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Poor signal

bazzachazza
2: Seeker
2: Seeker

I have recently changed phones from a Blackberry 9700 to a Balckberry 9900 both of which are 3G enabled. I route the signal though a Sure Signal (a 9361 Home Cell V2-V). When a call is in progress the correct lights are showing on the Sure Signal with both the power and phone lights both lit. The phone is showing a full signal, and the 3G icon displayed. So according to both devices I should be able to conduct a phone call. However the signal can be clear and then fades on calls or I get various comments that I sound like I am in the bath or that I sound like Norman Collier (I am old enough to know what he sounded like and the comparison is not flattering). I have also put the sim into a Nokia E71 with the same affect.

I am rapidly losing faith in the sure signal can anybody help?

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION

My money would be on Livedrive causing the problems. Can you pause it on all machines and leave yourself a voice-mail to hear the resulting audio quality? If that's good, switch Livedrive back on and repeat the experiment.

 

If Livedrive is the problem, can you then configure it to run only while you sleep (or something like that).

 

The other approach to try would be to enable Quality of Service (QoS) on your router - if your router supports QoS (not all do) - to give the SS priority over all other upstream traffic. [Which is, incidentally, what I have done to ensure decent upstream quality over my BB connection.]

Philip

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13 REPLIES 13

philip42h
16: Advanced member
16: Advanced member

... also described as sounding like a dalek. :Winking_smiley:

 

Normally caused by having insufficient upstream bandwidth available to the SS and/or excessive competition for the available bandwidth when you are making a call.

 

So to start with, what are the results of a speed test? What else is using your available bandwidth?

Philip

I have tried 4 speed tests on 3 different sites. The results are:

Dwnload/ Upload 4.1/ 0.3, 5.13/ 0.26, 4.34/ 0.37, 6.0/ 0.276.

The only devices using the bandwith at the moment are the home computer the laptop and my Blackberry.

There is another PC and a netbook but they are not using bandwidth at the moment.

It used to work ok with just these running!

The delivery of the data packets that make up and audio stream is time critical - if the data doesn't arrive on-time the audio gets 'chopped'.

 

That being the case, while the audio stream doesn't require much bandwidth (~64Kbps) dedicated to itself it isn't very tolerant of other data streams sharing and there isn't any bandwidth figure that is guaranteed to be 'enough'. However, with 4 or 5 Mbps downstream you shouldn't have too much difficulty hearing what others are saying to you - is that the case? If you fancied trying to watch a HD iPlayer session at the same time as making a call you might well find that disrupts you conversation!

 

With only around 300Kbps to play with upstream pretty much any competition for bandwidth has the potential to cause problems. Things such as an on-line backup would be a prime example of competition; similarly someone conducting a conversation or video call using Skype would cause issues. Is it possible that any such applications could be running on the PC, laptop or Blackberry?

Philip

Skype was running all the time, but i have now switched it off. Livedrive on line backup is running. The settings on this are bandwidth 512kbh, Max download bandwidth 64kb/s, max upload bandwidth 8kb/s. On the slider scale on the bottom of the livedrive window, both the download and upload bandwidth are set to 100%. The livedrive is running on both the PC and the laptop.

Widows update and Norton Anti virus is also running on both machines.

We never run iplayer as it is continually buffering so we dont bother using it. Could this be a further indication that there is not enough bandwidth?

My money would be on Livedrive causing the problems. Can you pause it on all machines and leave yourself a voice-mail to hear the resulting audio quality? If that's good, switch Livedrive back on and repeat the experiment.

 

If Livedrive is the problem, can you then configure it to run only while you sleep (or something like that).

 

The other approach to try would be to enable Quality of Service (QoS) on your router - if your router supports QoS (not all do) - to give the SS priority over all other upstream traffic. [Which is, incidentally, what I have done to ensure decent upstream quality over my BB connection.]

Philip

Thank you so much. I have stopped both skype and livedrive and that seems to have done the trick!

 

I have looked at the router settings and according to the DHCP list, the sure signal is third down the list after the router and another phone, so well up the list really. I must admit I am not that computer literate, so assume this is the same as the QoS, and as turning the 2 programmes off seems to have worked I have decided not to touch it.

 

Hopefully, there wont be any further problems and it will continue to work ok. If there are, I will get back in touch but for now, once again many thanks for your help, I am really impressed and relieved!

Glad that you are sorted ... :Smiling:

 

The order in the client DHCP list doesn't signify anything in terms of priority. If you want to know whether your router supports QoS, post the make and model and someone will advise ...

Philip

Make of the router is TalkTalk D Link

Model is DSL-2680 Broadband Wireless ADSL2+ Router

There's no evidence of support for QoS in your router's User Manual ... sorry, but it doesn't look as though that option is immediately open to you without upgrading the router.

Philip