Internet problem

Stratus · 05-23-2005, 05:10 PM

So here’s my problem. I’ve never really had any problems with my cable internet connection, but all of a sudden I keep losing connection in a weird way. I’ll be playing a game and my ping is just fine, then suddenly I lose connection for 10-20 sec. Then my ping is fine again. This happens usually once a minute, sometimes they are 30 sec. Apart. I am connected to the internet through a hub and I thought that my problem was a damaged Ethernet cord, but I connected directly to the modem using a different cord and had the same problem. Any ideas?

**Terrister** · 05-23-2005, 06:47 PM

What do the lights on your cable modem do while this is happening?

batty_professor · 05-23-2005, 07:00 PM

The fact that you're connected through a hub may be the key here. Using a hub, one computer can sort of "black out" the other momentarily, such as when loading a page. Or more likely when uploading, as when sending a mail message. I think if you will switch to using a router, where all users must share, and share alike, the "problem" will disappear.

**Terrister** · 05-23-2005, 07:07 PM

BP>She says it does this when directly connected also.

Stratus · 05-23-2005, 07:20 PM

the data transfer light is blinking when this happens, but no more or less then it is when the problem isn't happening. and, btw, I'm a guy.

batty_professor · 05-23-2005, 07:41 PM

Ok, sorry I missed the thing with being plugged into the modem directly. I suspect there's a chance there's some application running in the background, spyware perhaps, or an application that logs your game activities? that is having this effect. You can get checked out for spyware in our security forum, run ad-aware, etc. The members there are good help.

**johnwill** · 05-24-2005, 06:34 AM

Try a different machine on that connection, this will narrow it down to the connection or something on the machine.

Stratus · 05-24-2005, 11:04 PM

So I tried another machine on this connection and experienced the same problem. So that rules out this machine as the problem. It must be the connection. Should I talk to Comcast about the problem?

**JamesO** · 05-25-2005, 06:53 AM

Not sure you will get far speaking with the service provider help desk, unfortunately you probably know more than the person on the other end of the phone!

Can you access the cable modem status page, you want to look for signal levels, CRC and FEC errors. Most cable modems have a web interface to access this info. Do a search on the web for info on your make and model cable modem. Do you also subscribe to CATV service? If so, most of the digital set top boxes can display signal stats on your TV screeen.

Please provide make and model of cable modem and make and model of CATV set top box, this might be helpful?

Also try the Default Gateway address of a PC connected directly to your modem, plug this IP addres into your web browser and see what happens.

It is possible the signal to your cable modem is low, cable companies do not userstand very well how to keep a stable signal level in their cable plant. The cable techs typically play with signal levels to cover up larger, system wide problems. Also bad connections and water can play havoc on the system levels.

On your computer,

Start, Run, type "cmd" then press enter.
In the black box type "ipconfig /all > c:\ipconfig.txt"

Go to my computer, click on the C drive, open c:\ipconfig.txt and then copy this info for the machine and post it back here for review and comment.

Start, Run, type "cmd" then press enter.
In the black box type "ping www.yahoo.com > c:\ping.txt"

Go to my computer, click on the C drive, open c:\ping.txt and then copy this info for the machine and post it back here for review and comment.

Start, Run, type "cmd" then press enter.
In the black box type ping "tracert www.yahoo.com > c:\tracert.txt"

Go to my computer, click on the C drive, open c:\tracert.txt and then copy this info for the machine and post it back here for review and comment.

Once we have the tracert info, we will give you additional direction on pinging your ISP on the first hop from your location.

JamesO

Stratus · 05-25-2005, 02:43 PM

My modem is a Homeconnect cable modem model 3CR29220
What I could get off of the internet interface is:

downstream lock 693000000 Hz
frequency (seems to be a bit bellow 857 MHz)
ranging 1
UCD List 1,2,3,4,5,6
DHCP DHCP success
TFTP TFTP Success
Regustration Reg success
BPI BPI success
Internet Status CM is ALLOWED for CPE Internet Traffic
bytes sent 1147047
bytes recv. 324546228
uncorrectable errors 13180
crc errors 310

The rest seemed to be password protected with a user name and password I don’t have.

