meehawl
join:2002-02-04
San Diego, CA
edit:
May 10th, @02:13PM
| [General] 1984/512 on Pro service with Motorola 2210-02?
Because my 10-day "tuning" is not complete (I am at day 3), I am not going to register a line speed problem. However, when I check the "technician readout" for the TA in "use public IP address" mode I see this:
140 Current Rate 1984 512
141 Previous Rate 0 0
142 DSL Max Rate - -
143 DSL Min Rate - -
144 Current ATTN DR 9632 1088
145 Current SNRM 15.0 16.0
146 Current LATN 38.0 21.0
147 Current SATN - -
148 Current TP 6.8 0.0 My "Statistics" page shows this:
To Modem To Internet
Max Allowed Speed (kbps) 1984 512
SN Margin (dB) 15.0 16.0
Line Attenuation (dB) 38.0 21.0
Loss of Signal 0 0
Loss of Frame 0 0
CRC Errors 131 3 The TA's max upload speed seems to be set at this odd 1984 Kbps speed, but I ordered the Pro tier with a nominal 3000 Kbps downstream. I'm wondering if this is normal, to have the TA set at this lower speed during the 10-day tuning period, or if there has been a mistake in provisioning and I need to call now instead of waiting 10 days.
Also, does AT&T do extreme traffic shaping for BitTorrent? I am testing this in comparison to cable broadband. So when the DSL came in I simply plugged in the TA directly to the phone jack and an existing, pre-configured dedicated downloading machine on a different subnet from the rest of the home LAN. With cable, although I usually choked the torrent download speed at 250 Kbps, this machine could get up to 900 Kbps sustained for popular torrents. Anyway, when I switched the machine over to the AT&T DSL, the aggregate torrent download speed dropped to a maximum of ~39 KB/s (with my new application-level choke set at 2000/250 Kbps), and remains flat at this rate for hours. If I jump on a new well-seeded torrent, the individual torrent download speed ramps up over ~20 seconds to ~75 KB/s, but then quickly decays down so the aggregate torrent speed remains at ~389 KB/s. All torrents are encrypted.
AT&T's speed test without any other download activity running gives me this odd result:
Download = 319.09 kbps
Upload = 433.22 kbps Anyway, long post, but I just wondered if I can expect things to improve dramatically after the 10-day period, or if these results can be taken to indicate an early problem with the service? The TA's configuration screens seem to lack any port forwarding or triggering options, or an obvious "bridge" mode. Is there a better TA I should get? Should I switch off PPPoE on the TA, put it into simple bridge mode, and use a DD-WRT/OpenWRT router behind it for advanced configuration? Thanks for any help. |
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NormanS
Premium,MVM
join:2001-02-14
San Jose, CA
 ·Pacific Bell - SBC
| They want 10 days for a reason. That 1984 rate is one of the steps on the way to 3008.
On day 11, if things aren't where they should be, a post in the AT&T Direct forum is probably in order.
--
Norman
~Oh Lord, why have you come
~To Konnyu, with the Lion and the Drum |
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meehawl
join:2002-02-04
San Diego, CA | Thanks for the response. I will practice patience. |
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meehawl
join:2002-02-04
San Diego, CA | No Change
Day 12, no change. DSL readout still shows 1984/512 on the technician page. Tried power-cycling, no luck. Speeds still very low, with download below upload(325/437 Kbps). Have posted in Direct forum. |
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d_l
Barsoom
Premium,MVM
join:2002-12-08
Reno, NV
| reply to meehawl
Re: [General] 1984/512 on Pro service with Motorola 2210-02?
These failed speed ramps still happen when the line should obviously support the faster speeds. At one time, they happened so often they were nicknamed the Orwell bug for being stuck at 1984. Then ASI pretty much fixed that problem and everything was mostly good for a while, but they seem to be failing again now for no good reason.
I wonder if it has anything to do with the ramp software's interaction with the new Motorola 2210 modems. |
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meehawl
join:2002-02-04
San Diego, CA
| My Line Was Capped Before I Ever Used It
After several days without resolution on this i called the telephone support and, after nearly an hour on hold, managed to get my line "uncapped" and it now gets 2.6 Mbps download and the modem status is no longer on the "1984" but now shows 3008/512, as expected. The 2nd-tier support person had to "call the local office" to see what was going on. When I asked her why it had been capped, she told me: "They said they cap all new lines. Go figure".
It seems counter productive to start new customers off on such a slow speed. Many without the knowledge or initiative to call AT&T will assume their DSL speeds are meant to be that slow and, when they visit a neighbor using a cable or 3G Service, will just be blown away. |
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d_l
Barsoom
Premium,MVM
join:2002-12-08
Reno, NV | reply to meehawl
Re: [General] 1984/512 on Pro service with Motorola 2210-02?
"They said they cap all new lines." - I'll bet that is some nonsense from someone out of the loop. |
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meehawl
join:2002-02-04
San Diego, CA | Nonsense?
If that's nonsense, then why was my new line initially capped? I was not aware that it was the policy of AT&T's Level 2 technical support to distribute "nonsense". But perhaps I have been misinformed? |
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tonydi
Premium,MVM
join:2001-05-11
San Jose, CA
| said by meehawl  :If that's nonsense, then why was my new line initially capped? Did you miss the part about the speed ramp and how it sometimes (too often) fails, leaving you at the 1984 speed? |
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meehawl
join:2002-02-04
San Diego, CA
| More Details
My initial speed was nowhere near 1984, if you read my post you will that it was stuck at a download of ~330 Kbps. When I called, the first thing the Level II CSR did was some "reconfiguration", and that boosted the download speed up to something like 1.6 Mbps, about what I would expect for 1984 Kbps. After she did this, another round of "reconfiguration" changed the DSL TA's setting from 1984 to 3008 Kbps.
So it seems as if there was a 2-part problem. I tested my download speed on Day 1 and, through the 10-day period, and after. It was a constant ~330 Kbps throughout. From my perspective there was no ramping to fail, and the TA's setting of 1984 was a secondary problem.
It's been 8 years since I last had DSL (and that was SDSL). It's sad to me that installing cable modems seems so effort-free (from a consumer point of view) but that installing DSL is such a chore. Not a great marketing point. |
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