pipergeek
join:2004-03-16
Saint Louis, MO
| Recent Charter HSI issues in St. Louis
We are Charter HSI customers in the St. Louis, Missouri area. We have had this service in place for at least 4 years and probably longer.
Sometime around Christmas eve we started having problems with our 5mbit Charter HSI service. At first it was an up and down over and over again issue. I have contacted Charter numerous times and near the beginning they scheduled a tech to come out, then the service would be up for a long block of hours and I would cancel the visit before it happened. Then it would go down again. I ended up buying a new modem and having them provision it, that worked for a few hours or so then the next day it was down. I called back and they said there was an outage in our area and to call back to check on the outage, they would send a tech if the outage was over and we were still having problems. The outage lasted 2 days, tonight I called them and they said there was not an outage now, I was still not connected. I even connected the modem to the cable that comes into the house to eliminate all of the coax and the lightning arrestor in the house, still no connection. We worked through some things, and were finally able to get it on line. But I was unable to connect to the internet. I got off the phone with the charter tech because he told me that he could see my modem now and he kept telling me that I should be able to get on line now, and good luck getting on line.
I couldn't, but I ended putting a different piece of coax in place and removing the lightning arrestor from the line. I used a 4 way splitter in place of the lightning arrestor and we were then able to connect.
Now the connection seems to be pretty poor, there are a number of sites that do not want to connect and persistent pings are showing between 10 and 13 percent packet loss.
As I said, we are in St. Louis MO.
Currently the setup is a piece of coax from the modem to a 4 way splitter and then to the drop from the outside.
My biggest concern is the packet loss and the slow or non-existent connection.
My new Motorola Surfboard is showing downstream as 35.6 SNR, -7.2 dBmV and upstream as 55.0 dBmV.
We have a netgear router that is in the mix here, We have multiple computers running a variety of OS, Vista home premium. XP and Mac OS X, all with current updates and service packs.
All windows machines are running the latest AVG and Spybot S&D with the latest definitions.
This service has truly been rock-solid for many, many years, until this past week.
Should I call them back and try to get a tech out here, or is there something else I can try to do?
Any guidance would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Kevin |
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daveinpoway
Premium
join:2006-07-03
Poway, CA
| The upstream power level is too high; it should not exceed 50 dBmv.
Make sure there is no more than one splitter between where the cable enters the house and the input connector of the cable modem. Verify that all connections are tight and check for damaged cables and splitters. If the upstream power remains high, a tech visit will be needed. |
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pipergeek
join:2004-03-16
Saint Louis, MO
| What are the acceptable levels for teh downstream and upstream numbers?
Today we are connected, I have been watching the power numbers and today it has been around 35 for the upstream. A few minutes ago it crept slowly up to 49.8 and we were disconnected at that time. Now it is back down to 35.3 and now it is 38.5.
Is it normal for it to vary so widely during the course of the day?
I have put the lightning arrester back in line and I have switched out cables between it and the modem to try to get better numbers.
The variance in the numbers have all happened with the same cable and lightning arrester in place.
Is there anything I can tell the tech when I call them to convince them that I need a tech to come out to the house?
Any advice is greatly appreciated.
thanks,
Kevin |
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defiant
Garbage in, garbage out
MVM
join:2000-09-04
Monroe, MI
| »Charter Pipeline Forum FAQ »What Should my Modem Signal Levels be?
IMHO, a 3 dB swing on the upstream is too much throughout a day. One bad connector someone inline, at the tap perhaps, could cause this to occur. Since you've connected the modem to the drop directly (I'm assuming) and still could not sync, I'm willing to bet this might be the case.
I noticed you eliminated the lightning/surge arrestor in your troubleshooting, but, they can cause a number of issues with two-way cable plant (ingress, impedance problems, etc.). If your cable drop is properly grounded, there isn't too much to worry about.
Do you have cable TV service with Charter and has that been affected in any way? |
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pipergeek
join:2004-03-16
Saint Louis, MO
| We don't have TV service with Charter.
Currently, I have reconnected the surge arrestor and have a cable running about 20 feet to the place where my modem usually sits. I am connected and the current upstream is 39.8 dBmV.
We will see what happens.
Thanks for your help.
Kevin |
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defiant
Garbage in, garbage out
MVM
join:2000-09-04
Monroe, MI | If it stays within a few dB of 39.8, you should be ok. |
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megarock
join:2001-06-28
Saint Louis, MO | reply to pipergeek
I've been having a few issues of late as well. Seen this topic and checked my upstream which is sitting at 46.0. From what I read above 50 is too high so am I riding kinda too close for comfort here? |
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defiant
Garbage in, garbage out
MVM
join:2000-09-04
Monroe, MI | 46 is fine. 50 is nothing to worry about either, though it is the high-end of spec. You won't have trouble holding sync until you go above 55. |
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pipergeek
join:2004-03-16
Saint Louis, MO
| Well it is down again this morning. I am posting this from the local library. It worked until after 1 AM last night, and this morning it was down. I called Charter and they are supposed to send a tech.
I was able to log into the modem's signal page a couple of times and it reported numbers of 49.0 and 52.2 at a few different times and it won't connect.
