A New Low For AT&T DSL

[Bruce Wrenn]

On Monday morning of this week, we lost both land line and DSL. In THREE calls (from cellphone) totaling over thirty minutes, finally AT&T said they had a problem and would have it fixed by Thursday noon (four days later.) Later Monday afternoon, land line was back up and running, but DSL had dropped from 690KBS to less than 100 KBS. I waited till Friday to call back about DSL lack of speed. Spent over thirty minutes on phone with Customer NO Service rep. Tried to run speed test, and after ten minutes, it never connected to server (AT&T), so Customer No Service person scheduled a on site visit for Tuesday. Since then speed have ranged from 0 - 120 - 230 KBS, which means I see a lot of spinning circles. Tonight when opened up computer, ran speed test (not AT&T version,) and it showed 630 KBS. Opened up, I mean tried to open SMC, and after five minutes, got out and ran speed test again (0.09KBS.) Dial up is faster than my AT&T DSL. The reason I use third part speed test is most of the time AT&T's can't find their server. It's like paying for ten gallons of gas, but only getting a cup full. I've reset router, but speed doesn't change. Last night got AT&T's message about "Experiencing Delays," so they are aware they have a problem. To add insult to injury, on calls, AT&T tried to sell me their cell phone service. I asked "who in their right mind would buy another service from AT&T when they couldn't deliver the one I was already paying for?"

[William Chain]

It’s been a loooonnnggg time since I’ve even heard someone mention DSL. That’s still a thing?

[Mike Henderson]

Use https://www.speedtest.net/ for a good estimate of your Internet access speed. You can use it for any type of access - DSL, Cable, even cellular.

Mike

[Bill Dufour]

Location? in california I know some of the communication equipment has burned up in the last week. this will reduce speeds locally and overload as they shift around the missing equipment. I think most communications towers have only about three days worth of fuel so they have to get fuel delivered over closed roads. One line man was killed last week by these latest fires. The phone lines normally get overloaded for 24 hours after a big quake as folks from outside try to call into loved ones. I assume it is the same back east with every hurricane?
Bill D

[Curt Harms]

It’s been a loooonnnggg time since I’ve even heard someone mention DSL. That’s still a thing?

I suspect it's more common than you'd think in sparsely populated areas. I have family in the upper midwest who are on DSL. It's either that or wirele$$ for internet access. Their nearest neighbors are about a half mile away and it'd be expensive to run coax or fiber to service so few customers over a relatively large area.

[William Chain]

Wow, that's something. I had DSL back in 97? 98? Can't remember. Still have a whole bag of those filter boxes that have to go on every voice line in the house. I don't know why I kept them, but this thread sent me back to the electronics toolbox in the garage, and sure enough they were there right where I put them when we got a cable modem in 2000 I think it was. OP, need these filter things? Yours for the asking.


I suspect it's more common than you'd think in sparsely populated areas. I have family in the upper midwest who are on DSL. It's either that or wirele$$ for internet access. Their nearest neighbors are about a half mile away and it'd be expensive to run coax or fiber to service so few customers over a relatively large area.

[Mike Henderson]

Back in 1996 and 1997 we were just developing some of the technology for DSL. I received a patent (https://patents.google.com/patent/US6101216A/en)for some of my work (with others) on splitterless DSL that we did in that time frame.

That was hot stuff back then, and now it's looked at as obsolete.

Mike

[Bruce Wrenn]

Location, central NC, less than twenty miles from State Capital building, second highest income per house hold county in state, less than 1/2 mile from city limits, subdivision of 18 houses, average value 350K+, so we ain't exactly rural. Distance from switch to house, 5 miles. Spectrum internet just across the creek, less than 1/2 mile. AT&T has no desire to upgrade copper that has been here since 1980. Spectrum has no desire to cross the creek, even though they serve areas on both sides of us. Two of my neighbors have left AT&T because of shabby service. We have DSL lite, while next door neighbor had next higher level of service, till one day he was over here and I was using my DSL. He asked how I had so much faster DSL than they did, even though they were paying for next tier of service. Simple, I'm closer to the switch by a couple hundred yards. Second neighbor (now on Hughs Net,) used have techs out DAILY, before ditching AT&T. Kids in this neighbor hood can't do online classes, so they have to go to shopping center. Friends a couple miles up the street, signed up for U-Verse, until they found out they could either use internet, or watch TV, but not both at the same time. If we had third world internet, that would be an improvement. Oh yeah, tonight's speed 0.02 KBS

[Mike Chance in Iowa]

It’s been a loooonnnggg time since I’ve even heard someone mention DSL. That’s still a thing?
Unfortunately, yes, it is still a thing. Many of us in rural areas have no choice but DSL and often, there is only 1 choice. I can't count the number of hours on hold, or having to once again, tell someone across the world reading from a script that the problem is out in the road and I do not need to reset the modem to factory settings. We have been promised a bonded pair for years and every time it's scheduled to be installed, it's mysteriously canceled. We regularly have slow-downs every day. We have looked into satellite, and cell phone options for the whole house, but we would quickly reach the data limits, plus even that connectivity is sketchy. We often have to use our cell hot spots, but our cellular isn't always a solid connection either.

