Basically the ADSL disconnects every time the phone rings or someone makes a call, and quite often just randomly for anywhere from 5 - 20 minutes or more until the router is restarted. We were using the Vodafone Huawei router but replaced it with a spare Netgear DGN2000 which seems to be faster, reconnect sooner after a call ends and reduced the number of random disconnections, but the same problems exist which points me towards the house wiring or another issue.

These are the router statistics currently which are very consistent in terms of speed and attenuation (sorry for the format):

System Up Time 28:59:45
Port Status TxPkts RxPkts Collisions Tx B/s Rx B/s Up Time
WAN PPPoA 144451 176274 0 3087 12841 02:44:58
LAN 10M/100M 53637 0 0 110 0 28:59:42
WLAN 11M/54M/270M 1392297 1022992 0 11774 1947 28:59:17

ADSL Link Downstream Upstream
Connection Speed 13202 kbps 984 kbps
Line Attenuation 18.0 db 5.5 db
Noise Margin 14.1 db 13.2 db

Somebody used the phone a few hours ago hence PPPoA restarted which happens every time. The other day I opened the unused jack in the hallway and this increased the attenuation to 27/30db, halved the upload and reduced the download rate. It wasn't until I opened it again (thinking I may have done something with the wires) and rechecked the stats that it went back to normal.

We don't have a proper demarc point, the lead in cable comes up in a garden and through the holes in the foundation. Above this in the corner of the lounge is a surface mounted BT jack which has the modem and a cordless phone plugged into it through a filter and there is another jack in the hallway on the opposite side of the lounge. I can get a dial tone out of the one in the hallway and, if I remember correctly, both only have one pair of two used and one cable present in each of the boxes so I am guessing there is a splice or join somewhere underneath the house.

Here is the unused jack, the connector/face plate part was apparently replaced recently due to corrosion or gunk on the contacts although this didn't appear to improve anything.


And the lead in cable (because why not as such a small file size anyway?):


Sorry if this post is very long, tried to explain it all simply, if you need to know anything just ask I might have left it out due to tiredness.  Chur guys.