Slow internet speeds < 4 mbit/s download

[matih]

Dear all,

sorry for writing in English but I do not know any Greek.

I would like to ask some help as at our location we are struggling since years with slow internet speeds. Various speedtests report 2.25 mbit/s download and 2.38 mbit/s upload. Now, I am fully aware that our situation is a difficult one: our location is quite remote. Still sometimes we are able to get 23 mbit/s download. And we know that our neighbour is also achieving such speeds. And the neighbour is really near to our house! So, for sure we are distant from the last cabinet, but I would really like to be sure that we have checked everything possible, before giving up.

In the next days I will have a technician pass by (I am not in Greece at the moment) and perform some tests while being directly connected to the router in order to see if, by disconnecting the whole LAN and being directly connected to the router we get different results.

A few words about our network: since we dispose of two phone numbers we have 2 WANs. One uses a Speedport W 724V Type Ci router, while the second one uses a Huawei HA35-10. There is then a Draytek 2926 which is configured in doing load balancing so that we may use both ADSL connections at the same time with the idea of achieving better speeds and also some kind of backup in case one of the two ADSL lines fails.

The first question I have for the forum is the following one: is there any way to let the two routers (Speedport and Huawei) work in a transparent way (PPPoE passthrough)? As I really would like to let the Draytek 2926 to do the "heavy lifting" and let the other routers just behave as modems. The issue is, that on both lines we have phone lines which are currenlty used quite often as mobile coverage is not strong enough. :-| Any chance? If not may I buy another router that allows PPPoE passthrough and the use of the landlines?

Honestly if even one of the two connections was working good (20/1 mbit/s) it would already be quite an achievement.

Thank you very much!

matih

[K1m0n]

Various speedtests report 2.25 mbit/s download and 2.38 mbit/s upload

Could be your connection, could be the isp backhaul.
Inconclusive.
We need to know what the modem(s) say about their wan(s) at the same time.

Still sometimes we are able to get 23 mbit/s download

Depending on what the draytek does, it could be when the huawei uses the LTE.
Again, inconclusive.

And we know that our neighbour is also achieving such speeds. And the neighbour is really near to our house!

This indicates that (assuming that you and the network use the same network path), you are not *that* far away.
But read on:

#1. Forget about what speed tests measure/report,
for troubleshooting the first step is what connection speed/properties are reported by the modem/cpe.
So, post pics from speedport/huawei wan dsl/lte connection pages.

Wan connection speed/properties !== speedtest results!

Wan connection properties will indicate distance & possible cabling issues.
Speedtests can be helpful for measuring throughput but can come with slow results even when the connection itself is otherwise ok
if/when the isp is loaded and has capacity issues with its backbone
(which tends to be an issue outside major cities).

#2 Assuming that you and your neighbor are both on the same kind of service (adsl),
*and* that your dsl/wan connection is indeed negotiated @ ~2 mbps,
*and* that you haven't done something seriously wrong in your side (@draytek?),
those issues strongly suggest a cabling (vs distance/isp) issue.
*Where* the issue occurs on the cabling, that is for the technician to determine.

A word about cabling and responsibilities:
There is a service drop-off point in your premises/building/farm/property,
where exactly this is can differ.
In a residential building that is typically on a junction cabinet on the basement,
on rural single houses/farms/etc can be a box bolted on the outside wall or even at the pole.

Anyway, the isp is responsible for the network/cabling up to the drop-off point.
Anything after the drop-off point is under the owner's responsibility.

So, what you have to do is, after determining the drop-off point, measure the conn. speed/properties at the drop-off point,
which is typically done by temporarily connecting the cpe at the drop-off point.

If the connection at the drop-point is problematic you need to contact isp support, its their responsibility.
It might be just a bad connection or a worn cable (relatively easy to fix = they will do it).
If it is a more general problem on the area whether they will fix it or not is another issue,
remote areas do have old network, and don't expect the isp to redo miles of cabling for a few customers, so don't hold your breath.

If the connection at the drop-point is ok, you have cabling issues on your side, it's on your property, it's your responsibility,
so you will have to contract a technician to check/fix/replace the cabling on your side.

