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Abandon Ship!!! Ladies and Geeks first...

Old posts that have not been replied to for several years.
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Photon
Op
Posts: 170
Joined: Wed Aug 28, 2002 8:00 am
Location: Liverpool, England

Abandon Ship!!! Ladies and Geeks first...

Post by Photon »

Help!! Dunno if its just my Work's BTOpenwound account, but is anyone else having monumental difficulties accessing this site today? Normally no problem, but currently I'm getting a load of obvious crap characters all over most of the pages (if I'm lucky I just get snippets of html and PHP code)

I'm fine with other phpBB sites as well... Any clues?

Doh .. now cant submit this seeing as there is no submit button.

[edit] - ah the joys of cut and paste ... still getting constant errors on page and curruption in text and graphics....
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ppslim
Revered One
Posts: 3914
Joined: Sun Sep 23, 2001 8:00 pm
Location: Liverpool, England

Post by ppslim »

Using our office BTOpenWoe account, there is nothing wrong. Our network my be duff (major outage in our comms rack, meaning all our comms are served via a crappy 10mb HUB, rather than the stacked 10/100 switch).

What exactly are the syptoms? I didn't realy understand what you talked of.

A quick check on the BT Status line, shows nothing wrong (I have it in the global address bok of our phone system).

I am on HG4, what gateway is your connection on? (see your login name. Either dial-up networking for a Frog or PCI modem, or direct your browser to 192.168.254.254 if using a router (only if BT supplied)).
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Photon
Op
Posts: 170
Joined: Wed Aug 28, 2002 8:00 am
Location: Liverpool, England

Post by Photon »

WEll I'm getting all sort of corruption - in the background graphic, and I only seem to be getting half a page most of the time - if I get a page at all (and if I do much of the text is corrupted with many a foreign character in odd colours). First time this has happened tho.

I'm not sure of which gateway we are on until I can be arsed to walk through to the server, but I doubt you down there are on the same gateway as us in sunny southport.

Ah well, just have to catch up tonite if I get time.... :roll:
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ppslim
Revered One
Posts: 3914
Joined: Sun Sep 23, 2001 8:00 pm
Location: Liverpool, England

Post by ppslim »

We could well be on the same gateway.

Each of the "Home Gateways" can handle 10,000's of connections (exect figure unknown).

THese are located at BT openworld premesis, and you don't need to be int he same area as some1 else, to use the same gateway.

From your server room, you have the copper running tot he exchange.

This is split at the DSLAM.

The DSLAM will send all traffic down to a regional hub (I am unsure if ours is liverpool or manchester), where the authentication and routing phase begins.

Each connection is routed, based on the username used.

The username takes the format user@realm

Use is obvious. Realm is used to pick which ISP server to rout the connection and authentication information to.

After another call to the status line, and there is still nothing wrong.

The issue you discribe is typical of packet loss, and is the usual cause of faulty routers. This cane be anything from your DSL router, right through to the computer on which the site is hosted.

Seeing as I am on BT too, and not experiencing it, it would like a issue between your computer, upto and includignt he gateway.

Power cycle the router, try other computers before contacting BT, else your in fro hell off them, trust me.
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Photon
Op
Posts: 170
Joined: Wed Aug 28, 2002 8:00 am
Location: Liverpool, England

Post by Photon »

Well all seems fine today ... you were right tho - a small investigation uncovered the packet loss from hell, peaking at about 20-30%... powering through the whole system didnt seem to help either - but we don't always get great service out here in the stix.

Wouldn't mind, but I got BT phoning up this morning trying to sell me the connection I already have. Again ... :roll:

Hey - maybe with two it would work properly!!! :evil:
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ppslim
Revered One
Posts: 3914
Joined: Sun Sep 23, 2001 8:00 pm
Location: Liverpool, England

Post by ppslim »

I pray for you if you ever have to call BT Openwoe support.

They supply you with a connection, and a Efficient Networks router and total lack of service.

I won't bore you with the technicals, but to here is a real life example of BT (from only last week).

We only have 5 computers. This will be increasing to 8 next year and a large format networked printer.

As suhc, our network was totaly wired into the 4 port hub of the rotuer (yuk). I had to use a small 8 port hub to fit the second puter in my room.

To make for the expansion, we needed cales fitting, and a larger hub.

I ordered a 16 port switch, which I fitted Thursday morning.

The router remained working right the way through this process, and even worked straight off when connecting it to th switch. However, it needed moving up one shelf, to keep thinks tidy.

As soon as it was unplugged, the git died. I am guessing 384 days of solid power and heat expansion, had split the PCB. SO once it cooled down, the connection was borken. Of course, because the thing wouldn't power on, I wouldn't warm it enough.

I phoned Openwoe. Took forever to find our details, because we have been with them for over a year and half. THey turned around and went on about doing checvks first.

What is the first question they asked? "Do you have a standalone computer?"

Well, lets see. Where F*** would I plug one of them into a networking router.

After 3 hours of arguing with 12 customer services advisors and 2 department heads, they finaly decided to put yes, and pretend the checks where passed.

BT came out the next day at the end of there alloted time slot. Before hand, Openwoe phoned 6 times to ask if he had arrived.

The replacment was simple. Plug it in, wait 20 mins for the firmware update loop, enter the username and so on, then fend off the damned BT engineer. He looked the Gay type that would attack you for his fix.

Openwoe phoned again, to ask if all was fixed/installed, and asked to do some check to confirm. What is the first thing they say to me "Borwsing web-sites is not a sign of a connection!" LOL

Then they started going on about not supporting networks again.

I eventualy put the phone down without saying a word.

I am yet to be cutoff, or have a phone call back :P
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Photon
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Posts: 170
Joined: Wed Aug 28, 2002 8:00 am
Location: Liverpool, England

Post by Photon »

:D

Dont get me started - I made the mistake of contacting OpenWound support once ... why do you think I'm not doing it again - I'm trying to finish this game - I dont need the stress!

However, I personally transferred this office from an old Demon dialup account over to BTOpenWound broadband when I started here, and you aint seen hell untill you have tried with Demon.

Things like :
  • Taking approximately 6 months to cancel our account, then failing to do that even when they finally said that they had, then failing to pay back the 500 odd quid they therefore owe us, claiming that they only owed us 12 quid, because we only just cancelled it. Litigation imminent.

    Refusing to transfer the tags on our domain, without a fax signed by both directors of the company, along with a letter sent to confirm (oh, and both of these had to be on company headed letter paper, which we had to FAKE....) - they were unable to do anything either by phone or by email .... good going for a net company. Even then they took three weeks to do it .. apparently its (I quote) VERY COMPLEX to open word pad and change the domain tags...
I could go on ... we have been through nearly 8 months worth of battles with demon, and it still goes on...
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