Dishonest ISP
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Dishonest ISP
Are they all like this?
Periodically, what is usually a reasonable dialup anytime service becomes very poor - you can often hear that there's going to be a problem by the unusual modem handshaking tones. Then, either their computer does not respond to the verification, or takes a long time and/or the quoted connection speed is half or less than normal.
OK, so stuff fails occasionally but what really gets up my nose is when you report the problem they always claim there is no fault at their end and send you a list of things you should check on your computer!
I never follow this 'advice' and it appears that someone actually gets off their backside for a few minutes because the service is restored to normal.
What really annoys though, is the attitude, and the certain knowledge that some users will create all manner of problems for themselves by following this 'advice'.
Periodically, what is usually a reasonable dialup anytime service becomes very poor - you can often hear that there's going to be a problem by the unusual modem handshaking tones. Then, either their computer does not respond to the verification, or takes a long time and/or the quoted connection speed is half or less than normal.
OK, so stuff fails occasionally but what really gets up my nose is when you report the problem they always claim there is no fault at their end and send you a list of things you should check on your computer!
I never follow this 'advice' and it appears that someone actually gets off their backside for a few minutes because the service is restored to normal.
What really annoys though, is the attitude, and the certain knowledge that some users will create all manner of problems for themselves by following this 'advice'.
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If you wish to make a complaint about your ISP (assuming you're in UK) then contact their trade body, the Internet Service Providers Association. By what I've heard they usually get a result 
BD
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My theory on this one is as follows.
(1) In any bank of dozens or thousands of modems you'll get one that fails from time to time.
(2) Sometimes instead of going from fully working to fully dead they go through a period of sort-of not-really-working.
(3) If the modem rack is pretty busy then naturally it'll be the neary-dead ones that are available to answer calls ... for the simple reason that they aren't working properly so nobody is using them.
(4) So if you keep re-dialling you'll keep getting the same nearly-dead modem.
Solution: try again an hour or two later, when the traffic pattern will have changed, or the nearly-dead modem will have died completely and won't be attempting to answer the phone any more, or someone will have spotted it and taken it out of service.
Be interesting to hear from any ISP techies as to whether this theory does actually make any sense or not (I've only worked on dial-in systems for a handful of modems at a time).
(1) In any bank of dozens or thousands of modems you'll get one that fails from time to time.
(2) Sometimes instead of going from fully working to fully dead they go through a period of sort-of not-really-working.
(3) If the modem rack is pretty busy then naturally it'll be the neary-dead ones that are available to answer calls ... for the simple reason that they aren't working properly so nobody is using them.
(4) So if you keep re-dialling you'll keep getting the same nearly-dead modem.
Solution: try again an hour or two later, when the traffic pattern will have changed, or the nearly-dead modem will have died completely and won't be attempting to answer the phone any more, or someone will have spotted it and taken it out of service.
Be interesting to hear from any ISP techies as to whether this theory does actually make any sense or not (I've only worked on dial-in systems for a handful of modems at a time).
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That theory makes good sense, dont know if its true or not...
I have the same problems with my Dial-Up ISP from time to time. I either cant connect at all for ages, or it keeps cutting out, or i get a stupidly slow connection, i mean way less than 52k.
I was thinking of scrapping it and useing the 3G internet for when im away from My ADSL...
Oh, my ISP seems to have issues with Vista... They provide the update, but to get the update you have to be able to get online as it saves the update in temps and installs them, so no way to save the files and move them to Vista, or not that i have found.
I have the same problems with my Dial-Up ISP from time to time. I either cant connect at all for ages, or it keeps cutting out, or i get a stupidly slow connection, i mean way less than 52k.
I was thinking of scrapping it and useing the 3G internet for when im away from My ADSL...
Oh, my ISP seems to have issues with Vista... They provide the update, but to get the update you have to be able to get online as it saves the update in temps and installs them, so no way to save the files and move them to Vista, or not that i have found.
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"What's dial-up?"
It's what poor people use.
Seriously, my main gripe is not the occasional problem, it's that they always lie about it and always send a patronising email telling me what adjustments I should make to MY equipment.
This, despite the fact that I never do, and tell them so, and also point out that it always works perfectly both before and after the problem.
It's what poor people use.
Seriously, my main gripe is not the occasional problem, it's that they always lie about it and always send a patronising email telling me what adjustments I should make to MY equipment.
This, despite the fact that I never do, and tell them so, and also point out that it always works perfectly both before and after the problem.
Spoon PPRuNerist & Mad Inistrator
Frostie,
I forgot the smiley!
I had similar problems to you a few years ago - it was always worse in wet weather. After many months I eventually got BT to accept the fact that the line was crap, so they came and replaced the cable from the pole to our house. End of problem.
Also I swore I would not have BT involved when I chose my broadband provider - just as well we have Telewest / NTL / Virgin cable in the area!
SD
I forgot the smiley!
I had similar problems to you a few years ago - it was always worse in wet weather. After many months I eventually got BT to accept the fact that the line was crap, so they came and replaced the cable from the pole to our house. End of problem.
Also I swore I would not have BT involved when I chose my broadband provider - just as well we have Telewest / NTL / Virgin cable in the area!
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Frostbite
First post so be nice to me.
One thing you could try is the BT line test facility. Dial 17070, wait for the initial confirmation of the number you're dialing from and then select 'quiet line test' (press 2). If your line is noisy you will get very reduced data rates. Make sure it's nice and silent. Best of luck.
Forgot to mention - make sure you're not on-line when you do the test or you'll get an earful of modem!!
First post so be nice to me.