Offc it is a different case if your neighbour is on a different kind of service (ex: rural/vdsl) vs (yours: adsl? i suppose...).

perform some tests while being directly connected to the router in order to see if, by disconnecting the whole LAN and being directly connected to the router we get different results

Unlikely, as long as you haven't done something seriously stupid on the draytek or otherwise lan-side, but do check.

is there any way to let the two routers (Speedport and Huawei) work in a transparent way (PPPoE passthrough)?

The speedport does do pppoe-passthrough (which btw is not completely transparent but will do) so you can establish a second session through it,
and by doing so it will retain its ata capability.
It can be made complete transparent if configured in bridge mode, in which case it will lose the ata capability,
so you will have to somehow terminate the sip service elsewhere (not recommended).

HA35, is the cpe for the speedbooster service (which combines xdsl+lte),
it does some internal magic to bond the 2 connections using isp bonding server upstream,
to my knowledge it doesn't support bridge/pppoe-passthrough (by doing so it wouldn't be able to do the bonding part...),
so it can't be made transparent.
If you have to put an extra router behind it (draytek) you will add an extra nat layer.
But do check the relevant thread about speedbooster, I have no hands-on experience,
but generally speaking the speedbooster service only operates with the isp cpes.

If you do want to do 1/2/n xdsl + LTE load-balancing/bonding in a proper way you will have to do it with your own equipment
(which might be a good idea if you have decent lte coverage or an lte tower on LOS + an unlimited data sim, but this is either enterprise lvl equipment,
or network geek area for DIY).

I really would like to let the Draytek 2926 to do the "heavy lifting" and let the other routers just behave as modems.

2926 is EOL. If you are to put it wan-facing, you want to consider the security issues it might pose.
That being said, it is a decent router for smb, does do (some...) load-balancing,
there are way better options for load balancing (again, a network geek area of expertise for DIY).

If not may I buy another router that allows PPPoE passthrough and the use of the landlines?

Again:
The speedbooster service only operates with it's own cpe, it doesn't do passthrough, so no.
So, as long as you want to retain the speedbooster service = you are married to the it's cpe = no passthrough/transparency.

For the other connection, you could use isp cpe with pppoe-passthrough (works),
or use a recent fritzbox which also supports passthrough (the only all-in-ones officially supported with auto provisioning for telephony service),
or you could use whatever modem you like but you will have to ask the isp for the sip credentials and terminate the sip session
on another ata/pbx lan-side (and no provisioning/support will be provided by the isp).

The above in general.
I suggest that you first diagnose the issue, checking the cpe's wan/dsl pages for more info is the 1st step.

[matih]

Hello K1m0n,

thank you very much for your answer, I really appreciate you taking the time to read my whole post and to write such a complete answer.

Yes, I do agree with you, we need information from the two modems: our technician is already informed I hope he will manage to perform the tests this week already. In that occasion he will also make some print screens about system information >> Line information etcetera.

I will keep you posted.

matih

[matih]

Hello.

I still do not have the print screens regarding the quality of the ADSL signals, but I have some more information regarding the quality of the connection. Still "non conclusive" as K1m0n says, but I did notice it, and I could not refrain from sharing it.

I am partecipating to a project which, in order to check the quality of the user installation, produces a graph which allows me to monitor the "stability" of the internet connection. Is it not real time and it is not meant to provide information to troubleshoot, it is just an indicator if the internet connection of the device to the internet is stable or not.

During the past weekend there was a rather long internet interruption on the island (root cause unknown, technician meant it could be related to the low temperatures as the internet disruption where quite spread across the island) and it is interesting to see the stability of the connection how it changed from before the internet interruption and after.

So here below please find the first print screen where I have added some comments:



And here a print screen taken today, where you can see that the stability improvement is staying and not going away. At least for now.



I have asked our technician if he changed something in order to improve the connection as the results show but apparently, he just had the routers restarted. I have been thinking about the meaning of this and probably I should interpret it as "one more piece of the puzzle" which will come together once we have more information.

I wish you all a nice evening and thanks for reading. :-)

[matih]

Dear all,

I finally managed to have some more information. Not complete, but it is something.

First of all: our technician called OTE which then did something (changed some copper cable?). Since the intervention the speeds increased signficantly.

