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High Packet Loss in the Evening Only

dncan29
3: Seeker
3: Seeker

I've been having periodic packet loss for the last month or so at very specific times in the evening, and am at a bit of a loss on what to do.

 

To start off I'll explain that I live in a remote area, so I use a mobile SIM in a TP-Link router for household internet. The phone mast is quite literally at the bottom of the garden, so I've always had a very strong signal and quite fast speeds - enough for gaming and streaming simultaneously. I also have a number of smart devices around my home, including several Google Home devices and smart switches. Never had any issues in nearly 2 years with this setup.

 

Beginning at the start of December 2022, I noticed that I was getting very high packet loss (up to 30%, with higher spikes) while playing online. At these times my wife also noticed that YouTube, Netflix and iPlayer were buffering regularly or playing at low quality. We assumed at first that it would just be a temporary glitch, and left it at that.

 

After a few more nights I started investigating further. To start off I tried disconnecting our wifi boosters - no change. Resetting the router - no change. Comparing wired (PC) and wireless connections no  difference. After resetting everything and even trying the hotspot on my phone, I gave up. Give it a couple of weeks, I thought. It's the Christmas holidays, maybe the lines are just busier than usual.

 

Come January and with no further change, I used pingplotter to test our connection over a few days and the results have been quite interesting:Screenshot_20230118_084948.png

This is an example taken over a 48 hour period. My latency (black line) is very stable. The red bars show packet loss. What's interesting here is that every day, at 15:00 on the dot, the packet loss starts to rise. It peaks and drops again at 19:00, then rises sharply throughout the evening before tailing back to zero at 23:00.

This cycle repeats every day, without fail, near enough to the minute. And it's exactly the same whether I'm on a wired or wireless connection, and is also the same using the hotspot on my phone (and we've tried this with 2 different Vodafone SIMs).

 

Surely this must be some technical glitch on Vodafone's end? As I mentioned it only started beginning of December 2022, but the connection is unusable for gaming in the evening and streaming is also slow.

 

Is there anything more that can be done?

Thanks for any help :Smiling:

120 REPLIES 120

Didn't notice anything and the graphs on my router show minimal loss since 22nd 

https://ibb.co/sw0cyjp

How you monitor this ? Is it special software or build in router software?

Connmon add-on for Merlin software on ASUS routers

I have tp link unfortunately....

Our 'small' problem is back just started right now at wa4 

Same here in CR5. Just been pants for weeks on end since December. You get a couple of good days and think everything is sorted and then it happens all over again. Very dull indeed

…and again tonight the 5pm ‘shadow’ descends on Vodafone network. Roll on contract end as that might come quicker than any resolution from Vodafone sadly

Tried to cancel contract, they said i have to pay canceling fee. As i have speed and good static ping so they do not see the problem.

They said the same to me. I kept escalating till they agreed to waive the cancellation fee.

 

If they really can’t do anything more for you they will issue a letter of deadlock which you can then take to Ofcom.

Thank you i try that