Sure Signal not transmitting a 3G signal

[Retired-George]

This issue presents the following symptoms:

For version 1 Sure Signal (the one with four lights on the front):

• Lights one and two are solid which indicates the Sure Signal is connected, but isn't giving a 3G signal.
• Light four doesn’t light up or lights occasionally and then goes out at certain times of day.

For version 2 Sure Signal (the one with 3 lights on the front): 

• The power and system lights are both solid, indicating that the Sure Signal is giving a 3G signal.
• Your registered phones don’t pick up a 3G signal.

For version 3 Sure Signal (the plug in version):

• Power, internet and service lights are solid and the ‘in use’ light is either solid or flashing
• Your registered phones don’t pick up a 3G signal

Troubleshooting steps:

Check that your broadband connection meets our minimum requirements.
Please run the broadband speed checker.

If your connection fails any part of the test, this indicates an issue with your Internet Service Provider (ISP) and you’ll need to contact them to discuss this.

Your connection speed will vary throughout the day, so we recommend running it at various times to get an accurate reading.

To ensure the Sure Signal broadcasts at the correct frequency, it sends and receives small amounts of data to a Network Time Protocol Server hosted by ourselves. If these packets of data take longer than 240ms to make a round-trip, the accuracy can no longer be ensured and so the Sure Signal will automatically stop broadcasting and light four will go out.

Check for planned maintenance.

Planned maintenance can cause periods of downtime, so check the forum for any planned maintenance. If there is, this will be announced at the top of the Sure Signal forum.

Reset your Sure Signal:

1. Hold in the reset button until all lights go solid
2. Pull the power lead out with the reset button still pushed in
3. Continue to hold down the reset button and reconnect the power lead
4. Wait for all lights to come on and then release the reset button

The Sure Signal will be back online in around 1 hour.

Configure your Router Firewall.
The IP address and ports used for NTP (Network Time Protocol) synchronisation are listed below. You may need these to configure the correct firewall settings on your router.

This step isn’t usually necessary, but it may help if you’re using a complex network (such as a corporate or office LAN), or a complex router.

We recommend contacting your ISP or router manufacturer directly for detailed instructions on exactly how to change your router settings. Alternatively, select your router make and model over at http://portforward.com and follow the default guide there.

Destination IP addresses:

• 212.183.133.181
• 212.183.133.182
• 212.183.131.128/26

• Protocol = UDP
• Port = 123

Please note that in the list of IP addresses above, the notation "212.183.131.128/26"means the entire range of IP addresses between 212.183.131.128 and 212.183.131.191

Perform a PathPing to our server.

In order to check if the Sure Signal's able to communicate with our NTP server, a PathPing can be performed as a test. In order to do this, you'll need to open the command prompt in Windows as follows:

• For XP just click Start > Run and type cmd then hit enter
• For Vista/Windows 7, press Start and type 'cmd' into the search bar
• Right click the result and click ‘Run As Administrator’

Once you're in the command prompt, type in PathPing 212.183.133.181. This will perform a trace route to the NTP server and will show you the route it took to get there. One of the columns will display packet loss, if this occurs before hitting our server, you'll need to contact your ISP for further assistance.

If you've completed all the troubleshooting steps above and not identified the cause of the issue, your Sure Signal may be faulty. Please post in this thread and we can look into it further.

Thanks,

Jenny

[trobbo]

thanks for the reply James - I notice that another port has been added to the list to be included in firewall exceptions. I checked it against the one given to me when I first set up my Sure Signal. This is port 1723 and raised my hopes but to no avail as still no joy connecting.

I've now taken the Sure Signal box outwith the firewall altogether via DMZ - but no connection.

For the third time I've contacted BT about this as you suggest, sending them all relevant details. They insist, and I'm inclined to agree with them, that as all other aspects of my connection are working that this is something that Vodafone should be taking up with them, and not expecting their customers to do it.

I can't try my Sure Signal at my friends house unfortunately as he's away in Cornwall for a few weeks.

[gdwhitehouse]

I went with dhachaigh's suggestion from the other thread and turned the SureSignal off for 24hrs and then tried again - it then connected OK and was still working the next morning. Hardly scientific, but we can make calls again.

G

[Retired-Simon]

Hi trobbo

Thanks for your reply. As you've contacted BT for a third time and they are certain that the connection is fine we'll speak with our Sure Signal team and see if there's anything further that can be suggested from our side.

Hi gdwhitehouse

Thanks for letting us know that your Sure Signal seems to be back online. If you need any further help then please get in touch.

Thanks

Simon

[trobbo]

Hello Simon,

It's been nearly two weeks now since you spoke to your Sure Signal team about my connection problems and I've heard nothing back.

I've tried my Sure Signal box at a friend's house who is on Sky Broadband , via a DMZ on his router and am unable to connect there either.

Is there a way I can escalate dealing with this problem, it's being going on for over a month now? I am on PAYG but my wife is on a Vodafone contract which is close to its end, and if this isn't fixed soon we will be forced to go with O2 or Orange as they do provide a good signal where we live.

best wishes

[trobbo]

Is anyone around who could reply to my message?

