Truitt
@softcom.net
| [Fixed] Help with my new WISP
I need some help in making my new WISP connection as best as it can be. Ive had cable for years and we just moved to a new house but its not able to get DSL/CABLE  . I tried IDSL from covad and it was terrible not to mention I had to wait a month and a ½ for the install.
Well I have never been a fan of wireless but I saw that a local ISP that's been in town for years offers wireless broadband. I said #uck it and signed up, there isn't anything else I can get. 49.95 per month for 3/2 Mb speeds and no contract, I looked on their site and it looks like the tower is about 2 miles from where I live. I came on here and read some other wireless users stats and it looked promising.
I just got hooked up Friday and when I got home I hopped on and it wasn't bad, I was really happy. In WoW I was pinging solid under 200 which is playable by me. Speed test was about 1400 down and 500k up which was ok with me. Around 6pm it got absolutely terrible 500+ pings everywhere, huge spikes and speed tests resulted in 200 down and 150ish up.
I don't know what to troubleshoot on this since I've never had wireless internet before. I ran Ping Plotter for over a day and the results weren't that good when it showed how much packetloss I got and you can see the increased latency during prime times.
Here is the ping plot
»img244.imageshack.us/img244/3269···1an8.jpg
I know nothing about the equipment either, I signed up for 2 different accounts cause my dad is a huge bandwidth hog and did not want to share a connection with him. Here is a pic of the 2 antennas they installed for 2 diff accounts mine is the bottom one. I believe the equipment the ISP uses is Bel Air networks.
»img257.imageshack.us/img257/9129···0of6.jpg
»img100.imageshack.us/img100/6061···2ff9.jpg
They run a cord to each PC through the wall from the antenna. What I want to know is what is the device on the end of this that plug in to the pc/router?
»img171.imageshack.us/img171/4431···5da8.jpg
Is there anything I can change on my end to improve performance for this? Like buying a better antenna running shorter cable etc..?? Could it just be over subscription on the ISP's end causing the reason for the slowdown. Any help would be appreciated. |
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AMD Phreak
Premium
join:2003-12-14
3 edits | Your equipment is Motorola canopy operating in the 900MHz band. It looks like they are maybe using M2 yagi antennas. I'd guess the antennas are 5 feet in length, maybe 13dBi of gain although its hard to tell. I do see that the connector where the radio is connected to the antenna itself is not sealed up which will possibly allow water to enter the connection, shorting the connection out and interrupting service until the connector dries out. Even if the connector dries out after being wet the coax is usually filled up with water thus destroying it anyway. I'm not one to judge but thats shotty workmanship, not sealing the cable up.
The device on the end of the cable that jumps the cable into the router is the power injector for the outdoor radio. The canopy system is powered from 24VDC supplies (the black box with the green light that is labeled "Motorola" that plugs into the wall outlet). The side that has the open RJ45 jack is for the connection to the outside. If you have to move things around be sure you arent plugging PC's or routers into the jack (if it becomes unplugged) as it will send 24VDC into your NIC. Only plug the flat black cord into devices.
The canopy system is best troubleshot by your WISP. There are so many variables that the subscribers (customers) that have no experience with the system cannot possibly repair it.
In looking at your ping plots (which is very hard to really look at in detail) I see high times far off of your ISP's network and on their carriers network (Sprint). This may be due to a router on the Sprint network putting ICMP traffic through the router on a lower priority, or a busy router.
If you are seeing poor throughputs it can be one of the following:
AP is overloaded (too many customers on the AP)
The point-to-point link that feeds the site where the AP is, is overloaded (too much traffic coming to/leaving the site).
The core of the network is overloaded
Their connection to the internet is saturated and far oversubscribed beyond what it should be.
--
"No job is so important, and no service is so urgent that we cannot take the time to do it safely."