WAN1


WAN2


WAN1 + WAN2


The intervention solved the issue, meaning that with those speeds we can do what we need. Still I have tried to have more information regarding the quality of the ADSL signal. I managed to have such information only for one of the two connections, apparently OTE changed the password of the router while resetting it and did not share it.

The information that I have got is only for WAN2, see printscreen below:



From what I understand by looking at the attenuation it is not good.

Thanks.

[K1m0n]

The information that I have got is only for WAN2

Your connection is vdsl2 (copper-to-the-local-cabin).
WAN #2 syncs (at the time of the pic) @36 mbits.
That is the speed you *should* see (in theory...) if you measure wan.
If you systematically measure significantly lower, isp has backhaul capacity issues upstream.

With noise margin = ~7db and att. close to 60 disconnections may (and probably will) occur.
High att. & low noise margin indicates a long distance from the cabin, and/or cabling issues in the premises.
You can't really fix the distance part (unless you move...) but you could (and should) check the cabling in the premises,
every little bit of improvement helps.
If you have a parallel circuit for the telephony in the premises (the common case in older buildings,
multiple phone sockets connected in parallel to the phone line) redo the circuit.
Split the cabling by having a single circuit for vdsl-in (your wan(s) 1/2/n -> to the modem(s)),
and a second *discrete* circuit for the phones which will be driven from the cpe's fxs ports (phone-out).
You typically do that by locating the first socket (or branching) in the premises,
and you use a double socket to split the circuit.
The part of the circuit that carries the vdsl-in signal from isp connects to socket #1 and that connects to the wan/dsl port of the cpe.
The rest of the circuit (that goes to the rest phone sockets) connects to socket #2 and is driven from the cpe's fxs port.
This eliminates the need to use splitters/filters, and also eliminates noise in the circuit,
and (sometimes) can help significantly.

apparently OTE changed the password of the router while resetting it and did not share it.

It is highly unlikely that the technician used its *own* password.
It is highly likely that the technician just reseted the cpe,
in which case the default admin pass is printed on a sticker at the back (or bottom?) of the unit.

I would:
Check/re-do the cabling/socket at the premises.
Remove draytek from the equation (at least for testing/monitoring).
Review the draytek's config.

[matih]

Dear K1mo0n,

thank you very much for your answer. I'll try to rephrase that in order to be sure that I understood correctly your idea.

Your suggestion is to avoid the VDSL signal to "freely go around" on the premises while potentially loosing it's (already) low strength. By sending the VDSL signal on a dedicated circuit directly to the modem we could reduce this risk, in order to do that we should install dedicated circuits:

01) one circuit for the phone
02) one circuit for the internet

My understanding stops here though, I think an electrician would be the person that I should ask for? As I am not entirely sure on how it is possible to correctly identify the "part of the circuit that carries the VDSL in signal" from the rest of circuit. Are those specific wires that should be connected to socket #1? Do they have specific colors? Or any indication of any kind? ... and I thought that phone cables had just two wires... :-D :-D ...

The other thing that confuses me is the fact that our phones are connected to the modem. Isn't that an issue? Would the phone still work if we proceed as per you suggestion? And since the phone line goes already directly into the modem will we really have an advantage?

If you do not mind I would like to talk to you directly. How may I send you a direct message?

Thanks a lot.

[K1m0n]

in order to do that we should install dedicated circuits

Typically, some rewiring/clean-up/ and a double phone socket is enough,
depending on the situation on the ground, you may need to lay a new cable from the first socket
up to where you want the cpe to reside.
But don't think in the lines that you have to re-do the wiring in the whole building.

I think an electrician would be the person that I should ask for?

Yes, an electrician, or anyone doing networks should have no problems fixing it.
The idea is that line (cable/wiring) branching plus other plugs/sockets/phones connected in parallel to the vdsl
circuit harm connection quality.
How much? difficult to say, if you are close enough to the cabin, everything will be peachy even with cabling issues on premises.
If you are far from the cabin fixing your cabling on premises can make a big difference.
How big of a difference?, well that will be seen after fixing the wiring, so, no promises.

Have a look at this:
https://www.cyta.com.cy/mp/informati...oadband_GR.pdf

It's from cyta, and unfortunately its in Greek, but at 3.2 it has a diagram with the suggested (and not-suggested) cabling.
Basically, all installs should split the circuit, its just that for the subscribers that are close to the cabin the
method of connected everything in parallel is good-enough.

s I am not entirely sure on how it is possible to correctly identify the "part of the circuit that carries the VDSL in signal" from the rest of circuit.