IP config:

Windows IP Configuration

Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : DoomBox

Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . :

Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Unknown

IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No

WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No

DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . : hsd1.nh.comcast.net.

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : hsd1.nh.comcast.net.

Description . . . . . . . . . . . : SiS 900-Based PCI Fast Ethernet Adapter

Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-0A-E6-9A-4C-5E

Dhcp Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes

Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes

IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 65.96.193.242

Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.252.0

Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 65.96.192.1

DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 68.87.71.8

DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 24.34.241.8

24.34.240.8

68.87.64.196

Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : Tuesday, May 24, 2005 11:13:02 PM

Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : Saturday, May 28, 2005 7:47:25 PM

Ping:
Pinging www.yahoo.akadns.net [68.142.226.44] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 68.142.226.44: bytes=32 time=57ms TTL=47

Reply from 68.142.226.44: bytes=32 time=56ms TTL=47

Reply from 68.142.226.44: bytes=32 time=63ms TTL=47

Reply from 68.142.226.44: bytes=32 time=62ms TTL=47

Ping statistics for 68.142.226.44:

Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),

Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:

Minimum = 56ms, Maximum = 63ms, Average = 59ms

Tracert:

Tracing route to www.yahoo.akadns.net [68.142.226.47]

over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 7 ms 5 ms 7 ms 10.215.24.1

2 * * * Request timed out.

3 * * * Request timed out.

4 * * * Request timed out.

5 * * * Request timed out.

6 * * * Request timed out.

7 * * * Request timed out.

8 * * * Request timed out.

9 * * * Request timed out.

10 * * * Request timed out.

11 * * * Request timed out.

12 * * * Request timed out.

13 * * * Request timed out.

14 * * * Request timed out.

15 * * * Request timed out.

16 * * * Request timed out.

17 * * * Request timed out.

18 58 ms 70 ms 57 ms p16.www.re2.yahoo.com [68.142.226.47]

Trace complete.

Other than that I have analog cable, not digital cable.

I couldn’t find the signal strength, unless that is the frequency.

BTW thank you all for the help you’re giving me.

**JamesO** · 05-26-2005, 01:23 PM

At first glance, here is what I see,

You have Comcast as your ISP
Comcast appears to block trace route, which is not good, I would be on the phone with them about this. May be an oversight on Comcast's part, may be the way they have your service configured?
Your ping times to Yahoo appear to be a bit high?? Usually Yahoo is mirrored locally somewhere, my ping time to Yahoo is 18 ms!
Your ping time to your first hop (10.215.24.1)is not bad at 5-7 ms
10.215.24.1 is a black hole not routable address, this may be the cause of the traceroute failing?? Comcast should not be using a 10.x.x.x. address, but many ISP's do.

Next time you start having problems, open 2 seperate DOS windows and start an extended ping in each window. 1 ping to 10.215.24.1 and the other to 65.96.192.1, which is shown as the default GW that DHCP has supplied.

Extended ping is "ping 65.96.192.1 -t" or "ping 10.215.24.1 -t"

To stop, put cursor in DOS box, hold Ctrl and hit C a few times.

See what the extended pings do, you should have no drops and your times should be 20 ms or less.

Also check your IP config all to see if anthing changes.

JamesO

**johnwill** · 05-26-2005, 04:58 PM

That must be a local thing, since I have Comcast, and I can trace, except for the local gateway box on our pole.

It is curious that I used the same URL and got totally different IP addresses.