-- AT&T
--Safety One Tower Rescue Certified
--LLigetfa:"Wimax is like teenage sex. Everyone talks about doing it." |
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LLigetfa
join:2006-05-15
Fort Frances, ON
1 edit | reply to Truitt
From what I can see both antennas point to the same tower. Unless there are multiple APs on that tower, they would both be fighting for the same bandwidth so the second SM won't give you any much more. If you dad is a bandwidth hog, he is still stealing bandwidth from you if you are both on the same AP.
--
Strange as it seems, no amount of learning can cure stupidity, and formal education positively fortifies it. -- Stephen Vizinczey |
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milbrath
join:2006-03-27
Dresden, TN | Those are 17db M2 Yagi's. Must be a difficult shot. I'd be curious as to what your RSSI & Jitter Levels are. Ofcourse you'd have to ask your Wisp that.
BM |
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AMD Phreak
Premium
join:2003-12-14
| said by milbrath  :Those are 17db M2 Yagi's. Must be a difficult shot. I'd be curious as to what your RSSI & Jitter Levels are. Ofcourse you'd have to ask your Wisp that. BM Indeed. OP can you maybe have the WISP provide you with power level (dB) and jitter of your links? RSSI on the Canopy system is nice, but I have found that it is a value that is less important compared to the dB levels.
--
"No job is so important, and no service is so urgent that we cannot take the time to do it safely."
-- AT&T
--Safety One Tower Rescue Certified
--LLigetfa:"Wimax is like teenage sex. Everyone talks about doing it." |
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LLigetfa
join:2006-05-15
Fort Frances, ON
| reply to milbrath
said by milbrath :Ofcourse you'd have to ask your Wisp that. If they didn't lock the R/O access to the SM, it may be available via IP 169.254.1.1.
--
Strange as it seems, no amount of learning can cure stupidity, and formal education positively fortifies it. -- Stephen Vizinczey |
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milbrath
join:2006-03-27
Dresden, TN
| reply to AMD Phreak
Well I posted that bit of info before I looked at his ping plotter results, looks like it's 900 Canopy Software Scheduling(30ms to first hop? hardware would be ~14ms or so). As was stated it appears they use sprint for their backbone and looks like the problem is on sprints side as ping plotter looks pretty good until a few hops within the sprint network.
And yes I said RSSI, but I meant DB. RSSI levels on canopy are completely WORTHLESS. No consistency whatsoever in relation to raw signal strength.
BM |
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AMD Phreak
Premium
join:2003-12-14 | Depends on where the first hop is.
True there is lower latency with HW scheduling vs SW, the 30ms could still be HW scheduling with the added latency of a BHM-BHS setup. |
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seagreen
Premium,Mod
join:2001-05-14
Salish Sea
Host:
CenturyTel
Wireless Service P..
Southern California
HughesNet Satellite
WildBlue Satellite
| reply to Truitt
Take your .pp2 file from ping plotter and show the graphs from the first few hops. When looking at issues with your ISP the last hop is actually the least important one to graph.
For ease of reading, change your graph display settings so that the warning color is 100 ms and the warning color is 250 ms.
Upload the screenshots in your post - the one on image shack is very difficult to read.
I really don't see "prime time" issues with your trace. Your highest ping times were ~10 PM to midnight, early AM and late morning - none of which are really "prime time". Your only prime time is a small bump in ping time at around 7 pm. I also don't see "terrible 500+ pings everywhere" which is not to say it wasn't happening - only that ping plotter did document it during this tracing period. |
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Truitt
@softcom.net
| Like this? |
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Truitt
@softcom.net
| reply to Truitt
Thanks for the info so far everyone. I don't know much about wireless hence my questions.
