So my DSL, along with the DSL of 2 nearby neighbors has gone to shit. Centurylink sells us 1.5/0.8 mbps DSL. As of the last month or so, all of us have been lucky to get 50 kbps. After running some tests, our download rate clocks in at 0.4 mbps, but with grotesque bufferbloat. According to DSLReports tests, the buffer bloat clocks in at 4000 ms up to 10000 ms. Streaming is no longer possible. After running tracert, it looks like my latency goes to shit at the first hop, after leaving my Actionteck pk5000 modem/router.

The tech that called was full of shit. Told us we were fucked pretty much, and said go to satellite. He offered no solutions, refused to talk about the bufferbloat, and said 0.5 mbps should be our minimum speed. Needless to say, I am really pissed.

Anyways, anyone have ideas?

Do you use the phone service? How is the line quality?  Since your neighbors have the same problem it could be as simple as wiring in a pedestal that needs to be repaired.

Yeah I got POTS too, quality is good as ever. I am not too familiar with how DSL works past my modem, but I know I share a line running to the ISP with those 2 neighbors.

You don't share a line unless they have the same phone number that you do. There are cable pairs inside a cable that go from your house to the DSLAM. You and your neighbors have different cable pairs that all go to this DSLAM and then the DSLAM is connected to the ISP in some way. How it's connected I don't know. There are different ways. There is a specific amount of bandwidth allotted to the DSLAM. Like 10Mbps or 100Mbps. etc. This is what you share with your neighbors. If this bandwidth is getting maxed out then you will experience slow down and latency. Ignore the buffer bloat metric. Is the internet speed the same in the early morning as it is at 8pm? If it is then there is a problem with the line or the DSLAM itself. If you get the rate you are paying for at 6am but at 8pm it goes to shit. Then more than likely they don't have enough bandwidth allotted to the DSLAM you and your neighbors work off of. Either way the only way to fix this is to keep calling your provider every day until they fix it.

Around a month ago, it went to shit. It was never good. Realistically, I got a download speed of 175-250 kbps at best, and I could stream and do most of what I wanted. But about month ago, speeds plummeted literally overnight. They tested to be about 0.4/0.8 mbps, but what I saw on things like Steam was usually 15-40 kbps, with streaming being impossible. It always seems like the online testing apps show my DL speed to be much higher than what I actually get.

I will do some testing in relation to time of day tonight.

I give no fucks about what download speeds you're getting from speed tests.  I need to see ATM statistics, what are the ES and SES, CRC counts, corrected block counts, what does the loop-qual show, has there been or not been a metallic line test, has the loop been conditioned or unconditioned, what is the attenuation, what is the SNR at, what is the target SNR.  I need all of that from the NID, and from the IW.

None of these things the customer is going to be able to give you. You are speaking gibberish. Ultimately he is going to have to go back to his provider and bitch long enough for them to do something about it.

As someone that deals with DSL and customer internet related issues daily you are asking a lot for them to do more than just power cycle their modem.

Which is exactly why it's fucking retarded to ask for DSL help here.

I agree.

Since you obviously had no intention of helping the OP, couldn't you have just said that in your first post? Nice to see that you have knowledge of the subject and your narcissim made damn sure we know it. Too bad you couldn't put it to some use. Thanks for posting though!

Damn there are some sorry ass jackasses that respond on here.  I think if we read enough of the threads we can figure out who I'm talking about.  As to your problem OP, there could be quite a few things that are causing your problem, I know an engineer at Centurylink, IM me with your details if you would like some help.


As to the above mentioned jackass, OP was asking for help, don't be such a dick.


 

Thanks for the offer. One of the senior techs I talked to at CL said he would reset the local equipment, so I am going to see if it is any more usable tonight.

As for more useful stats for Enigma, the only info I can get from my Actiontec pk5000 router/modem are:

DSL LinkStatus
DSL Mode Setting:Multimode
DSL Negotiated Mode:G.DMT
DSL Link Uptime:1 Day, 08H:30M:03S
Number of Retrains:0
Retrains in Last 24 Hours:0
Link Train Errors:1

TransportStatus
VPI:0
VCI:32
ATM QoS class:UBR
MTU Size:1492
Packets Sent:995841
Packets Received:776168
Error Packets Sent:0
Error Packets Received:0
30 Minute Discarded Packets Upstream:0
30 Minute Discarded Packets Downstream:0

ChannelStatus
Channel Type:Interleaved
Near End CRC Errors:0
Far End CRC Errors:0
30 Minute Near End CRC:0
30 Minute Far End CRC:0
Near End RS FEC:272
Far End RS FEC:0
30 Minute Near End FEC:0
30 Minute Far End FEC:0
     
LevelsDownstreamUpstream
SNR:31 dB15 dB
Attenuation:12 dB7 dB
Power:13 dBm9 dBm

Anything beyond this, I don't have at this time.

If that's on internal wiring that's about as clean as it can get, which means it's a throughput issue at the DSLAM, which basically means you're fucked.

CenturyLink <spit> is notorious for overselling DSL.

Additionally, they have been showing a strong resistance to investing much of anything into upgrades in the consumer copper broadband market. It appears that their strategy might be to invest in fiber carrier build-out while milking the consumer broadband market as it withers.

If you are stuck with CenturyLink, your only real solution is call/complain/repeat.

You should stick to what you're good at.

What's that, being a considerate person, I'll do that.  

 

He's good at calling it like it is. Such as calling you a jackass. That was hammer-meets-nail right there.

Well, my DSL is back to normal. Got a call from a tech, who essentially said "Our system cant handle so much data, go to satellite if you don't like it". But within a couple hours my speed is back and is around .5 mbps to 1.2 mbps down. I don't have any clue about the situation, but it is back to normal.

Thank you all for your input.

He's good at not even comprehending what's going on.  You should call that engineer friend of yours at CenturyLink, maybe he's willing to explain why this thread is really stupid.  Hell if he's west coast, I might know him.  There's like a 40% chance we'll have a good laugh about this.