Ahh.. you open the sockets (and possibly the junction boxes in the walls...) and you search what connects where.
The vdsl signal comes to the premises from the isp drop-off point using a cable,
the goal is to make sure there are no branches/sockets on the cabling until it hits the vdsl modem.

Then, if you want to provide pots telephpony to the rest of the house,
you connect the internal cabling/sockets to the cpe's fxs ports.

Are those specific wires that should be connected to socket #1? Do they have specific colors? Or any indication of any kind? ... and I thought that phone cables had just two wires... :-D :-D ...

Depends on what they did when they laid the cabling.
On older houses, typicaly its same color copper cables in one big parallel circuit.

The other thing that confuses me is the fact that our phones are connected to the modem. Isn't that an issue?

No, it ain't. You can keep the phones directly connected to the cpe if that suits you,
but since you will do the cabling anyway, you could send telephony to other sockets.

And since the phone line goes already directly into the modem will we really have an advantage?

The advantage would be that you would have no branching on the vdsl-in circuit,
and thus quite possibly better xdsl stats.
But we are just guessing here.
I don't know what is going on with your cabling, you don't too.
It could be that you don't have any branching (if a straight cable comes to modem and there are no other sockets in the house),
it could be that you do have issues.

My suggestion is to investigate.

If you do not mind I would like to talk to you directly.

No, please don't.
I can't help you directly, and by having the conversation here we help anyone coming here via google.

[matih]

Hello and thanks a lot for the explanations!

I have asked the possibility to contact you directly, because I was wondering if it was possible for you to explain all of this to our technician in Greek in order to remove any possible incomprehension due to language barriers. I will now use the diagram that you shared and since it is in Greek I believe we will solve even possibile language incomprehensions.

I will let you know the results of the inspection and hopefully I will also get the data for WAN#1, which by the way stayed offline for the whole Sunday as you may see from the graph below:




I have found a nice application which is running on docker which keeps testing every hour the internet connectivity with speed and pings and creates suche nice graphs as the one posted. I have installed it on a Synology NAS which is in the premises and allows me to keep control over the connection even if I am abroad (performing speedtest via the VPN is not trustworthy, I do not know exactly why but it goes much slower: probably Draytek Vigor 2926 is not fast powerful enough). The application is called speedtest tracker: link.

[K1m0n]

I will now use the diagram that you shared and since it is in Greek I believe we will solve even possibile language incomprehensions.

That^ +1.
Plz note: the cyta pdf does show the diagram using a dsl splitter to split incomming adsl/pots service before the cpe.
This was valid at pre-voip times, nowadays you don't need a splitter as shown,
you just connect vdsl-in to cpe's wan port.
Phone-out you get from the cpe's fxs (phone) ports.

I will try to locate a manual with the suggested circuit from a more recent guide.

probably Draytek Vigor 2926 is not fast powerful enough

2926 should be good for ~80 Mbps ipsec (aes 256) or ~45 Mbps ssl vpn.

Edit:
Here -> https://help.cosmote.gr/system/templ...7%CE%A3_GR.pdf

@page 12, there are clear instructions.
gray line marked #1 is vdsl-in, and goes directly to cpe (no circuit branching, no phones/socket(s)/splitter/whatever).
If needed, lay a new wire from the isp drop-off point to the cpe.
The other (unmarked) grey line goes to the rest sockets/phones in the house (if needed).
These 2 circuits should be discreet.
Usually its not a big job.

[matih]

Dear K1m0n,

sorry for the long wait, but for the moment being I do not have any news regarding the analysis of the cabling, nor the ADSL quality for WAN#1.

I keep monitoring the connection and all in all it seems to work fine, although I have noticed a strange behaviour that I can not double check while not having physical access to the devices: every now and then the VPN stops working and I can not connect anymore even though the internet connection is up. I can say that the connection is up because I am able to connect to the synology NAS via Synology QuickConnect.

I believe there are many variables which make troubleshooting kind of difficult:

01) We use a dyndns service as the IP address is dynamic.
02) We have two internet lines: is one of the two offline? If yes which one and why?
03) Does it depends on the Draytek router itself which may partially stop working?
04) ...

