Plusnet Broadband/Internal Wiring Advice :(

Lizbetty

Hi everyone

We moved into our house in December last year and we have had a lot of problems with our Plusnet broadband since they *eventually* managed to get us switched on (that took a long time!).

The latest check I did showed 0.6 mps download speed and 0.3mbps upload speed This is with the line plugged into the test socket upstairs. Broadband wouldn't connect at all when it was plugged into the faceplate yesterday. It's an intermittent issue, the terribly slow speeds are constant but we are finding that our broadband is very flaky and goes on and off a lot, with it going off altogether twice in the last 3 months.

Plusnet have said the same thing - use the test socket, change the filter, if it is still a problem we'll get a engineer but we'll charge £60 if it's internal wiring.

Plusnet have mentioned a couple of times that they have done something their end which should speed it up, last time it stopped the line dropping so much but didn't cure the speed problem, and now the line is dropping again.

I'm worried that it might end up being an internal wiring problem - when we bought the house, the owner would ring us and the telephone line would drop a lot. They said it had been a problem for a while. Because the phone line is working, I assumed that was a Sky issue, as they used them previously. Our phone line makes the occasional click, but it never drops.

We can't afford £60 at the mo, and my husband needs the internet for his business. I feel stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Has anyone else had a similar problem? If it is internal wiring, are we as well just getting an independent engineer to come out (we have an ex BT chap who advertises around here) to see rather than potentially end up paying £60 to be told it's internal wiring?

Stumped. I don't understand it enough and it's very frustrating.

All advice welcomed! Thank you,

Kind regards
Lucy

Sooler

Your test socket is upstairs, where is the router and PC?

what state is your internal wiring in? are you using any telephone extension cables between the BT socket and PC? are you testing with the shortest cables you can use? can you try connecting with wi-fi?

notbritishgas

OP, if you have tested in the test socket and the fault still persists then you have theoretically eliminated your internal wiring as the test socket should go straight out to line.
However it is just possible that it has been wired incorrectly and some other sockets/equipment has been connected to the line side of the master socket rather than the faceplate.
Does the external cable (overhead?) go directly to the master socket?
What are your router stats, especially the attenuation and signal to noise ratio.

Lizbetty

Thanks for your replies.

I've just double checked where the line comes in, as there are a couple more telephone sockets around the house.

The main socket is the one upstairs which the router is plugged into, and the router has been sat at most a metre away from that telephone socket (with a filter, the telephone is also plugged in there). The pc is upstairs too, it's all set up as wireless and we have a laptop which I'm on now which we use downstairs which is also wireless and we access our broadband on our mobiles too.

There are other telephone sockets which have been installed (not sure who by), one downstairs presumably for the Sky telly thing which the previous owners used, one is in the downstairs cabinet where the electric meter is (?) and the other is in my eldest daughter's room upstairs - I think that was installed for the Sky package they had, too. We don't use any of those at all at the moment.

There is a Sky dish which has been attached to my eldest daughter's bedroom wall - the main black telephone line goes from the main pole in the street to the Sky dish and then runs along the guttering outside to the main socket in the upstairs hall which the router is plugged into.

I hope that all makes sense. I do know the bloke who had the house liked to do things himself (because we have household electrical sockets in the garden running from the house and a *lot* of leaking pipework..), but I guess Sky will have installed the sockets. That is just a guess mind you.

I'm not sure if there's any way to tell whether this wiring is ok myself - it appears to be ok to a novice like me, if very confusing!

I would have liked to try plugging the pc in with the ethernet cable to see if that helps, but the set up makes it impossible as we have no telephone socket in the spare room where the pc is. We will need to use it wirelessly and so I figured that wouldn't matter so much if I didn't manage to wire it up to see it helped?

I will have a look at the router stats, I guess that will be through the Plusnet Thomson Gateway which I've not sussed properly as yet, so might take a few hours

Thanks again for your help with this, I really do appreciate it. It's very frazzling

Kind regards
Lucy

mike347928

Plug your phone/ house details in here https://www.dslchecker.bt.com - it should tell you what speeds you could be getting at your line length if your wiring was perfect inside and out.

macman

Wherever else your phone line runs, it does not go to the Sky dish. The only Sky phone connection would be from the Sky box to a phone socket.
Household sockets run from the ring main to the garden sounds potentially lethal, I would isolate those without delay. You cannot just run cable designed for indoors into a garden, nor are internal socket weatherproof.