

[James]

Hi sewell298,

As more and more people purchase a sure signal box it is possible that the connection time from activation will be more than it used to be.

We have seen instances in the past where this process has taken 6, 12 and even 24 hours to activate and fully download a new profile to the unit.

We are currently in the process of implementing new back end servers to run the ever growing number of Sure signal users however the only thing that we can ask is for our customer to be patient for the setup to be completed.

The unit is designed to be left running all of the time to keep contact with our servers, this then prevents a lot of the breaks in service where the unit reconfigures and has to reconnect to the servers each time it is switched back on.

If it is that this does get worse or fails to connect at all then we will need to look at the possibility of a faulty box however as it stands the information that you have provided falls within the standard behaviour of the unit.

James

[crankslave]

Morning

Back with the same old problem again, it seems to be a recurring theme every 3-4 months.

So, no function or sporadic function to select phones only in the house for the past 10 days.

Using a BT business hub which is working fine.

Factory reset done, no better, so below is the stuff from the computer which you'll no doubt ask for and IP address

My IP address is  109.153.103.117

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.

C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator>212.183.133.181
'212.183.133.181' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.

C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator>pathping 212.183.133.181

Tracing route to 212.183.133.181 over a maximum of 30 hops

0 CORNERST-082.gateway.2wire.net [192.168.1.248]
1 homeportal [192.168.1.254]
2 homeportal [192.168.1.254]
3 217.32.146.206
4 213.120.177.106
5 217.41.168.215
6 217.41.168.109
7 acc2-10GigE-0-0-0-5.l-far.21cn-ipp.bt.net [109.159.249.206]
8 core2-te0-15-0-5.faraday.ukcore.bt.net [109.159.249.155]
9 213.131.193.76
10 peer1-xe11-1-0.telehouse.ukcore.bt.net [109.159.254.112]
11 LNDGW2.arcor-ip.net [195.66.224.124]
12 85.205.116.14
13 * * *
Computing statistics for 325 seconds...
Source to Here This Node/Link
Hop RTT Lost/Sent = Pct Lost/Sent = Pct Address
0 CORNERST-082.gateway.2wire.net [19
2.168.1.248]
0/ 100 = 0% |
1 2ms 0/ 100 = 0% 0/ 100 = 0% homeportal [192.168.1.254]
0/ 100 = 0% |
2 3ms 0/ 100 = 0% 0/ 100 = 0% homeportal [192.168.1.254]
0/ 100 = 0% |
3 14ms 0/ 100 = 0% 0/ 100 = 0% 217.32.146.206
0/ 100 = 0% |
4 13ms 0/ 100 = 0% 0/ 100 = 0% 213.120.177.106
0/ 100 = 0% |
5 13ms 0/ 100 = 0% 0/ 100 = 0% 217.41.168.215
0/ 100 = 0% |
6 15ms 0/ 100 = 0% 0/ 100 = 0% 217.41.168.109
0/ 100 = 0% |
7 13ms 0/ 100 = 0% 0/ 100 = 0% acc2-10GigE-0-0-0-5.l-far.21cn-ipp
.bt.net [109.159.249.206]
0/ 100 = 0% |
8 21ms 0/ 100 = 0% 0/ 100 = 0% core2-te0-15-0-5.faraday.ukcore.bt
.net [109.159.249.155]
0/ 100 = 0% |
9 20ms 0/ 100 = 0% 0/ 100 = 0% 213.131.193.76
0/ 100 = 0% |
10 20ms 0/ 100 = 0% 0/ 100 = 0% peer1-xe11-1-0.telehouse.ukcore.bt
.net [109.159.254.112]
0/ 100 = 0% |
11 20ms 0/ 100 = 0% 0/ 100 = 0% LNDGW2.arcor-ip.net [195.66.224.12
4]
1/ 100 = 1% |
12 16ms 1/ 100 = 1% 0/ 100 = 0% 85.205.116.14
99/ 100 = 99% |
13 --- 100/ 100 =100% 0/ 100 = 0% CORNERST-082 [0.0.0.0]

Trace complete.

C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator>

Please sort this out ASAP

James

[crankslave]

Hello

Anyone here!

[nea1ev]

Add mine to the list of failing Sure Signals with the same fault. I have gone through the usual resets so can we have an answer from Vodafone?

[sewell298]

Past few days my VSS has behaved itself. Switch it on & it connects in under a minute. Works perfectly again. Having changed every setting possible. Confirmed the fault in a different house. The fault has suddenly cleared itself. But it does sound like the more people who use VSS the worse the problems will get. Equipment not upto the job.

[Wayne]

Hi everyone,

@crankslave - Thanks for your post here. I have performed a resynchronisation of the device for you. Can you reset your Sure Signal and let me know ho you get on?

