House wiring - worth checking out?

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DrCheese

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#87941 10-Aug-2011 23:35

Hi Folks,

I live 600 m from an ADSL2+ cabinet and the best speedtest.net results I have are 10 Mbps downstream and 0.63 kbps upstream. Attenuation is 19.5 dB down and 7.9 dB up. This indicates I should be 1.4 km from the cabinet rather than the measured 600 m in a direct line down the street (attenuation divided by 13.8).

I've managed to eek out a better upload speed by switching to a TP-Link TD8840 router with a Broadcom chipset (0.45 to 0.63 Mbps), but I figure I should be able to get up to 20 Mbps down and 1 Mbps up considering the distance to the cabinet.

Is it worth having my internal wiring looked at to see if this is the cause of lower than expected speeds? I have naked DSL and the incoming line branches out to seven phone jacks, one of which has the ADSL router plugged in. The other six jacks are connected to my wiring but there are no devices plugged in. I'm wondering if the lines to the six inactive jacks should be cut. How much of an issue is messy internal wiring?

Cheers,

David.

Bung

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#504743 10-Aug-2011 23:57

DrCheese: I figure I should be able to get up to 20 Mbps down and 1 Mbps up considering the distance to the cabinet.

What synch speeds as reported by the modem do you get? You will always have overheads that will reduce your measured throughput.

DrCheese

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#504746 11-Aug-2011 00:10

Bung:
DrCheese:? I figure I should be able to get up to 20 Mbps down and 1 Mbps up considering the distance to the cabinet.

What synch speeds as reported by the modem do you get? You will always have overheads that will reduce your measured throughput.

Attainable Rate (Kbps): 15176, 816 (down / up)

Rate (Kbps): 11936, 777

Cheers,

David.

cyril7

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#504784 11-Aug-2011 07:23

Hi, its not common that fixing normal house wiring issues makes more than a couple of dB to attenuation, even though it can take it from 10 to 18Mb/s. Based on that if fixed and it went to 17-19dB still places you 1.4km so 15Mb/s may be it. Just because you 600m from the cabinet its not uncommon that the cable wanders up the street and back down again.

That all said, I still recommend you make a clean fresh and master filtered line, that way you can stop wondering, and my guess is that in the least the upstream will fix, and you will probably get alot closer to that attainable.

Cyril

CYaBro

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#504787 11-Aug-2011 07:40

Silly question: do you need a master splitter for naked dsl?

Opinions are my own and not the views of my employer.

cyril7

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#504788 11-Aug-2011 07:48

no

David, I should add that fixing the house wiring will mean you should get closer to the attainable figure which is real for 1.4km or 18-19dB. But I doubt it will realise the 600m, as I would suspect the 1.4km is real, just walking and cable runs are not the same.

Cyril

DrCheese

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#505110 11-Aug-2011 17:14

Thanks for your replies.

Cyril, is a master filter required? I read elsewhere on GZ that this wasn't necessary:

http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=49&topicid=26834

Or perhaps I misunderstood your post from this previous thread.

Cheers,

David.

New World

Shop on-line at New World now for your groceries (affiliate link).

DrCheese

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#513725 29-Aug-2011 22:57

To end this thread, I thought I'd provide an update on what I've found to be useful for increasing ADSL speeds. I need to eke (not eek) out as much speed as possible to send and receive large files from Europe as part of my consultancy business.

Original download (DL) speeds after the installation of an ADSL2+ cabinet 600 metres away back in November 2010 were around 4-6 Mbps in during the day, with upload (UL) speeds of 600 kbps. DL in the evenings were an abysmal 1-2 Mbps. All the standard isolation tests were carried out.

1. Lodged the problem with my provider. I was told that there are people in NZ who can't even connect to the internet, so I shouldn't be complaining. Not unlike complaining about poor quality food at a restaurant and told that I should be grateful as there are people starving in Africa.

2. Requested numerous port changes. This does nothing as far as I can determine, except make my UL speeds go up and down. A futile exercise in frustration.

3. Switched internet provider to vodafone. DL now 6-10 Mbps and UL 200-600 kbps. (Note that this new provider improved my speeds; your mileage may vary). Oddly, the UL speeds were usually around 200, 450, or 600 kbps, but not in between these values.

4. Replaced the free Huawei 556a router (courtesy of vodafone) with a cheap TP-Link TD-8840 router (Broadcom chipset). DL and UL now rock solid at 10 Mbps and 630 kbps. I guess this depends on the type of exchange or cabinet you are connected to, so again, your mileage may vary. I've read good reports on the TD-8840 on GZ.

5. Lastly, I paid a cable wallah to visit my house and check the wiring. The numerous telephone extensions in my house were cut loose, and my connection is now a simple cat 5e from the Telecom box attached to my house to a single jack in my office. No more messy wiring, and no data cables running parallel to 230 V power cables, which could have potentially created some interference and downgraded data speeds. The wallah did point out that the Telecom box should not be half buried in the dirt, but at least 300 mm above ground. But it was dry inside, so hopefully no problems. No change to UL (630 kbps) but DL increased 7% to 10.7 Mbps. Rock solid, day and evening.

So in conclusions, the internet provider was my worst problem and was easily and cheaply fixed. Paying someone to check the wiring was expensive, and didn't improve the situation that much.

Cheers,

David.

cyril7

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#513753 30-Aug-2011 07:34

Hi David, one question what exactly are your line stats (From the modem) now, I assume all the figures you mention above a speedtest or file download speeds.

Cyril

DrCheese

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#513759 30-Aug-2011 08:11

Hi Cyril,

Attainable Rate (Kbps): 15772 856
Rate (Kbps): 12720 760

Cheers,

David

webwat

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#514580 31-Aug-2011 16:46

Since you were already getting "Attainable Rate (Kbps): 15176, 816 (down / up)" before starting on this exercise, you can see that the 10Mbps speed is not limited by a 15Mbps connection, although it may be more stable now. If you need even more reliable speed with a specified service level, there may be some HSNS services that fit within your budget.

Also note that you have had a quite dramatic improvement in upstream connection speed even though your uploading throughput hasn't changed.

Time to find a new industry!