[Dave Lehnert]

I have DSL and never had the need for something faster.
I have fioptics on each side of me but for some reason cant get it.

[Ole Anderson]

Geeze, and I have Comcast coming out today because My 300 mbps connection is only a third of that.

[Curt Harms]

I have DSL and never had the need for something faster.
I have fioptics on each side of me but for some reason cant get it.

If you're interested, you might spend some time on broadbandreports.com, click 'forums' then your carrier. I've seen complaints similar to yours on Verizon FiOS' forum. The problem was that the carrier's database of eligible properties was inaccurate so your property wouldn't show as eligible for service. A problem like that would probably not be resolved by the "Are the cables connected? Did you unplug it and plug it back in" script reading support people.

[Jim Koepke]

My connection is through DSL. We have fiber within a mile from here to a server that works the copper.

439681

Sometimes computer downloads get slow if Candy is watching something on Netflix.

jtk

[Melvin Feng]

A more complicated option is to find a friend with higher speeds that lives within line of sight of your home and do a wireless bridge between the two. Ubiquiti has a few options like their airfiber 60 (currently sold out), and their nanobeam, rated for over 15 Km. I don't have these products, but I do use three ubiquiti access points in the house for the wireless in our home (btw, it is a fantastic system, and I am very happy with it, but it is more complicated to setup).

If you can find someone that is on cable, you can setup a wireless bridge, and share the cost of a higher plan with them. You would need to do the install and infrastructure, but depending on the link and the speed shared, you could get significantly higher speeds. You would be susceptible to wind and inclement weather, but it could still be a better option for you.

[Jim Becker]

You can do that, Melvin, but it's generally prohibited by the ISP and if caught, it could mean "no service" at all...

[Melvin Feng]

You can do that, Melvin, but it's generally prohibited by the ISP and if caught, it could mean "no service" at all...
Ah! I didn't even think about those terms and conditions, but that would make sense. I was only thinking about the technical aspect of trying to get decent internet access, it is good to think about things more wholistically!

[Jim Becker]

Yes, technically, it's relatively easy to share. But like anything, those pesky Ts & Cs are what they are.

That said, I'm thankful I've been on fiber for many years now...and sad that the status of high speed Internet access in so much of North American "bites".

[Bruce Wrenn]

There have been several recent news programs featuring the Navaho Reservation lacking internet connections. In many areas around the county the school system is parking buses that have hot spots on them. School system was handing out Chrome Books to kids who had no internet connection.Unfortunately they only work for school transmissions. Without internet connections, Chrome Books were as useful as teats on a boar hog.

[Brice Rogers]

Google "Viasat Internet plans". They are the nation's largest bandwidth satellite provider. Their two satellites provide something like 90% of the satellite bandwidth for the entire nation. Their plans start out at 30 Mbps and go up to 100 Mbps (IIRC). Hughes also provides satellite service but they are a somewhat smaller player.

[Mike Henderson]

Google "Viasat Internet plans". They are the nation's largest bandwidth satellite provider. Their two satellites provide something like 90% of the satellite bandwidth for the entire nation. Their plans start out at 30 Mbps and go up to 100 Mbps (IIRC). Hughes also provides satellite service but they are a somewhat smaller player.

Are those the people who provide Internet service to cruise ships? I was on one ship that (I was told) had a 30Mbps satellite link. It was grossly inadequate for the number of people on the ship.

Everyone takes pictures with their iPhone and the iPhone tries to send those pictures to iCloud. Even though people are not "using" the link doing web stuff, the link is completely swamped.

Mike

[Peter Kelly]

Google "Viasat Internet plans". They are the nation's largest bandwidth satellite provider. Their two satellites provide something like 90% of the satellite bandwidth for the entire nation. Their plans start out at 30 Mbps and go up to 100 Mbps (IIRC). Hughes also provides satellite service but they are a somewhat smaller player.Viasat isn't terribly expensive either, plans start at $50/month for 12mbps/3mbps. There's also T-Mobile Home for around the same price. https://www.t-mobile.com/isp

[Jim Becker]

Google "Viasat Internet plans". They are the nation's largest bandwidth satellite provider. Their two satellites provide something like 90% of the satellite bandwidth for the entire nation. Their plans start out at 30 Mbps and go up to 100 Mbps (IIRC). Hughes also provides satellite service but they are a somewhat smaller player.

Sat services can certainly get Internet into places where other technology doesn't exist or is poorly allocated. However, the laws of physics/speed of light come into play...the latency (delay) for sat services is substantial enough to seriously affect two-way video and is even noticeable for voice communications. So while it's a work-around, it's not ideal. The new lower altitude sat-mesh setups may improve on this distance related challenge, but there's still a lot more latency than is desired for the kinds of applications that are suddenly key to work and education.