Hopefully the tech will be able to find something this afternoon.
I plan to tell the tech about the upstream numbers but I am sure he will just think I am another idiot end-user.
Thanks for the help here! |
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Pr0
join:2004-10-25
Chesterfield, MO
| reply to pipergeek
I had similar problem when we moved into current place - upstream swings from 45 to 55+ dBmV and back, usually weather and time-of-day related (worse when wet/cold outside)
Calling Charter and talking "professionally" - as in giving them upstream power numbers and times of day etc helped a lot: after they tested indoor wiring and confirmed its ok - I had both local and line techs at my place at diff. times of a day, testing at diff outside locations. Finally they ended up replacing outside buried cable at my house and thermal compensator up the line and voila - steady 45 ever since. |
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pipergeek
join:2004-03-16
Saint Louis, MO
| The tech came out, tested the line coming into the house and said he couldn't connect with the "office" to even run a test.
He went out to the pole in the backyard and connected his tester there and then told me he was calling a system tech to deal with it because the line from the pole headed away from the house was very old and he was not getting a reliable signal. He said the system tech would come and look at it and we didn't even need to be home, so who knows if I will ever find out what the problem was.
I have spoken "professionally" every single time I have called. I work in IT and have spent my share of time in the helpdesk and desktop support roles. So when I interact with folks in those positions, I am as courteous as possible. I was on the phone with Charter folks a lot in the last week and a half, and I was met with a wide variety of attitudes during those calls.
The tech who came to the house today was very good, explained everything he was doing and updated me on things he found. |
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kruser
Premium
join:2002-06-01
Saint Louis, MO
clubs:
 ·AT&T Southwest
| said by pipergeek  :The tech came out, tested the line coming into the house and said he couldn't connect with the "office" to even run a test. He went out to the pole in the backyard and connected his tester there and then told me he was calling a system tech to deal with it because the line from the pole headed away from the house was very old and he was not getting a reliable signal. He said the system tech would come and look at it and we didn't even need to be home, so who knows if I will ever find out what the problem was. I have spoken "professionally" every single time I have called. I work in IT and have spent my share of time in the helpdesk and desktop support roles. So when I interact with folks in those positions, I am as courteous as possible. I was on the phone with Charter folks a lot in the last week and a half, and I was met with a wide variety of attitudes during those calls. The tech who came to the house today was very good, explained everything he was doing and updated me on things he found. So did the tech that came out today fix anything?
I'm an at&t dsl person with two dsl lines. I've had the Charter 16/2 plan now for about two months and zero problems so I'm wondering what is causing your problem to suddenly appear?
One of my dsl lines is a backup for my Charter line plus I pump weather station data over the dsl line. |
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pipergeek
join:2004-03-16
Saint Louis, MO
| Saint Louis, MO
Re: Recent Charter HSI issues in St. Louis
Nope, not fixed, not yet. It was down again today so I called again, got someone in Florida. He sent another tech to come take some readings. The tech showed up went through everything that the first tech went through, he thought it was my modem, then he thought it was the drop from the pole to the house, so he put a new one in. Then he came in the house to test it, the modem wouldn't connect, so he said I had a bad modem, then he put is tester on the line, said yep, must be a bad modem. then, just as this problem has been before, his readings went bad, he then went and tested it at the inside end of the new drop he just installed. It was still bad. He said he was glad it went bad while he had the tester connected. He said that the original line problem ticket had been closed already, so he opened a new one. He said someone should be looking at it tomorrow. So the saga continues, hopefully something will get resolved.
This is the second tech that has come out and determined that the issue is the line between the pole at my house and the Charter office. Hopefully someone will get it fixed. the one thing the drives me crazy about all of this is the fact that there is no number to call to check on the status, the only number to call is the 888-get-chart(er) number and then every time I have gotten on there I have to re-explain everything and very few folks know what has already happened and what has been done.
We are going on 2 weeks with this intermittent outage. It is quite frustrating.
Like I think I said earlier, we have had Charter for a long time and it has been Rock Solid until these past 2 weeks.
Thanks to everyone so far. |
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wildone
@charter.com
| reply to pipergeek
I live in texas and have been going threw a similar experience. The tech that came out the first time stayed for 3 hours replaced my modem and lots of wire. He left and said someone would be back the next day. Day 2 no one showed. I go outside to my cable box and there is a pile of old wire and wire ties on the ground. I go inside and call charter. After explaining what happened they inform me my ticket was closed because the problem was fixed. Hmm I still have no internet. So They tell me they will send a different tech guy out and a supervisor. Day 3, Same tech shows up as before. He stays 20 minutes then leaves. I call and ask charter if someone is going to come out and fix my net. They said the ticket is closed and the problem has been fixed. Hmm. well. Why dont I have internet. So I get a $20 credit on my bill and still no net and no one else coming out to look at it. I will be calling monday and will get it fixed or canceling. We have att Uverse available in our area. so No loss. I have been with charter over 10+ years and all I really get is my monthly bill raised every year. I have basic cable(no on demand) and the slowest internet and its $92 a month.
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