[batecom]

hi

  all

       mine is the same today

what ever i do it makes no diffrence  just  2 main lights on our type sure signal

Serial number: 21196991141

here is my stats

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7601]
Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.

pathping 212.183.133.181

Tracing route to 212.183.133.181 over a maximum of 30 hops

  0  conrad-PC.Home [192.168.2.7]
  1  192.168.2.5
  2  cr0.cmlye.uk.easynet.net [87.87.250.41]
  3     *        *        *
Computing statistics for 50 seconds...
            Source to Here   This Node/Link
Hop  RTT    Lost/Sent = Pct  Lost/Sent = Pct  Address
  0                                           conrad-PC.Home [192.168.2.7]
                                0/ 100 =  0%   |
  1   17ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  192.168.2.5
                                0/ 100 =  0%   |
  2   63ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  cr0.cmlye.uk.easynet.net [87.87.25
0.41]

Trace complete.

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7601]
Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.

C:\Users\conrad>pathping 212.183.133.181

Tracing route to 212.183.133.181 over a maximum of 30 hops

  0  conrad-PC.Home [192.168.2.7]
  1  192.168.2.5
  2  cr0.cmlye.uk.easynet.net [87.87.250.41]
  3     *        *        *
Computing statistics for 50 seconds...
            Source to Here   This Node/Link
Hop  RTT    Lost/Sent = Pct  Lost/Sent = Pct  Address
  0                                           conrad-PC.Home [192.168.2.7]
                                0/ 100 =  0%   |
  1   17ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  192.168.2.5
                                0/ 100 =  0%   |
  2   63ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  cr0.cmlye.uk.easynet.net [87.87.25
0.41]

Trace complete.

C:\Users\conrad>tracert 212.183.133.181

Tracing route to 212.183.133.181 over a maximum of 30 hops

  1    <1 ms    <1 ms    <1 ms  192.168.2.5
  2    54 ms    53 ms    51 ms  cr0.cmlye.uk.easynet.net [87.87.250.41]
  3     *        *        *     Request timed out.
  4    51 ms    53 ms    88 ms  ip-84-38-37-22.easynet.co.uk [84.38.37.22]
  5    57 ms    54 ms    54 ms  89.200.131.187
  6    63 ms    91 ms    91 ms  bu4.gr10.telon.uk.easynet.net [89.200.135.145]
  7    64 ms    79 ms    59 ms  AMDGW2.arcor-ip.net [195.69.144.123]
  8   103 ms    95 ms    90 ms  92.79.213.149
  9    87 ms   105 ms    93 ms  85.205.116.6
 10     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 11     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 12     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 13     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 14     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 15     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 16     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 17     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 18     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 19     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 20     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 21     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 22     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 23     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 24     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 25     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 26     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 27     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 28     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 29     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 30     *        *        *     Request timed out.

Trace complete.

C:\Users\conrad>

they look good here so what is  wrong with the sure sigal device has  i have no phone  while i am in the office which is no good for business is it

can support please fix it

conrad

[Retired-James]

Hi trobbo,

My apologies for not replying to you sooner it seems that your original post had been missed.

As you have now been able to try the Sure Signal on a different connection using a different ISP and you are still experiencing issues it does point me in the direction of a possible faulty box although I can see that it did update on the server on 06/08/2012.

So that we can look at getting you a new box I have sent you a quick PM, please follow the instructions on the PM and one of the team will be able to get this all done for you.

You can find your PM inbox here.

@ batecom, thanks for your post here.

From the information provided I can see that there is a bit of latency on the line however this isn’t anything to worry about as the traceroute looks fine.

Looking at the registration I can see that there has been a location profile update which may have been caused by an update by your ISP.

I have updated this for you today; please can you perform a reset on the Sure Signal and let me know how you get on.

Reset Instructions

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.

James

[trobbo]

James, thanks for the reply - I've sent you a message regarding this

[trobbo]

Hi James, The new Sure Signal arrived yesterday. I registered it and set the firewall rules and after about 15 mins it had connected. 

All is working now and it's good to have a reliable signal again.

many thanks

[Briantea]

I have had big problems with my Sure Signal Box since changing to TalkTalk fibre service (Kit is BT Openreach). If I reset the Sure signal I get the lights as they should be, but as soon as I try to make a call it fails and just goes to lights 1 and 2 on steady. If I do a full reset, they come back on as they should be, but will fail again sometime during the next call. I have contacted technical support and done as they suggest with port forwarding etc, with still the same problem afterwards.

I have now moved the Sure Signal onto a standard 2Mb copper telephone line with the same router (yes I have 2 in the house) and it works 100% perfectly, great signal, reboots in minutes if switched off and easily copes with several phones.

My questions is therefore, is the Sure Signal suppossed to work on a 37Mb fibre Infinity broadband service? Mine doesn't seem to want to, no matter how I set up the router (Netgear 3700 N600). You can't do anything with the actual fibre modem that I'm aware off.

Any help much appreciated as my other phone line is due to change to fible in a couple of months and my phone isn't usable without the Sure Signal.