Vodafone Brodband...just don't buy it!

[Matt_Hirst]

I moved to Vodafone broadband in November they'd got a deal on, from day 1 struggled with the connection in the house, constant drop outs, tv streaming was impossible (with my previous supplier there were no issues). 

Getting through to customer services was a waste of time, talking to Tech an even bigger waste of time - one Sunday I was onto Vodafone for over 4 hours (1 hour on hold).

Anyway due to the drop outs I was getting I got talked into upgrading to pro (heavily discounted might I add) told this would fix all my issues - I did say I doubt it, advised upgrade would turn up in a couple of days and I would get a 14 day cooling off period after the service went live / items for the upgrade had arrived.

The dongle and Apple TV arrived this Thursday finally...plugged in the wifi booster - though how this was ever going to help with wired connections I do not know - set the apple tv up as well which made the drop outs worse.  Called tech up today who says its a bandwidth issue and nothing they can do to rectify the issue, told to try connecting my old wifi router up and use the QOS on that to see if it will rectify the issues I am having however they will not offer any support with this router or on how to set it all up oh and by the way the cooling off period ends today so need to do it asap.

After an hour of trying to get the router to work I gave up and cancelled the contract so now face my broadband being cut off in 3 - 5 days and unable to have my phone line or broadband transferred to another supplier for 10 working days.

So much for Vodafone saying the cooling off period will start the day I receive the kit to see if it fixes my broadband issue.  Best advise avoid Vodafone Broadband at all costs.

Matt

[Jayach]

As you have a few days before getting cut off, may as well try to fix it. If, as you say the problems occur when wired then we can forget about the WiFi.

First thing is what speed is your router synced at?

Log into the router and show us the DSL status, like this:

DSL Status

This status page shows technical parameters of your data connection.

DSL Status Information

DSL Mode

ITU-T G.993.2_Annex_B (VDSL2)

DSL Uptime

17 days, 0 hours, 17 minutes and 47 seconds

Line Coding

DMT

Status

Connected

Number of Cuts

0

Link Power State

L0

Line Quality

  Downstream Upstream

Current Rate	79999 kbps	20000 kbps
Maximum Rate	82960 kbps	26772 kbps
Signal-to-Noise Ratio	4.3 dB	10.3 dB
Attenuation	DS1 9.0 dB, DS2 21.7 dB, DS3 33.9 dB	US0 2.0 dB, US1 14.9 dB, US2 24.2 dB
Power	12.9 dBm	4 dBm
CRC Errors in last 24497 minute(s)	0	5831
K (number of bytes in DMT frame)	0	0
R (number of bytes in RS code word)	8	0
S (RS code word size in DMT frame)	0.0647	0.3819
D (interleaver depth)	8	1
Delay	0 ms	0 ms

[Matt_Hirst]

DSL Status Information

DSL Mode

ITU-T G.993.2_Annex_B (VDSL2)

DSL Uptime

4 hours, 59 minutes and 59 seconds

Line Coding

DMT

Status

Connected

Number of Cuts

1

Link Power State

L0

Line Quality

  Downstream Upstream

Current Rate	31592 kbps	8931 kbps
Maximum Rate	32929 kbps	9123 kbps
Signal-to-Noise Ratio	6.2 dB	6.1 dB
Attenuation	DS1 13.3 dB, DS2 33.5 dB, DS3 50.9 dB	US0 4.9 dB, US1 24.8 dB, US2 39.4 dB
Power	12.4 dBm	5.9 dBm
CRC Errors in last 299 minute(s)	89	2
K (number of bytes in DMT frame)	0	0
R (number of bytes in RS code word)	0	16
S (RS code word size in DMT frame)	0.2417	0.8511
D (interleaver depth)	1	1
Delay	0 ms	0 ms

  Downstream Upstream

Super Frames	4636060	1458616
Super Frame Errors	41	0
RS Words	0	84595779
RS Correctable Errors	0	1
RS Uncorrectable Errors	0	0

  Downstream Upstream

HEC Errors	147	0
OCD Errors	0	0
LCD Errors	0	0
Total Cells	1093468275	0
Data Cells	384796740	0
Bit Errors	0	0

  Downstream Upstream

Total ES	81	1944
Total SES	0	84
Total UAS	74	30538

[Jayach]

That doesn't look too bad, you are obviously a fair distance from the cabinet. Do you know what speeds you were getting from your previous supplier? What speeds do you get from speedtest.net, wired and wireless?

[Matt_Hirst]

More or less the same speeds.

Tech guy today said it was a bandwidth issue, previous tech guy I spoke to a week or so ago who talked me into going to pro said it was my Devollo homeplugs causing the slow down (these have been removed since this was suggested to be an issue to no actual benefit).

As I explained today the only difference now is the router which lead me to think maybe its a QOS setting unfortunately with Vodafone you cannot setup QOS.

[Matt_Hirst]

Currently getting 22Mbs Down 0.72 Up.  Currently only me online.

Worst I had today was 5Mbs Down 6Mbs Up - this was when I was downloading a game and my daughter was streaming a movie via Disney + on the Apple TV box. 