Tracing route to www.yahoo.akadns.net [216.109.117.109]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.0.1
2 * * * Request timed out.
3 8 ms 9 ms 9 ms ge-2-2-ur01.norristown.pa.panjde.comcast.net [68.86.216.237]
4 48 ms 9 ms 9 ms po10-ur02.norristown.pa.panjde.comcast.net [68.86.209.102]
5 21 ms 17 ms 12 ms po21-ar01.wallingford.pa.panjde.comcast.net [68.86.209.106]
6 13 ms 11 ms 12 ms po90-ar01.401nbroadst.pa.panjde.comcast.net [68.86.208.29]
7 15 ms 16 ms 16 ms 68.86.211.14
8 13 ms 14 ms 14 ms 12.119.53.49
9 15 ms 18 ms 14 ms tbr2-p012401.phlpa.ip.att.net [12.123.137.49]
10 17 ms 16 ms 16 ms tbr1-cl9.wswdc.ip.att.net [12.122.2.85]
11 17 ms 16 ms 18 ms gar1-p300.ascva.ip.att.net [12.123.8.49]
12 * * * Request timed out.
13 19 ms 19 ms 18 ms ae1.p400.msr1.dcn.yahoo.com [216.115.96.181]
14 17 ms 19 ms 18 ms ge9-3.bas2-m.dcn.yahoo.com [216.109.120.155]
15 18 ms 19 ms 19 ms p24.www.dcn.yahoo.com [216.109.117.109]

Trace complete.

**JamesO** · 05-26-2005, 07:35 PM

Unfortunately, Yahoo, Google and some of the other heavily used web sites tend to use distributed web hosting/caching and sometimes dynamic load sharing on the DNS. It appears that Yahoo uses Akamai, this is where the akadns.net comes into play.

This can make for some unusual trace routes and unrealistic ping response times if the web mirrors are on site at the ISP.

See this link, may offer some interesting insight!

http://www.cse.nd.edu/~surendar/teac...s/Lecture7.pdf

I will look for a single hosted web site to use for future trace routes and pings, as this will give some consistent results.

JamesO

**johnwill** · 05-27-2005, 06:15 PM

You're right James, I totally forgot about large distributed sites.

05-23-2005, 05:10 PM	#1 (permalink)
Stratus Registered User Join Date: May 2005 Posts: 4 OS: xp	Internet problem So here’s my problem. I’ve never really had any problems with my cable internet connection, but all of a sudden I keep losing connection in a weird way. I’ll be playing a game and my ping is just fine, then suddenly I lose connection for 10-20 sec. Then my ping is fine again. This happens usually once a minute, sometimes they are 30 sec. Apart. I am connected to the internet through a hub and I thought that my problem was a damaged Ethernet cord, but I connected directly to the modem using a different cord and had the same problem. Any ideas?

05-23-2005, 06:47 PM	#2 (permalink)
Terrister Moderator Hardware Forum Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: West Georgia, USA Posts: 7,098 OS: Xp	What do the lights on your cable modem do while this is happening? __________________

05-23-2005, 07:00 PM	#3 (permalink)
batty_professor Asst. Manager, Alternative Computing Forums Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: Hooterville Il 45 mi. east of St. Louis mo Posts: 2,608 OS: Fedora Core 5 for now	The fact that you're connected through a hub may be the key here. Using a hub, one computer can sort of "black out" the other momentarily, such as when loading a page. Or more likely when uploading, as when sending a mail message. I think if you will switch to using a router, where all users must share, and share alike, the "problem" will disappear. __________________ It's better to know me and not need me than to need me and not know me. B. While users are never under any obligation, if you feel the urge please feel free to visit our donation page. Every little bit helps. And we thank you for your support. Microsoft free Registered Linux user 397458

05-23-2005, 07:07 PM	#4 (permalink)
Terrister Moderator Hardware Forum Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: West Georgia, USA Posts: 7,098 OS: Xp	BP>She says it does this when directly connected also. __________________