@nea1ev – Can you let me know your Sure Signal serial number please?

Thanks

Wayne

[nea1ev]

Hi Wayne - My Sure Signal became live again sometime last night. The serial number is 21196953315

[nea1ev]

and now it's doing the same thing again.

[nea1ev]

And it's back.. being a bit tempremental of late!

[aitchemeff]

Hi. My Suresignal has worked very well for 2 years but now I have the light 1 on and light 2 flashing problem. I have had no change of router or anything else that I am aware of. I changed my SIM card about month ago which initially caused a problem, but after a call to the suresignal helpdesk and a wait of 12 hours that was resolved.

I have rebooted my router and did a factory reset on the Suresignal, but after about 2 hours the 2nd light is still flashing.

My Suresignal serial no is - 21197194919

Thanks for any help.

[nea1ev]

And again my Sure Signal is displaying this "fault".  Come on Vodafone; Two Vodafone contract phones in my house and I can't use either due to poor cell coverage hence the Sure Signal, which in itself is hardly delivering what it is advertised to do.

[aitchemeff]

Working fine this morning. Must have been a problem on the server side.

[Dave]

Hi neat1ev,

I can see you've connected again since your last post. Is your Sure Signal working again now?

If not, can you try a factory reset for me, just in case it has cached a failed connection?

• Hold down the reset button until all the lights show (about 30 seconds)
• Keeping the reset button held down, remove then re-insert the power lead.
• Once all lights display release the reset button.
• The Sure Signal will come online in around 1 hour.

Dave

[Wicked-Weasel]

HI there,

Sorry for delay in response - I have been moving house. I have one VSS working well now at home and fixes the dead patch we have on the ground floor so that is great. After some faffing I have also got my other half's phone on the thing as well (Didn't seem to like me putting her name agaist the phone number in the user list when it is a second phone on my account!).

However, the one at work is still not doing anything at all other than power light on and system light flashing. I have double nat'd the thing to see what is going on and to resolve the NTP issue by address mapping through the firewall however, this does not appear to be the issue. I am sure the box works fine as I had exactly the same problem with my home box at work (before I installed at home).

I have attached the log file from the firewall... As you can see, all transactions are allowed and appear to be working so I am at a loss to explain why this does not work. Can you shed any light please? (please also see previous posts for further details).

WORK VSS Serial Number *40120251307

Many thanks,

Oli

[DaveCD]

Hi Wicked-Weasel

Thank you for your post and the additional information.

I have checked the serial number provided and can see the last time you connected with this device was last night, please can you advise me if you are still experiencing difficulties or has this one also been resolved?

Many Thanks

DaveCD

eForum Team

[Wicked-Weasel]

Hi Dave,

I have never had the thing working here. All anything has even done on this site is show a solid power light and a flashing system light. This has been the same for over a month.

Please note: this is NOT the box. This is something to do with the vpn link it is trying to establish with your servers, I will also confirm all vpn standards are supported within the network env. Please go over my previous emails to understand what we have.

As previously said - given the box gives basically NO feedback as to where it is failing, it is nearly impossible to establish what the fault is. Is there not a way to ssh/telnet into the thing to get more data?

Thanks,

Oli

[Wayne]

Hi Wicked-Weasel

Thanks for your post here.

The problems you are having are due to two things.

Firstly, port 123 needs to be open. This is the keep alive port, so even if the Sure Signal was to gain a connection, it would drop out almost immediately because the keep alive port is blocking traffic.

Secondly the Sure Signal requires access to our NTP servers. The Sure Signal pulse emits signal and requires timing synchronisation to avoid signal interference from other cell sites in the area. It’s also required for security.

Are you aware that we offer an Enterprise Sure Signal solution that would probably be more suitable to your needs depending on the size of you business?

Thanks

Wayne

[Wicked-Weasel]

Hi Wayne,

OK - so re-directing traffic on port 123 is not going to work. Unfortunately, this VSS is not to solve a company wide issue, this is just for 3 of us in our build room. 

The decision was taken last year to close off port 123 and impliment internal ntp's only. This is not going to change for any part of the corpoerate network any time soon afraid to say.

I will need to go back to the drawing board and see if I can come up with another plan as this is not going to work.

If you have any other ideas (or you can allow inbound traffic on your ntp servers from a port redirect) let me know.

FYI - ADSL lines in the area are also hopeless (0.90 / 0.30 down/up respectively). 

Many thanks,

Oli

[Henly]

Hi. I am trying to set up a SS box. It shows as registered on the Vodafone website but just sits there flashing light 2 and a steady light 1. The serial no is 21197191683 It is connected via a bt home hub 2 that does not have any specific restrictions - just the standard set up. Please advise. Thks