Don't know what best to do for our needs!

macman

FBaby wrote: »

Thanks again for all this. I clearly missed the part about the test socket. I googled and understand I have to unscrew the mater socket. Will do this tonight.

Undo the two screws on the lower faceplate and hinge it forward. Behind that is the test socket. Connecting into that isolates your internal wiring and extensions.Do both a speed test and a quiet line test again from there.
I find it hard to believe that Sky have not already asked you to do this test when your reported a fault-it should be the first thing to check?
Have you already swapped out the ADSL filters for known good ones?

FBaby

ok, things are going from bad to worse! Been trying to look for that test socket without success. Neither socket have it....and then we remembered: 2 years ago, we had an extension done on the house and this included adding a partition to make a closet where the socket used to be so the engineer who did the work moved the socket to the new wall. We've checked, and where we assume the original/test socket was positioned has been plastered over, so we can't access it. We cannot tell where the cable have been redirected as they can't be seen anywhere. It doesn't bare well does it

macman

Use a cable finder to locate the master NTE5, and then start digging...why plaster over a phone socket?
You appear to have been testing off extensions.

jem16

macman wrote: »

Use a cable finder to locate the master NTE5, and then start digging...why plaster over a phone socket?

I doubt they will have plastered over the actual socket. I suspect they have removed the socket, redirected the wiring and installed a new socket.

jem16

FBaby wrote: »

ok, things are going from bad to worse! Been trying to look for that test socket without success. Neither socket have it...

So are you saying neither socket has the split faceplate?

Could you describe or photograph both sockets?

so the engineer who did the work moved the socket to the new wall.

Was this an Openreach engineer or someone else?

FBaby

jem16 wrote: »

I doubt they will have plastered over the actual socket. I suspect they have removed the socket, redirected the wiring and installed a new socket.

Yes, that's what it looks like, however, the socket where it's been redirected does not have a test socket. We unscrewed it and looked inside and there is nothing, just very thin cables coming from somwhere unknown. We've looked everywhere in the house and there are no other sockets to check, just the one upstairs, did the same, and no test socket there either.

I've spoken with neighbours (a few streets away) who also had issues some years back and they said they didn't have a test socket either. Do all household have them (our house was built in the 70s)?

Was this an Openreach engineer or someone else?

No he wasn't. He came and sorted the cables for the TV too.

FBaby

So are you saying neither socket has the split faceplate?

That's correct, neither have split faceplate.

Use a cable finder to locate the master NTE5, and then start digging

you've lost me again on this

jem16

FBaby wrote: »

I've spoken with neighbours (a few streets away) who also had issues some years back and they said they didn't have a test socket either. Do all household have them (our house was built in the 70s)?

It's not so much a test socket as a BT Master Socket NTE5 which contains a test socket. The idea is that on the top section this is where your telephone line comes in and no-one, apart from BT is meant to touch that section. On the bottom section, that is where the test socket is located and where you can attach your extension cables.

Earlier houses could have non split master sockets or even older GPO type sockets.

Have a look here;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_telephone_sockets

No he wasn't. He came and sorted the cables for the TV too.

That would account for it. Openreach would have installed an NTE5 socket but charged a hefty amount for it.

One of those sockets will be the master as it's where your external line is coming in. Can you trace back from outside to see which it is?

However without the split faceplate there is no way of isolating your internal wiring to see if the fault lies with you or BT.

When you get your fibre installed, an engineer will come to install a new faceplate so he'll want to know where the master socket is.

http://www.plus.net/home-broadband/faqs/fibre-optic-broadband/#installation-info

penrhyn

Looks like dodgy internal wiring is the root cause of the problems here.
Fibre could well be the way to go if the OP chooses an ISP that uses the BT fibre modem.
Whether they would charge extra to sort out OPs wiring I dunno.
SIL recently took Sky Fibre which was a self install.
The SR101 router being capable of VDSL as well as ADSL., and he gets a rock solid 40mbps down, and 10mbps upstream.

jem16

penrhyn wrote: »

Looks like dodgy internal wiring is the root cause of the problems here.

Yes I would agree.

Fibre could well be the way to go if the OP chooses an ISP that uses the BT fibre modem.

OP seems to have chosen EE with a self install. Unfortunately with this wiring I suspect s/he may still have problems with speed.