05-23-2005, 07:41 PM	#6 (permalink)
batty_professor Asst. Manager, Alternative Computing Forums Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: Hooterville Il 45 mi. east of St. Louis mo Posts: 2,608 OS: Fedora Core 5 for now	Ok, sorry I missed the thing with being plugged into the modem directly. I suspect there's a chance there's some application running in the background, spyware perhaps, or an application that logs your game activities? that is having this effect. You can get checked out for spyware in our security forum, run ad-aware, etc. The members there are good help. __________________ It's better to know me and not need me than to need me and not know me. B. While users are never under any obligation, if you feel the urge please feel free to visit our donation page. Every little bit helps. And we thank you for your support. Microsoft free Registered Linux user 397458

05-23-2005, 07:20 PM	#5 (permalink)
Stratus Registered User Join Date: May 2005 Posts: 4 OS: xp	the data transfer light is blinking when this happens, but no more or less then it is when the problem isn't happening. and, btw, I'm a guy.

05-24-2005, 06:34 AM	#7 (permalink)
johnwill Manager, Networking Forums Join Date: Sep 2002 Location: S.E. Pennsylvania, US Posts: 41,720 OS: Windows 7, XP-Pro, Vista, Linux Blog Entries: 1	Try a different machine on that connection, this will narrow it down to the connection or something on the machine. __________________ If TSF has helped you, Tell us about it! or Donate to help keep the site up! Microsoft MVP - Windows Desktop Experience

05-24-2005, 11:04 PM	#8 (permalink)
Stratus Registered User Join Date: May 2005 Posts: 4 OS: xp	So I tried another machine on this connection and experienced the same problem. So that rules out this machine as the problem. It must be the connection. Should I talk to Comcast about the problem?

05-25-2005, 06:53 AM	#9 (permalink)
JamesO Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: Fairfax, VA USA Posts: 2,289 OS: 98SE, W2k Pro, XP Pro	Not sure you will get far speaking with the service provider help desk, unfortunately you probably know more than the person on the other end of the phone! Can you access the cable modem status page, you want to look for signal levels, CRC and FEC errors. Most cable modems have a web interface to access this info. Do a search on the web for info on your make and model cable modem. Do you also subscribe to CATV service? If so, most of the digital set top boxes can display signal stats on your TV screeen. Please provide make and model of cable modem and make and model of CATV set top box, this might be helpful? Also try the Default Gateway address of a PC connected directly to your modem, plug this IP addres into your web browser and see what happens. It is possible the signal to your cable modem is low, cable companies do not userstand very well how to keep a stable signal level in their cable plant. The cable techs typically play with signal levels to cover up larger, system wide problems. Also bad connections and water can play havoc on the system levels. On your computer, Start, Run, type "cmd" then press enter. In the black box type "ipconfig /all > c:\ipconfig.txt" Go to my computer, click on the C drive, open c:\ipconfig.txt and then copy this info for the machine and post it back here for review and comment. Start, Run, type "cmd" then press enter. In the black box type "ping www.yahoo.com > c:\ping.txt" Go to my computer, click on the C drive, open c:\ping.txt and then copy this info for the machine and post it back here for review and comment. Start, Run, type "cmd" then press enter. In the black box type ping "tracert www.yahoo.com > c:\tracert.txt" Go to my computer, click on the C drive, open c:\tracert.txt and then copy this info for the machine and post it back here for review and comment. Once we have the tracert info, we will give you additional direction on pinging your ISP on the first hop from your location. JamesO

