I received the email below on the 20th of this montha and all was fine till midnight yesterday and by this morning my Internet speed has been reduced to 2mb, normally I have a constant 15mb speed.
"We're contacting you to let you know about some improvements we're making to your Orange broadband service. We expect that these improvements will mean a better quality connection, faster speeds and a better all-round internet experience for you.
During the next week, we'll be working away to move your service onto a new, improved network.
While we're working on your line, your service will be unavailable for approximately ten minutes. During this short period you won't be able to use your broadband or make calls. However, we will be doing the work in off-peak hours (typically between midnight and 6am), so you'll barely notice any disruption. "
It looks like you might be suffering a downgrade to an IP Stream maximum 8 Meg service. It could be worth rebooting (disconnect the router from the mains leave for perhaps 10 minutes then reconnect) first to see if reported speeds improve.
To check what's going on I'd suggest:
1. check your broadband at the BT checker http://speedtester.BT.com/ (though it can be a bit unreliable sometimes). You only need the phone no. and don't need to specify a service ID. Look for and tell us the the line profile = max speed as well the sync (both of which which can increase so worth checking over time), the speed range and the ADSL service - we're looking for ADSL2+ or ADSL.gmt. (You can cut and paste from the speedtester to a post).
2. Also try to obtain the attenuation and download noise margin and sync speed from your router (access is via http://192.168.1.1 for Livebox and unless you've changed it login/password is admin/admin required to access the details pages but NOT the internet login - don't alter that!!), you can check what speeds you should be able to achieve on http://www.farina1.com/adsl/ .
3. Sam Knows (do a google serch) will allow you to check what services are available on your exchange and whether it is upgraded to WBC for 20Meg speeds on BT-based services or not, or when it is expected (and what other services are available if you decide to ue a MAC to transfer service).
4. Orange are subsrcibed to the OFCOM Code of Practice v2 on speeds which means that if they cannot provide an up to 20 Meg service which you are contracted for, because of the limitations of IPStream (if that is what you have been transferred to) they they should allow you to move your service to another Provider with a MAC without any financial penalty even if you are within contract BUT YOU MUST CONFIRM THIS WITH Orange CUSTOMER SERVICE FIRST.
Finally BT's line management systems will adjust your line over ten days, and speeds should increase but this is a dramatic fall: I'd log a fault with Orange CS immediately.
Thanks merv for your useful post I have done all the listed Steps... Disconnected the Router at least 10 minutes then fired it up and below are the Result for each Steps:
1.
Test1 comprises of two tests
1. Best Effort Test: -provides background information.
Download Speed
1492 Kbps
0 Kbps 2000 Kbps
Max Achievable Speed
Download speedachieved during the test was - 1492 Kbps
For your connection, the acceptable range of speedsis 800-2000 Kbps.
Additional Information:
Your DSL Connection Rate :1876 Kbps(DOWN-STREAM), 664 Kbps(UP-STREAM)
IP Profile for your line is - 1654 Kbps
The throughput of Best Efforts (BE) classes achieved during the test is - 11.83:21.44:66.73 (SBE:NBE:PBE)
These figures represent the ratio while sententiously passing Sub BE, Normal BE and Priority BE marked traffic.
The results of this test will vary depending on the way your ISP has decided to use these traffic classes.
Whilst I'm sure other specialists will know more than me, I think you have a real issue. Unless there is a major fault on your line which it's unbelievable would occur simultaneously. and should show up on a quiet line test (dial 17070 then option 2) by some noise, and which needs reporting as a phone fault, then the fact you can do the BT test shows you've been transferred from Orange LLU. It appears that your exchange has ADSL, but apparently not ADSL2+ from BT which means that the maximum speed you can now achieve will be about 7.5Mbps as a result of the withdrawal of Orange LLU. (SamKnows has not been updated, why? Orange didn't tell them - after all they didn't tell their customers either!)
There's still a major problem, your maximum speed is 2 Mbps, and after my transfer I went straight to a higher speed, on an attenuation which is nearly double yours. The noise margin is OK as a start and should reduce to BT's usual 6, but I doubt it'll make much difference.
