High Attenuation and No Master Socket

[Swampmouth]

Morning All,

This could waffle on a bit, but I'm going to try and put as much in this first post as I can think of as I'm getting nowhere with this by myself

History
I've recently moved into a new house, brand new building, and I've now had Sky Max in for a couple of weeks. From the original discussions with Sky, I know my line should be capable of up to around 4Mbps, due to distance from the exchange, about 3km, but I stuck with Max from my old house due to the lack of download limits etc. I brought my old Netgear V1 router with me from there, where I used to be getting 9Mbps without any real problems.

Problem
When I was first connected I was getting around 2.5Mbps, and now I'm down to about 2Mbps.

Router stats are showing this morning:

ADSL Link Downstream Upstream
Connection Speed 2047 kbps 422 kbps
Line Attenuation 61.0 db 39.9 db
Noise Margin 4.2 db 10.5 db

This is pretty typical, although last night the downstream Nocie Margin was 7.8.

Now I've down the fairly typical things. I've checked the house for an NTE5 Master Socket with no luck. I've checked behind the 2 sockets that do exist. No capacitors in there to indicate a master.

Checking with the site developers the Master socket is contained in the grey box that's just outside the front door, but I can't seem to see anything in there that I can plug into to check whether it's internal wiring or not. It's Openreach branded and it's got a pull down front secured by a screw if that helps.

From the first extension socket, which is in the living room, 1st floor, I've removed the connection to the the second extension (we don't need it). The wiring was also setup as:

Pin 1 - Green
Pin 2 - Blue
Pin 3 - Orange
Pin 4 - White & Orange
Pin 5 - White & Blue
Pin 6 - White & Green

I've replaced that socket with an adsl & telephone socket from B&Q (not sure how good this is) but this hasn't made any improvements to the line attenuation, it's always been 61db.

So without a master socket I can't prove whether the issue is internal wiring or external. If it's internal I'll go back to the developer and see if I can get them to fix it (although if this involves pulling plaster off the walls my wife won't be happy!)

Can I contact Sky and get them to do a test on the line etc?
Should I ask them for a new router, would I be likely to get better with one of the newer ones?
Should I just quit my whining and put up with the speed I'm getting?
Is there anything else I should do before contacting Sky?

If anyone has any advice or guidance then it'd be greatly appreciated

Cheers,
Gareth

[IWasNotTheEnemy]

the attenuation is a measure of line length and bar moving closer to your exchange it won't change...

having said that, regarding the wiring the only wires needed are pins 2 & 5 - everything else will be acting as an arial so remove them...

i'm surprised there's no NTE5 - BT shuold fit these on all new builds unless BT didn't install the line...

[Brian69]

You say this is a new build property, is the telephone line underground, or overhead? As you say you cannot find a master socket, I suspect you may have an external demarcation point, if you have there should be a small leaflet in the property details about it, If you are not sure could you post a picture of how you line enters.

[Brian69]

Reading your post properly, (sorry about my first post) it would appear that you do have an external demarcation point (an XNTE, x for external) The devlopers are correct in that it contains all the components of a normal master sockets, plus the ring line is filtered,
Where a XNTE is fitted, BT/Openreach network and their responsiblity for it ends there at the XNTE, all internal wiring will have been carried out by the devolpers and is your/there responsiblity. You will notice in the XNTE a small yellow plug about in the middle. This is the test point for Openreach, but a normal telephone plug will not fit it.
If you suspect your internal wiring is not up to scatch, you could try and get the developers in to repair or mod it, but I would think that so long as the internal sockets work for normal telephone operation, that will be all they are contracted for. So what to do.
Bearing in mind that you may do anything you wish with your internal wiring, the first thing to do is locate the first internal telephone socket. This is normaly fairly close to where the line enters your home, you then need to disconnect it and reconnect one blue pair at a time. When you get a dial tone at this socket, check all the others in your home and they should be dead (no dial tone) you could then replace this socket with a ADSL/Phone filtered one (ADSL Nation do one, the XTF/85 ). This will prevent your internal wiring from causing problems and provide a connection for your router.

[Swampmouth]

Morning Brian,

Thanks for the posts. Photo is attached showing the wiring in the XNTE box. I've removed the connection from the first extension onwards and I've got just the blue wires connected, but it's not improved the noise margin or attenuation.

There's still alot of construction work going on on the site and on our road, could this have an impact?

I'll pop onto ADSL Nation now and see about ordering a new extension. Got to be better than the one I got from B&Q

Cheers,

Gareth

[Brian69]

It could be that while work is still going on that Openreach have not yet completed, and this may be your problem. With reguard to your wiring, it is very important that you check that all other sockets have no dial tone while you are connected to what you think is the first socket, it is not unknown for devolpers to put juction boxes in odd concealed places to save a bit of cable. To start with your wiring should be connected at the XNTE as follows

Blue with white rings to 2

White with blue rings to 5

Orange with white rings to 3