[Jayach]

There are more errors than I would have expected in 4 hours. Try a auto test to see if it finds anything (although I doubt it): Network Status checker | Check your signal (vodafone.co.uk)

[Matt_Hirst]

Running speed test again 6.42Mbs Down and 0.5 Up

[Matt_Hirst]

12/05/2021

20:53:38

Deleting STA from monitor

data

12/05/2021

20:53:34

Added new STA to monitor 

data

12/05/2021

20:53:22

2021/12/05 20:53:22 [warn] 7410#0: *6439 [lua] session.lua:103: changeUser(): changing user to vodafone

system

12/05/2021

20:53:17

2021/12/05 20:53:17 [error] 7410#0: *6439 [lua] sessionmgr.lua:262: redirectIfNotAuthorized(): Unauthorized request

system

12/05/2021

20:53:17

failed to send packet: Network is unreachable

data

12/05/2021

20:53:17

2021/12/05 20:53:17 [error] 7410#0: *6439 [lua] sessionmgr.lua:262: redirectIfNotAuthorized(): Unauthorized request

system

12/05/2021

20:53:17

2021/12/05 20:53:17 [warn] 7410#0: *6439 [lua] session.lua:354: new(): new session for default user

system

12/05/2021

20:52:48

[33216.383078] DROP wan in: IN=pppoe-wan OUT= MAC= src=159.89.203.14 DST=90.248.252.134 LEN=40 TOS=0x00 PREC=0x00 TTL=239 ID=5868 PROTO=TCP SPT=61953 DPT=10124 WINDOW=1024 RES=0x00 SYN URGP=0 MARK=0x8000000

firewall

12/05/2021

20:52:44

Failed to send DHCPV6 message to ff02::1:2 (Permission denied)

system

12/05/2021

20:52:18

failed to send packet: Network is unreachable

data

[Jayach]

---

@Matt_Hirst wrote:

Currently getting 22Mbs Down 0.72 Up.  Currently only me online.

Worst I had today was 5Mbs Down 6Mbs Up - this was when I was downloading a game and my daughter was streaming a movie via Disney + on the Apple TV box. 

---

Oops, our posts crossed there.

0.72 up is very low, I would have expected 7.2 possibly. Was that wired?

I would have suggested splitting the WiFi channels, and try connecting to the 5Ghz only, but I believe they have removed that ability on Pro.

Who was your previous supplier? Some have routers that can be configured to work on different ISP's. but most don't.

[Matt_Hirst]

Previous supplier plusnet

[Matt_Hirst]

Was running speedtest from my Pc so a wired connection into the back of the router.

Pc is a Alderlake 12700K with 32GB RAM Asus ROG STRIX mb.

[Jayach]

If those previous errors were from the Broadband service test, and considering the low upload speed it sounds like there is something wrong. I would think the Broadband service test errors have been logged to your account so try running it again in the morning and give them another call. I normally use 08080 034 515 for broadband support but you could also try the live chat https://www.vodafone.co.uk/bbservcd/.

I believe the latest PlusNet routers are badged BT HH5 so are locked down.

It would be handy if it could be solved, as once it's working the Vodafone service is O.K, It's just that support is appalling. (I had a terrible start for the first 3 months, but it has been O.K for over a year now.)

Good Luck.

[Jayach]

I'm not an expert at this, but taking a look at your errors on the upstream.

Downstream Upstream

Total ES	81	1944
Total SES	0	84
Total UAS	74	30538

Total ES (error seconds) 

Total SES (severely errored seconds) 

Total UAS (unavailable seconds) 

Compare this to mine, which has been up 17 days:

  Downstream Upstream

Total ES	0	4057
Total SES	0	20
Total UAS	50	50

And it definitely looks like something is not right. Have you tried with the router in the test socket? (although if you just swapped one router for the other there should be no problem there)

[Matt_Hirst]

I'll have a look at what errors there are but I'm not wasting another four hrs of my life on hold and trying to get through to Vodafone support.

As said previously luckily I'm in the cooling off period, just, so can cancel my account unfortunately it looks like it'll be a messy transfer as the account just gets cancelled and its not like a normal transfer from one service to another.

[Matt_Hirst]

  Downstream Upstream

Total ES	159	1944
Total SES	0	84
Total UAS	74	30538

This is the table as at 08:30 no change.

[Jayach]

I know what you mean about Vodafone "support". As you have the option to leave, then yes probably best to take it.

[Matt_Hirst]

Well got my router connected and everything going through that and its like chalk and cheese the difference its made so far...Still getting an intermittent slowdown, but nowhere near as bad.

Am still downloading items for my comp, my daughter is using appletv and we've been watching a movie on Roku with no issues.  Other noticeable difference is my PC just feels snappier when Internet browsing and can have multiple windows opening at same time.

All I will say is vodafone go back to having routers with QOS or have tech support that can help connect a separate router to your supplied router.

[Matt_Hirst]

Gone one step further, now got a separate modem and reconfigured this to connect to the dsl line and from there into my router, now speedtest shows 33-34mb/sec and is consistently higher when kids are streaming and using tech.  Removed all the vodafone supplied kit.

Best advice for anyone experiencing problems with vodafone is get a dsl modem and a router, remove any vodafone supplied kit.

[BoyceRIP23]

Im liking your advice. What dsl modem and router did you get and was it easy to install/network and get working? 

Your time in replying to me is very appreciated