Woah - that was wierd. Reposting as not exactly sure what happened with the last one?


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I am helping out my brother with some of his IT issues (turns out that casual offers of help can turn into a full time career...)


To cut a long story short, we ended up with ADSL broadband, and a couple of 2talk VOIP lines all running out of a Linksys WAG54GP2 modem/router. There is also a VPN tunnel connected to an identical Linksys up in Auckland. On the same line (with a filter) is running the POTS line used for EFTPOS.


This was all running very well with Vodafone providing said line. Due to a couple of different issues ($$$) we made the decision to switch to Orcon, and everything has pretty much gone downhill since then.


In particular, the internet (and hence VOIP connection) is patchy at best. The speeds have improved somewhat over the last day or so (gone from 1 meg to 6 meg download speed), but the patchiness of the connection (dropping in and out, long pauses before loading a page, dropped calls) makes it pretty much unuseable.


Bigger problem however is that the EFTPOS machine struggles to process transactions - it is continually timing out and having to reconnect, which means transactions are not processed.


We've spoken to Orcon who have suggested various things (credit where credit is due, they are awesome to deal with on the phone) - apparently the "noise ratio" was very high, and they have tried adjusting that at their end (this was probably responsible for the improved speed) but hasn't noticeably seemed to improve the quality, nor the EFTPOS connection.


They have also suggested not using the Linksys box, rather using their Homehub/Business hub (I gather this is a Siemens gigaset). Problem with that is it doesn't seem to have a bridge mode, and Orcon have deactivated the VOIP ports (and I have no idea about the VPN...), so I don't see how I could use both boxes.


I may well have missed something along the way (I don't know much about how this stuff works at a technical level), but I don't see how changing the router would necessarily make a difference, given the EFTPOS line doesn't go anywhere near it. But have I totally missed something here? Does EFTPOS not play nicely with ADSL? How is it different from a normal phonecall?


This is in the Wellington CBD, and from what I gather is an unbundled Orcon line.


I'm realistic that with cheaper options (VOIP etc.) come some costs in terms of call quality, reliability etc. But the quality has gone massively downhill since shifting from an identical set up with a different provider. AND the EFTPOS line at least is pretty important, so we stuck with a basic line - but it still doesn't seem to work reliably.


So, my question is what can I do to improve the quality of the connection, both the internet/VOIP and the EFTPOS (POTS)? Is it an Orcon issue or is it something that I am doing?


Any advice most appreciated.