Superfast 1. Only getting around 16 Mb/s download speed. Line banded? Aluminium cable?

[Delta10]

First some background. I live on an estate built in the 1970's. This house was late 1970's but the installation of the core infrastructure would have started a few years before. I have found which BT Openreach cabinet I am connected to. Straight line less than 400m so the cable ought not to be much more than 500m.

Back to the days of 56k dialup my speed was around 30k. With ADSL the maximum speed I had was around 5Mb/s.

When I moved to VDSL I initially had just under 25Mb/s. Around a year ago I suddenly started getting very regular disconnection / dropout sometime 3 or 4 per day. Normally the router reconnected straight away but occasionally not. Given the Covid situation I did not initially report not least as with WFH dropouts were relatively less of an issue than no service. The disconnections stopped after a while maybe 4 weeks. A month or two later they started again for a few days. I presumed Openreach resolved a fault.

Only when I came to swap ISP did I find my speed was down to 16 Mbps.

Due to the location of the master socket the router is connected on extension wiring.  However I have connected to the test socket inside the wall socket and get similar speeds and results from the router. I took the socket off the wall to check the connections of the incoming wiring were clean and tight. Due to the location of the router and mains power normally it is switched off overnight and when not at home. I have always understood the BT Openreach system will not see this as an issue because there is not an immediate ( attempted ) reconnection. Once the swap to Vodafone was live I arranged a mains feed to leave the router permanently on. After 18 days there had not been a speed improvement so I put the router back on the switched feed. When I swapped the router I used the new microfilter packed with the router for it and my DECT phone base and another new one to the basic wired phone. In just over a month I will be on holiday so the router will be off for 10 days.

Having read around this I suspect the line is banded. Also it is possible that the Openreach wiring is Aluminium.

The issue is BT Openreach not Vodafone but contact has to be by the service provider. Since Vodafone stated the speed would only be around 16Mbps so are meeting their commitment. Hence getting any action may be difficult.

Below are screen captures of the BT Openreach service at the cabinet, a speed test and a typical router DSL log.

My question is what do these results imply and what are the prospects of getting back to at least 25 Mbps without dropouts?

[Delta10]

@Jayach 

The SNR spread is a bit wider than +/- 0.2. The three checks shown here range between 7.9 and 8.5.

I have not been aware of any disconnections where as a year ago they were daily. Up to then only occasional and a speed of 25 Mb/s so something changed. Given my house wiring and connected items have not changed plus when connected direct to the test socket the SNR is not down to around 6.3 even if speed the same because Openreach have limited it with DLM my view is the issue is between the cabinet and my master socket.

I am away for 10 days soon when the router will be off. Once back I can check if the automated system has noticed this and reacted. If not I will chase up with Vodafone.

@Amanda 

I do not use social media i.e Facebook, Twitter etc.

Further surely a large business should have a better primary contact system for support ? With direct email I could link this post then be updated with the action being taken. Phone and chat are so time consuming.

if major issues for many customers social edia may be a useful way of updating the status but that is a totally different situation.

[Effie]

With social media, you can link this community thread and we can keep you updated via the private message functions of Twitter and Facebook @Delta10 

As there is no account access on the Community, in order for testing to be done you would need to contact the Broadband team via one of the available channels; phone, LiveChat or social media.

[Amanda]

Hey there @Delta10 thanks for letting us know what's been happening, what you've tried and for keeping the thread updated. 

We can run some checks on your line to see if any faults or issues flag up - please come and speak to my team over social media. 

If you remember to include a link to your post along with your community username, then you won't need to repeat yourself either 🙂 

[Delta10]

To close this thread off there was a fault on the line which Openreach rectified. The current speed and signal-to-noise ratio are below.