One thing you could try is the BT line test facility. Dial 17070, wait for the initial confirmation of the number you're dialing from and then select 'quiet line test' (press 2). If your line is noisy you will get very reduced data rates. Make sure it's nice and silent. Best of luck.
Forgot to mention - make sure you're not on-line when you do the test or you'll get an earful of modem!!
Last edited by 302B31; 16th Mar 2007 at 21:09. Reason: Senior moment
Tabs please !
I'll dust off my memories of dial-up....ahem.
BT will connect to your ISP at 64kb at the local exchange or some other point back in their network. The data rate from the serving exchange will then suffer due to the line characteristics of the copper (or aluminium wire) between the exchange and your location. The internal phone wiring in your house will degrade the signal further (48k in my office, 34k in the dining room and even worse if it was raining).
The bottom line is that no ISP in their right mind has invested in dial-up since 2000 so the kit is getting a little tired plus contention ratios (available capacity to customer ratio) are probably 12:1 or worse as maintaining a network for cheap and cheerful services has no margin and the gold customers have since trotted off to limitless ADSL so in short, you are a Betamax customer in a HDVD world, expect crap.
I have experience of a few ISP's and can advise that most of the non-network providers such as Tesco, Wanadoo etc. use established carriers such as CWC, NTL/Telewest (aka virgin media smiling beardy git). They in turn are buying bandwidth off BT for some products so you pay your money, you get BT regardless ....unless you are on cable the god help you.
Change to ADSL while your dialup connection still allows you to order it online but when making a choice, ensure your tech support is free and if you ever need them, they have a brain and English as a first language.
BT will connect to your ISP at 64kb at the local exchange or some other point back in their network. The data rate from the serving exchange will then suffer due to the line characteristics of the copper (or aluminium wire) between the exchange and your location. The internal phone wiring in your house will degrade the signal further (48k in my office, 34k in the dining room and even worse if it was raining).
The bottom line is that no ISP in their right mind has invested in dial-up since 2000 so the kit is getting a little tired plus contention ratios (available capacity to customer ratio) are probably 12:1 or worse as maintaining a network for cheap and cheerful services has no margin and the gold customers have since trotted off to limitless ADSL so in short, you are a Betamax customer in a HDVD world, expect crap.
I have experience of a few ISP's and can advise that most of the non-network providers such as Tesco, Wanadoo etc. use established carriers such as CWC, NTL/Telewest (aka virgin media smiling beardy git). They in turn are buying bandwidth off BT for some products so you pay your money, you get BT regardless ....unless you are on cable the god help you.
Change to ADSL while your dialup connection still allows you to order it online but when making a choice, ensure your tech support is free and if you ever need them, they have a brain and English as a first language.
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Once got a very nice letter from AOL technical department explaining the working of a multifaceted calculation required to calculate an areas 'Optimal' line speed after I complanied that there much vaunted 2mb package was not in anyway living upto there hype, after many weeks of investigation we in this area were told by BT the truth about the low weekday line speeds, it's your local school, soaking up the bandwidth with there IT department, something we had noticed weeks before, there offering to upgrade the areas lines to fibre during the financial year of 2011 left us rather cold on the idea when we also noticed that BT package owners were not being similarlay affected by this problem, so it's not only ISP's vendors that are capable of not only misleading the public on the expected speeds of there connections, BT has been at it from the start and untill the network provisioning is wrested from the control of the Crabs in the BT boardroom little will change here in the UK as you cannot run a competetive service with a monopoly supplier controling the network.
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Thanks for all the replies and info. I was going to let sleeping dogs lie, as the connection went back to normal over the weekend, but today my Freenetname/Madasafish dialup is back to garbage already!
I'm currently wasting £12.50/month for my anytime dialup with these plonkers, any suggestions for a replacement?
One thing that concerns me - I have a .co.uk which I don't want to lose, especially the mail address that goes with it. Would that be a problem to move to a new ISP?
I'm currently wasting £12.50/month for my anytime dialup with these plonkers, any suggestions for a replacement?
One thing that concerns me - I have a .co.uk which I don't want to lose, especially the mail address that goes with it. Would that be a problem to move to a new ISP?
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frostbite:
When God was a boy, I had Virgin dial up ISP and then went over to broadband around 5 years ago. Still using my ******@virgin.net e-mail address. I don't know if the ISP's do cease the address eventually or not but 5 years is a long time to overlook a departed customer.
When God was a boy, I had Virgin dial up ISP and then went over to broadband around 5 years ago. Still using my ******@virgin.net e-mail address. I don't know if the ISP's do cease the address eventually or not but 5 years is a long time to overlook a departed customer.
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I'm currently wasting £12.50/month for my anytime dialup with these plonkers, any suggestions for a replacement?
Have a look at http://www.adslguide.org.uk for ISP comparisons. BT are offering £14.99/month for the first 6 months, free wireless router included. Most decent ISPs (I don't include Tiscali) charge around the £18-£20/month for a realistic package. Check Nildram, Eclipse for starters.
One thing that concerns me - I have a .co.uk which I don't want to lose, especially the mail address that goes with it. Would that be a problem to move to a new ISP?
No.
Have a look at http://www.adslguide.org.uk for ISP comparisons. BT are offering £14.99/month for the first 6 months, free wireless router included. Most decent ISPs (I don't include Tiscali) charge around the £18-£20/month for a realistic package. Check Nildram, Eclipse for starters.
One thing that concerns me - I have a .co.uk which I don't want to lose, especially the mail address that goes with it. Would that be a problem to move to a new ISP?
No.
