Major Broadband Fault - 2 years on and still no progress :(

[aaronjunited]

If you don't mind me asking, what is an XNTE?

[Scubbie]

eXternal NTE socket = Master Socket that is located on the wall outside

It was intended to make things easier for BTO Engineers to repair our telephone lines as they don't require access to the inside of your home.

[aaronjunited]

Ahh pretty cool, I take it these are only installed on houses in mainland UK, never seen any of these in N.Ireland.

[Scubbie]

BTO installed them on new builds for a period of time. I haven't seen one myself, but I'm sure if I walked around some properties build say 5 years ago I would see them.

[amalkin93]

I live in West Yorkshire and the house was built in 2000 so its not old, all the builds around here have one, mine looks very worn down , nothing like the picture above but BTO refuse to do anything about it, it gets full on weather form the peak district hitting it.

[Scubbie]

Once BTO has connected your internal cable to the one coming from outside with gel clips, the weather won't affect your connection.

I would be inclined to see if this is what they did the other day.

[Isitme]

Its full designation is "External Network Terminating Equipment" just as the full name of the NTE is "Network Terminating Equipment" and is the BTO's demarcation point. I think these were just introduced about December, 2008, so if your phone was installed before that date, you probably have a junction box, not an XNTE, unless your line has been replaced since.

[amalkin93]

Ok so a little update...

I will be moving to Sky Fibre next week, and my line has remained completely stable except from two morning instances where this has happened:

Jun 6 08:09:32 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL link down
Jun 6 08:09:33 (none) daemon.crit syslog: Clear IP addresses. Connection DOWN.
Jun 6 08:09:33 (none) daemon.crit syslog: Clear IP addresses. PPP connection DOWN.
Jun 6 08:09:35 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: xDSL G.994 training
Jun 6 08:09:52 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL G.992 started
Jun 6 08:09:54 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL G.992 channel analysis
Jun 6 08:09:59 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL G.992 message exchange
Jun 6 08:09:59 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL link up, interleaved, us=800, ds=3072
Jun 6 08:11:10 (none) daemon.crit syslog: PPP LCP UP.
Jun 6 08:11:11 (none) daemon.crit syslog: Received valid IP address from server. Connection UP.
Jun 6 08:14:35 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL link down
Jun 6 08:14:37 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: xDSL G.994 training
Jun 6 08:14:38 (none) daemon.crit syslog: Clear IP addresses. Connection DOWN.
Jun 6 08:14:38 (none) daemon.crit syslog: Clear IP addresses. PPP connection DOWN.
Jun 6 08:14:54 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL G.992 started
Jun 6 08:14:56 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL G.992 channel analysis
Jun 6 08:15:01 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL G.992 message exchange
Jun 6 08:15:02 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL link up, interleaved, us=800, ds=3072
Jun 6 08:15:25 (none) daemon.crit syslog: PPP LCP UP.
Jun 6 08:15:25 (none) daemon.crit syslog: Received valid IP address from server. Connection UP.
Jun 6 08:26:00 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL link down
Jun 6 08:26:01 (none) daemon.crit syslog: Clear IP addresses. Connection DOWN.
Jun 6 08:26:01 (none) daemon.crit syslog: Clear IP addresses. PPP connection DOWN.
Jun 6 08:26:01 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: xDSL G.994 training
Jun 6 08:26:16 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL link down
Jun 6 08:26:19 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: xDSL G.994 training
Jun 6 08:26:21 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL G.992 started
Jun 6 08:26:23 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL G.992 channel analysis
Jun 6 08:26:28 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL G.992 message exchange
Jun 6 08:26:29 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL link up, interleaved, us=800, ds=3072
Jun 6 08:27:16 (none) daemon.crit syslog: PPP LCP UP.
Jun 6 08:27:16 (none) daemon.crit syslog: Received valid IP address from server. Connection UP.
Jun 6 08:37:36 (none) user.alert kernel: Intrusion -> IN=pppoa0 OUT= MAC= SRC=222.221.27.3 DST=90.203.49.227 LEN=48 TOS=0x00 PREC=0x00 TTL=107 ID=21626 PROTO=TCP SPT=16811 DPT=3389 WINDOW=65535 RES=0x00 SYN URGP=0
Jun 6 09:38:39 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL link down
Jun 6 09:38:40 (none) daemon.crit syslog: Clear IP addresses. Connection DOWN.
Jun 6 09:38:40 (none) daemon.crit syslog: Clear IP addresses. PPP connection DOWN.
Jun 6 09:38:41 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: xDSL G.994 training
Jun 6 09:38:56 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL link down
Jun 6 09:39:04 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: xDSL G.994 training
Jun 6 09:39:06 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL G.992 started
Jun 6 09:39:08 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL G.992 channel analysis
Jun 6 09:39:13 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL G.992 message exchange
Jun 6 09:39:13 (none) user.crit kernel: Line 0: ADSL link up, interleaved, us=800, ds=3072
Jun 6 09:40:01 (none) daemon.crit syslog: PPP LCP UP.
Jun 6 09:40:02 (none) daemon.crit syslog: Received valid IP address from server. Connection UP.

As you can see, during this period the line has dropped, however before and after this, it has been rock solid. Any ideas whats going on here?

[amalkin93]

So its happened again now at 12:47pm , the noise margin is unstable and keeps fluctuating around 0.1db and cant get a sync. Whilst I saw this happening I decided to try the quiet line test to see if there was physical noise, the line is full of crackling and fuzzy noise, which it wasn't like yesterday.

Im thinking the last BTO guy has not properly jelly crimped those XNTE wires, thought the night they received harsh rain from the moors which face it. Ive also noticed all of my neighbours XNTEs are facing the other way and are protected from the upland weather :/ Some of them also have ones which are properly shielded, ours is just a plastic shell which leaves the pair wires exposed at the sides.

[Scubbie]

After your last visit I would have thought that the wiring would have been checked to ensure that there was no damage along the length of it. With this in mind the gel clips are easy to inspect and you should quickly be able to see if there is any further problem.

If you would like a 2nd opinion, feel free to post a photo of the crimps and your master socket's wiring too.