To be blunt I think you've been shafted by Orange, you must complain and your speeds should significantly improve, but I can't see how Orange can get you above 8 in any way. In my view they are therefore both in breach of their own contractual terms and conditions on the assumption you signed to an up to 20Meg service, and you might wish to check but I believe that you have the right to leave by a MAC without penalty as a change to your detriment (though there might be a 30 day period from your "notification" so watch that), as well as under the OFCOM Code (available on their website). TalkTalk have just been hammered by OFCOM for breaching an OFCOM Code (which do do allow penalties of up to 10% of turnover so have some teeth), so if Orange play silly bees I'd complain to OFCOM; and also use the deadlock/disputes procedure if Orange try to charge you for leaving. If Orange agree anything get it in writing, and that you have the right to leave without penalty - so that if they try anything it doesn't prejudice your rights.
In my area and lots of others o2 (now Sky)/Be usually do the best speeds, and although Farina is optimistic, you should have a fantastic service on ADSL2+/LLU. Orange LLU though: gone and forgotten, I'm afraid.
All the best. I'm sorry for the delay in replying as I was out yesterday evening.
Thanks once again merv for your time and wonderful Post... I called up Orange today since I ve had no response back from my 2 previous Emails and I spoke to a rather helpful guy cant remember his name... Long story short , while he was on the Phone, I reset the livebox back to factory setting and immediately my Speed went up to 9mb as show Below from my livebox:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ADSL firmware version : A2pBT009c1.d17d
Connection mode : ADSL2
Type : Fast
Noise margin (dB) : 11.4
Attenuation (dB) : 24.5
Attainable download rate (kbps) : 9774
ADSL status : Connected [0]
Downstream Upstream
Rate (kbps) 9120 888
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
He said the line takes about 10 days to stabilize after which I should see an increase in speed and if not to use Samknows /BT to test for the maximum speed optainable on my line and give them a call back to see what can be done.
But the part that worries me which is what you said about LLU no longer being in use in my exchange and now maybe just speed of 8MB is my Connection mode as shown in bold above is now showing as ADSL2 while before the Upgrade I was on ADSL2+.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Test1 comprises of Best Effort Test: -provides background information.
Download Speed
7947 Kbps
0 Kbps 7150 Kbps
Max Achievable Speed
Download speedachieved during the test was - 7947 Kbps
For your connection, the acceptable range of speedsis 2000-7150 Kbps.
IP Profile for your line is - 8046 Kbps
The throughput of Best Efforts (BE) classes achieved during the test is - 13.02:20.78:66.21 (SBE:NBE:PBE)
These figures represent the ratio while sententiously passing Sub BE, Normal BE and Priority BE marked traffic.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is not looking Good for now..... let see what happens after 10 Days then I ll see the next step forward, truth is I ll like to go back to my 15MB speed as before.
What I dont understand is why did Orange move away from LLU?
I am not sure it is to provide a better service but rather to cut corners and reduce their overhead and costs before eventually droping their broadband service altogether by most likely selling off to Talktalk or someone else..
From the new stats, it looks like your exchange could have BT's 21CN, on SamKnows look for the following:
BT Wholesale information
. . .
21CN WBC status: Enabled.
In that case you should still be able to obtain up to 20Meg speeds and your line should recover eventually to at least near your old speed. The line is recovering as I thought it should. But I've not heard of anyone suffering such a dramatic fall as your speeds did initially, which shouldn't happen as the line management should give you its best speed, and then adjust to avoid unnecessary resyncs; although may be the router was misrecording which was why a factory reset helped where a reboot did not. (As you can see from the BT test, they use a line profile to limit speeds, which is normally less than LLU can manage - to minimise resyncs). However, I said the BT test can be unreliable: and it shows a line profile which is greater than the quoted maximum speed! Perhaps check your actual throughput speed, I normally use www.speed.io or www.thinkbroadband.com which are usually consistent. EDIT: otherwise you might have had a stuck profile, which should now recover following Orange's intervention: see the comment on stuck profiles on good lines on the Kitz page quoted by Borednow in his post below.
(If your exchange isn't WBC enabled, then your progress may be very interesting not least to tinytim on this forum!).
No one knows why Orange abandoned LLU, though as they don't employ their own broadband engineers and contracted out maintenance to BT about a year ago, I'd think it's easier and cheaper for BT to maintain their own systems, which they upgrade over time. And on my poor line, Orange LLU was spectacularly unsuccessful giving less than half the throughtput speed that I manage with Orange WBC. (It looks like those with better lines are getting the opposite experience though!). Orange have always been committed to a triple play idea (mobile, landline and broadband integration) which is a commitment, at least in public, they still maintain so I don't see them abandoning broadband yet: but it must depend on whether they can arrest their continual decline in customer numbers (still nearly 3/4 million though) and whether they can keep abreast of the game (which hopefully is why they entered into the deal with BT), but as others have pointed out there's no word on their attitude to new fibre services. However, if you can get near to 20Meg speeds with existing tech, I'm not convinced for most people that fibre is an essential yet. So I expect Orange to plod on whilst they think it's worth the cost, but if they suddenly change direction we'll be the last to know!
