Sure Signal - Call Audio Quality Issues

[Retired-George]

This issue has the following symptoms:

• Poor audio quality on both outbound and inbound calls
• Particularly affects customers using a Virgin Media cable connection

If you’re only experiencing poor audio quality one-way (for example, the call sounds fine to you, but the person you are calling reports poor quality), then this is most likely due to insufficient bandwidth on your broadband connection and is not an issue with your Sure Signal.

Troubleshooting:

If the person you are calling can’t hear you, this is usually caused by low upload speeds.

If you can't hear the person you've called, this is due to low download speeds.

Check if your broadband connection meets the 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 and you’ll need to contact them to discuss this further.

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

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:

Sure Signal version 1

• Connect device to internet and power supply

• Press and hold down the reset button (located near the internet port) until end of the process which will be indicated

• Remove the power cable at back of the unit and wait for five seconds

• Reconnect the power cable back to device

• Wait for the LED sequence to flash from top to bottom and back to top

• Wait for five seconds

• Release the reset button

• Within 10 minutes, all the 4 LEDs will start to flash in sequence – 1^st & 3^rd then 2^nd & 4^th then 1^st & 3^rd – with the sequence repeated. This sequence indicates the start of the factory reset procedure.

Sure Signal version 2

• • Connect device to internet and power supply
  • Press and hold down reset button – located near the internet port
  • Wait for all the LED (power + 2 white LED) to light up for few seconds (power LED will always remain lit)
  • Wait for five seconds
  • Release the reset button
    
    
  • Within 10 minutes, 2 white LEDs will start flashing continuously – power LED will always remain constant in addition (unless there is an issue with local connectivity)

Sure Signal version 3

• • Connect device to internet and power supply
  • Press and hold down reset button – located near the internet port
  • Wait for 20 seconds
  • Release the reset button
    
    
  • All the LEDs will temporarily switch off for about 10 seconds. The power LED will then light up and remain constant whilst white internet LED flashes continuously.

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

Move Your Sure Signal Away from the Router
Sometimes the Wi-Fi signal from the router can interfere with the 3G signal from the Sure Signal and this could result in poor audio quality.

In order to prevent this from happening, please ensure that your Sure Signal is moved away from the router as far as the cable will allow.

If you’re still experiencing poor audio quality, post in this thread and we can look into it further.

Thanks,

Jenny

[bilgeon]

Kay, the box doesn't say what version it is on the bottom. I assume it is version 2. It was purchased in July 2012. It is cream coloured and has four status LED's on the side. Since we re-registered the I/O (top) light is on solid but that's all.

Please advise.

Thanks

Bill

[Sukhi]

Hi bilgeon

It does sound faulty, as it's within 24 months we can repair it for you :). Follow the steps in the link Kay provided above to arrange this.

Thanks

Sukhi

[oracle1]

Hi SureSignal team ...

Can I check my expectations with you please?

History:

I started with a V1 SureSignal, due to lack of VF signal at my house. 3.5Mbps download max, 0.6Mbps upload.

This proved unreliable with several red light / no synch issues per day resulting in lost calls etc.

I also found that I regularly experienced progressively worse call quality issues after about the first 10 mins of each call. After about 20 mins or so the call quality would be unusable - difficult when on a conf call or talking to a customer.

At the time I tried lots of things recommended on the forum, but without any improvement.

I did contact Vodafone then, and we performed a full reset, but no fault was diagnosed.

When V2 SureSignal came out I hoped that might give me a better solution.

By this time I needed VF signal at two locations, neither of which has usable reception.

So my employer provided one V2 SureSignal, and I bought the second for the second location.

These both seemed to hold sync a bit better, only losing it sometimes.

However both still suffer the same creeping death in terms of call quality ... OK for the first ten minutes then gradually degrading to the point of being unusable.

So I have three ADSL lines, two at 10Mbps/0.6Mbps at location L1, and one 3Mbps/0.6Mbps at location L2.

All three lines on TalkTalk, on two different plans.

I have tried my V2 SureSignals on all of them, I have ensured that there was nothing else connected when the problems occurred.

I have tried both TalkTalk D-Link and Huawei Routers and a Netgear router.

Same problems in all cases.

It has been so frustrating that I had given up using my mobile for conf calls, and when talking for >10 mins ask colleagues to call my landlines.

Last week I was on a conf call with another work colleague. I was connected by landline.

After about ten minutes his voice started to break up, getting progressively worse until it was impossible to hear him. I asked, and yes he confirmed, that he was connected by VF SureSignal.

My impression was that the technology in general just seems to be too error prone to be reliable.

However I recently tested a mobile phone on another network, who gave me their SureSignal equivalent free of charge, and it has been working flawlessly at location L1 for two weeks now. This amazes me - theirs seems to work fine out of the box, but my SureSignal V2 units will not work reliably on any of my three ADSL lines at either of my two locations. How can this be? Is SureSignal V3 any better?

All ADSL lines are with TalkTalk. 

Are there any known issues with SureSignal call quality and TalkTalk ADSL?

Is there anything I can do to get a reliable SureSignal connection?

Thanks

Jonathan

[oracle1]

One separate additional point ...

At location L2, whenever there has been an interruption in the power supply, it seems that SureSignal tries to make a connection before my router has re-established the ADSL connection.

It then does not seem to try again in this situation and sits with a single red light.

I have to power off/on the SureSignal, and then it tries to re-establish the connection and normally succeeds.

Sometimes it does this straight away, sometimes it takes several hours.

If I don't manually power cycle it like this it stays disconnected for days.

This is very annoying, because if I have been away and come back to find no SureSignal connection, due to an earlier power disruption, then I can be unreachable for much of the day.

I don't understand why my SureSignal does not seem to auto-retry to establish the connection at location L2.

This is more of an issue than you might imagine, because as it is a rural location short-duration power outages are not unusual.

Can you confirm if my SureSignal V2 should auto-retry to establish connection?

If it should, is there anything I can do to make it do so?

Thanks

Jonathan

[Paffman]

Hi Jonathan,

May I ask who the 'other' company is who supply a similar box like the Sure Signal?

Regards,

Steve

[oracle1]

Hi Steve,

I didn't want to be impolite by talking directly of a similar product from another network, so please remove this post if not permitted.

This is the device that has been supplied to me, and the rest is clear from the article.

(Removed as against eForum house rules)

Thanks

Jonathan

[Paffman]

Thanks for the info and I am sure that posts that are not VF related will get removed 😉

The shame is that I was with this company before I went to VF...

[Nigel_E]

Hi 

I have a BT Home Hub3 replacing a Home Hub2 which worked fine with the Sure signal. I can hear incoming calls clearly but others cannot hear me as the conversation breaks up. Is there anything that can be done to solve this?

[Ben_H]

Hi Nigel_E,

Unfortunately, the Homehub 3 and Sure Signal 3 have a known compatability issue. BT customers with the more up to date Homehub 4 or 5 don't report these problems.

If you're not using Sure Signal 3 (which is the plug through variant), take a look at our Sure Signal Troubleshooting thread. If you're not directed to another page, feel free to post your results here.

Cheers, Ben

[Nigel_E]

Thanks Ben.

Have purchased Home Hub 4. Should arrive Thursday so will update you then.

Cheers, Nigel