We recently had an ADSL2+ service connected, and since it has been connected, we’ve had issues with it.
The original issue was we weren’t able to authenticate with Exetel after being cutover, so they were contacted, to contact Optus about the issue.
We were syncing at a great speed though, 10Mbit down, and 1Mbit up. Fantastic speed, we just couldn’t authenticate (get an IP).
So, after chatting with Exetel, who in turn contacted Optus, they were told the service was working correctly.
This unfortunately wasn’t the case, as there was still no authentication happening.
Later on that day, the service came up and running, but it was at seemingly ADSL1 speeds, the 10Mbit in, 1Mbit out speeds were gone, and instead, we had speeds in the 8Mbit range, and upload capped out at around 0.8Mbit.
I figure, perhaps they fixed it by placing us on an ADSL1 profile, but me knowing a fair bit about DSL and how it works, asked for ADSL2+ to be reapplied to our connection now that the authentication issue was fixed.
I’m told that it is indeed in ADSL2+ mode, but I find this hard to believe.
How on earth did we drop line sync from 10Mbit to 7.6 – 8Mbit in one day? It doesn’t seem right. No equipment changes here, it all crashed down when they fixed the PPP issue, so it’s more than likely something they’ve done to the port.
This raises a question for me though, is it that just all ISPs are somehow attracted to create problems when they deal with us?
We had iiNet, and that was a nightmare. Phone service issues from barred calling, 3 week connection timeframe for a TW DSL service and phone service, account issues, the list goes on. It was a non stop problem (I don’t exaggerate, we had issues every month with them).
Then, when we moved, we determined we would immediately drop iiNet for the crap it was, and move to Netspace.
Netspace started fantastically, but, as I have posted here before, the move we did last year with them was nothing short of a disaster and showed Netspace to be utterly incompetent, and far from worthwhile. In fact, they had unfair contract terms to top that off, if you move, you have to have another 6 month contract extension. They also had billing issues, failing to debit an account at the designated time, they fail to tell you about it, and instead just go about taking it a month later.
So, we dumped Netspace, they were a headache of their own, long wait times, they went from GREAT to POOR.
Then, late last year, we went with Exetel, one thing we realised was there was no need for support when it came to the ISP. They employ monkeys anyway, and we don’t need those to help.
Plus, Exetel were the better value 8Mbit provider, so we decided to take the speed increase as it would benefit our VoIP quality, well worth it.
Then, a few weeks back, I decided we’d get ADSL2+, and since we were cutover, it’s been a little bit problematic, nothing too drastic, though we were offline for around half the day they did cut us over due to an issue with PPP authentication, it was solved sometime later, and since then, it’s simply been trying to explain how our line sync dropped from 10Mbit to 8Mbit, when there has been no change in equipment.
It’s just a little disappointing knowing our line is capable of the faster speed, yet, it’s not being delivered. It’s not as bad as TW DSL ports, which are artificially limited to ADSL1, 8Mbit, and 0.3Mbit out, so it’s certainly a lot better than that rubbish, but, a tad disappointing that they don’t seem to recognise we have lost a large degree of sync speed with no change, which suggests perhaps Optus hardcoded the port to ADSL1 mode (they could have?).
I’ll keep at them until they get it sorted, they hopefully will. Exetel are a great mob, and aside from the poor website (I mean it looks really poor, compare it to Internode or iiNet and you’ll get what I mean), they do a great job at providing reliable IP connectivity without much fuss.
Hopefully they can live up to that title further on and fix this issue with minimum fuss.
I can’t believe our track record with ISPs and problems, we do little to initiate them, we simply get the ISP to enhance our service in someway, and watch them screw it up. We’ve had others change, such as another person we know who also recently got ADSL2+. It was a breeze for them, coming from one ISP to ADSL2+. Went over there, changed user and pass details, and viola, set.
The same didn’t happen for us, as can be seen by the problems.
I’m relieved the issue with PPP authentication was solved same day, that was good, but the other issue, I just don’t see how they can explain that adequately in the timespace. Maybe if we stick at it, they’ll get better.
Enjoy!