In the past the issue has been solved by restarting the router although I have no precise data on which one exactly. At the moment being the VPN is down since 7 days.

Maybe it would make sense to configure the draytek in order to use, instead of an aggregation of both internet connections, the fail over. This way I would have more control on how the Draytek is behaving as it uses one connection at a time. For sure I will loose some speed but it will not make such a big difference. Once set in fail over mode, I will be able to specifiy in the Draytek configuration which WAN connection to use as primary connection and which one as secondary. Therefore, with some testing and patience I believe it shoud emerge which one of the two connections is the one failing more often. Once this is clear I would evaluate to change the router with the Fritzbox 7583: do you confirm that the phone would still work even with a Fritzbox as long as the firmware is greater than 7.x? I am leaning towards that specific model of the Fritzbox because I know that I could use it somewhere else in case it would not work, but in order to use it in that other place I need G.FAST and that is the only router from AVM which supports it (AVM told me).

Does the above plan make any sense at all?

Thanks.

[K1m0n]

every now and then the VPN stops working and I can not connect anymore even though the internet connection is up. I can say that the connection is up because I am able to connect to the synology NAS via Synology QuickConnect.

In case of no-vpn in (or otherwise no incomming connections),
I would check if the isp has put the connection behind cg-nat
(case becomes more common every passing day).

The connection to the nas via quickconnect would work even behind a cg-nat-ed wan
(synology uses a broker service on its cloud to workaround the nat issues).
The vpn-in to draytek would *not* work behind a cg-nated wan.
That being said, I think that draytek has also come up with a similar broker service to workaround nat issues,
do your research.

We use a dyndns service as the IP address is dynamic

That should work as long as you are not behind cg-nat.

We have two internet lines: is one of the two offline? If yes which one and why?

I don't know, you neither, do check:
You will have to somehow connect lan-side and check the cpes.

Does it depends on the Draytek router itself which may partially stop working?

It does depend (I asume the draytek is the vpn server), but the drayteks are generally stable enough.
On the other hand, you do load balancing and I don't really know your config.
For one, I would make sure that dyndns is bind to the vdsl wan
(speed booster to my knowledge is always cg-nated) and that the draytek uses only the vdsl connection for vpn-in.

For anything more to say, one would have to be onsite.
Your setup is not that simple to troubleshoot.

Maybe it would make sense to configure the draytek in order to use, instead of an aggregation of both internet connections, the fail over.

It does.

For sure I will loose some speed

I wouldn't be so sure about that...
Draytek doesn't do aggregation (bonding), it does load balance (and not a stellar job at that...).
Load balancing with wans with different capacity/latency is not the best idea,
and can possibly lead to worst performance than simple failover plus other difficult to diagnose issues.

do you confirm that the phone would still work even with a Fritzbox as long as the firmware is greater than 7.x?

To my knowledge, every(all?) fritzboxes with fritzos >7.something
come with the cosmote profile included, and typicaly they will pull isp settings (xdsl/sip) via tr-069.
If not (happens) usually a phone call to cosmote and they will adjust it remotely.

That being said, I have 0 experience with the specific cpe, so I can't advise further.

[Chris2756]

dear matih
No need to be sorry, cos you dont know any Greek. Any way it is not so big sin. We welcome you into one of the European cantries.
Just let us to know, for what you are going to vote, at our next ellections, syriza, nd, pasok, kkl etc. This is WHAT (and only) we care about, in this country
very friendly yours
A Greek citizen

[geoavlonitis]

Γιατι να παει στο πολιτικο η συζητηση;

[Chris2756]

Πολιτικο σε σχεση πολιτειας-πολιτη, οχι σχεσης πολιτη-κοματων. Τα ανεφερα ειρωνικα. Την σχεση μεταξυ πολιτειας (ακριβοπληρωμενης) δεν μπορουμε να την αγνοησουμε, ειναι η ζωη μας, η καθημερινοτητα μας και διστοιχως μπαχαλο. Ακατανοητο, σημερα να αντιμετωπιζουμε αλητα προβληματα σε μια τηλεφωνικη συνδεση. Και ειμαι 100% σηγουρος οτι δεν φταινε οι πολιτες. Ελπιζω να σε καλυψα