Last edited by merv on Thu May 26, 2011 1:37 pm; edited 1 time in total
Joined: 13 Nov 2009Posts: 408Location: South East Essex
Hi saayinla
If you log into your 0range account what speed do they estimate for you? I've just checked mine & it's now reflecting the change that happened last night.
tinytim: I'll be interested to hear what story, if any, you get from Orange to justify why they think transferring customers from an up to 20Meg service to a 8Meg restriction is acceptable. By the way, my Orange profile still shows the old 2Mbps max it showed on LLU!
What confuses me with Saaylina is the BT wholesale gives a max line speed of 7150 (which is ADSL/non-WBC on a line we know is capable of higher speeds) which is then inconsistent with the BT reported line speed and ADSL2 on the line? That's why I originally thought there was a max xpeed of up to 8 Mbps from the exchange. (The other possibility is that the line was capped for some reason, perhaps because BT did not understand it was an up to 20Meg service, and hopefully this has now been corrected so the BT speedtester will catch up).
But are BT able to attain individual line speeds in excess of 8Mbps on non-WBC exchanges for transferred Orange LLU customers? We'd like to know.
There doesn't seem to be any consistency in what customers can expect.
_________________ Orange: more tricks, less treats?
Joined: 13 Nov 2009Posts: 408Location: South East Essex
I think it solely depends on what equipment is in the exchange. For me it's only ADSL but for others with 21CN WBC the options are far better.
In saayinla's case it looks like the DLM is progressively improving his profile so there's a good chance that he'll achieve a 6dB profile & something approaching his old speeds.
As you say the BT speedtester looks like it needs updating to reflect the latest profiles available.
saayinla's doesn't match because the router is connected on ADSL2 and not ADSL2+ due to either the training period or a noisy line, you can see the SNRM is 11.4dB. When the connection quietens down to the Target 6dB then the sync and IP Profile should agree with the above chart.
I think that BT have recently changed this. It was true for the first few days after my change from LLU, but for the last Three weeks the synch rate (also reported by router as well as BT speedtester) has been 5259 and profile 4629 (not the 4500 on the table), which corresponds with the experience of others reported on TBB forums. (NM consistently within a couple of percentage points of 6).
What I don't understand is why when s. has enjoyed a consistent 15Mbps speed on LLU (and I was disappointed with a consistent 2Mpbs on LLU) the change to WBC will have coincided with a noise issue on that line, and eliminated the noise issue on mine, if that is the explanation. I can understand that different software might interpret line conditions slighly differently, but so as to half or double sync speeds? Is that credible? Even if you allow for the reduction in NM in my case from 11 on Orange LLU to 6 on WBC, and attribute the whole impact on speed to that, the effect on my sync speed is 2Mbps. (In fact my synch speed rose to 5Mbps immediately after the transfer on an 11db NM, and settled back to just over 5 after a brief flirt up to 6, whilst NM reduced steadily from 10 down to 6 and connection remained on ADSL2+). Just for info: I know the limitations on my line are the Attn. of 48, and it's an up to 8Meg service.
EDIT: This is pure speculation, but if the Orange decommissioning has led to a mass influx of customers to WBC, then I wonder if the BT line management software is unable to cope and is causing customers to be on a minimum or "stuck" profile, which then has to be reset on the individual line by BT engineers, which is why things might improve after contacting Orange.
Last edited by merv on Thu May 26, 2011 1:19 pm; edited 2 times in total
What B.T. are changing is how quickly their DLM responds to changes in the line condition. The recovery time for the IP Profile is being speeded up.
This may be the reason for the disparities between syncs and IP Profiles being highlighted.
To my knowledge those charts are still current and valid.
As regards SNR, 0range LLU used 10dB Target and B.T. use 6dB so it is probable (and I have expressed this many times before on here) that 0range were in effect capping all ADLS2+ LLU connections by using a 10dB Target.
B.T. use the same method on the upstream connection of their IPStream product. By using a high Target SNR on upstream they are able to limit it to a maximum 448kbps.
I checked my profile in my Orange Account and according to Orange I should only be abole to receive 2MB. So all is still not well for now.
The speed as not Increased so far beyond the 8MB so will wait it out. if I do not get up to my initial 15MB or at least close enough, then I ll either ask for a discount or my MAC code.
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