Does anyone here on a WISP actually game and get decent pings? Right now I went on and loaded up some local CS servers and they're all 600+. If I ping or tracert anything the results are so unstable and different every single time. Is this just a mediocre technology and I am asking to much? |
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MatthewAlan
join:2007-09-01
united state | Im currently having trouble with my WISP, but when its working correctly(the prob just started Thurs.), I get real good game pings. Usally never higher then 90ms... |
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LLigetfa
join:2006-05-15
Fort Frances, ON
| reply to Truitt
The ping times to your first hop is often the entire wireless portion of the entire trip. Some WISPs will route between towers but even so, if you do PPPoE you are tunneling through most of it. If your first hop ping times are good, then don't blame wireless technology.
At my home in the country, the internet comes to me wirelessly and my ping times are better than my dedicated business DSL that I have in town. You cannot make a blanket statement that wireless is worse.
You have to realize though that you share bandwidth with your neighbors so choose your neighbors carefully.
--
Strange as it seems, no amount of learning can cure stupidity, and formal education positively fortifies it. -- Stephen Vizinczey |
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AMD Phreak
Premium
join:2003-12-14
| reply to Truitt
Can you pick some speed tests from speedtest.net that are close to you and see what they return?
I'd suggest asking your wisp to look at it. I know when my customers that are games ask for help I try and do my best to help them as I am a gamer myself. |
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overworked00
join:2005-03-24
Ripley, OH | reply to Truitt
we have a 512x512 package from »www.scswireless.com/index.htm and we play cod4 on it and ping from 50 to 60 at any given time during the day |
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seagreen
Premium,Mod
join:2001-05-14
Salish Sea
Host:
CenturyTel
Wireless Service P..
Southern California
HughesNet Satellite
WildBlue Satellite
| reply to Truitt
said by Truitt :
Like this?
Perfect!
Your ISP is responsible for two (maybe three) of those hops (assuming that the first hop is either your router or your radio) and, yes, the higher ping episodes and some of the packet losses do appear to be coming from within your ISP's network but they really don't appear that bad on this tracing.
Wireless is not mediocre technology but some networks could be better managed. |
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MatthewAlan
join:2007-09-01
united state
| reply to Truitt
quote:
You have to realize though that you share bandwidth with your neighbors so choose your neighbors carefully.
haha, don't worry if your neighbors are rude, just don't let bandwidth abusers move in! lmao, I found the quoted statement funny.
Sorry, for off topic post, just couldn't help it. |
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zeddlar
join:2007-04-09
Jay, OK
| reply to Truitt
This is a bit of a gray area for me but I believe the amount of people on the game servers will have an impact on your pings as well. From 6 to 10pm I get pretty high pings on EverQuest of around 1000 to 1100 usually on the game but I can ping any regular website like this one or yahoo and I am still pinging under 800 and almost always still under 750 which is what mt Satt connection always gets and is very good for Hughes.
If you notice your game pings coming down later in the evening and the game getting proggressivly less crowded at the same time I would say this is what you are experiancing but then again that would not affect your speed tests either of course.
--
HughesNet small buissness $99 package / AMC9,83west/990Mhz./.98 dish/2 watt radio/HN7000s modem/ 4 computers on a linksy's wired network |
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annimossity
join:2008-01-21
Galt, CA
 ·Comcast
 ·Softcom Wireless
1 edit | reply to AMD Phreak
Thats the closest one to me. Since its early right now ping times are usually good about right now.
BTW this is (Truitt the OP) Ive been reading this site for years I figured I might as well register.  . Thanks again for everyones help. Should I send my ping plotter to my WISP and just start blowing in their ear? Are there be any other specific hardware questions I should ask them about this?
Thanks again, |
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AMD Phreak
Premium
join:2003-12-14
| reply to Truitt
Glad to see you registered.
I'd call them and explain to them everything you have told us.
See if they will check the link, and any other points in the network between you and their edge. Please report back what they say and we can let you know if it is in line with standard diagnostics procedures.
--
"No job is so important, and no service is so urgent that we cannot take the time to do it safely."
-- AT&T
--Safety One Tower Rescue Certified
--LLigetfa:"Wimax is like teenage sex. Everyone talks about doing it." |
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