05-25-2005, 02:43 PM	#10 (permalink)
Stratus Registered User Join Date: May 2005 Posts: 4 OS: xp	My modem is a Homeconnect cable modem model 3CR29220 What I could get off of the internet interface is: downstream lock 693000000 Hz frequency (seems to be a bit bellow 857 MHz) ranging 1 UCD List 1,2,3,4,5,6 DHCP DHCP success TFTP TFTP Success Regustration Reg success BPI BPI success Internet Status CM is ALLOWED for CPE Internet Traffic bytes sent 1147047 bytes recv. 324546228 uncorrectable errors 13180 crc errors 310 The rest seemed to be password protected with a user name and password I don’t have. IP config: Windows IP Configuration Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : DoomBox Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . : Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Unknown IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . : hsd1.nh.comcast.net. Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection: Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : hsd1.nh.comcast.net. Description . . . . . . . . . . . : SiS 900-Based PCI Fast Ethernet Adapter Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-0A-E6-9A-4C-5E Dhcp Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 65.96.193.242 Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.252.0 Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 65.96.192.1 DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 68.87.71.8 DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 24.34.241.8 24.34.240.8 68.87.64.196 Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : Tuesday, May 24, 2005 11:13:02 PM Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : Saturday, May 28, 2005 7:47:25 PM Ping: Pinging www.yahoo.akadns.net [68.142.226.44] with 32 bytes of data: Reply from 68.142.226.44: bytes=32 time=57ms TTL=47 Reply from 68.142.226.44: bytes=32 time=56ms TTL=47 Reply from 68.142.226.44: bytes=32 time=63ms TTL=47 Reply from 68.142.226.44: bytes=32 time=62ms TTL=47 Ping statistics for 68.142.226.44: Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss), Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds: Minimum = 56ms, Maximum = 63ms, Average = 59ms Tracert: Tracing route to www.yahoo.akadns.net [68.142.226.47] over a maximum of 30 hops: 1 7 ms 5 ms 7 ms 10.215.24.1 2 * * * Request timed out. 3 * * * Request timed out. 4 * * * Request timed out. 5 * * * Request timed out. 6 * * * Request timed out. 7 * * * Request timed out. 8 * * * Request timed out. 9 * * * Request timed out. 10 * * * Request timed out. 11 * * * Request timed out. 12 * * * Request timed out. 13 * * * Request timed out. 14 * * * Request timed out. 15 * * * Request timed out. 16 * * * Request timed out. 17 * * * Request timed out. 18 58 ms 70 ms 57 ms p16.www.re2.yahoo.com [68.142.226.47] Trace complete. Other than that I have analog cable, not digital cable. I couldn’t find the signal strength, unless that is the frequency. BTW thank you all for the help you’re giving me.

05-26-2005, 01:23 PM	#11 (permalink)
JamesO Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: Fairfax, VA USA Posts: 2,289 OS: 98SE, W2k Pro, XP Pro	At first glance, here is what I see, You have Comcast as your ISP Comcast appears to block trace route, which is not good, I would be on the phone with them about this. May be an oversight on Comcast's part, may be the way they have your service configured? Your ping times to Yahoo appear to be a bit high?? Usually Yahoo is mirrored locally somewhere, my ping time to Yahoo is 18 ms! Your ping time to your first hop (10.215.24.1)is not bad at 5-7 ms 10.215.24.1 is a black hole not routable address, this may be the cause of the traceroute failing?? Comcast should not be using a 10.x.x.x. address, but many ISP's do. Next time you start having problems, open 2 seperate DOS windows and start an extended ping in each window. 1 ping to 10.215.24.1 and the other to 65.96.192.1, which is shown as the default GW that DHCP has supplied. Extended ping is "ping 65.96.192.1 -t" or "ping 10.215.24.1 -t" To stop, put cursor in DOS box, hold Ctrl and hit C a few times. See what the extended pings do, you should have no drops and your times should be 20 ms or less. Also check your IP config all to see if anthing changes. JamesO

05-26-2005, 04:58 PM	#12 (permalink)
johnwill Manager, Networking Forums Join Date: Sep 2002 Location: S.E. Pennsylvania, US Posts: 41,720 OS: Windows 7, XP-Pro, Vista, Linux Blog Entries: 1	That must be a local thing, since I have Comcast, and I can trace, except for the local gateway box on our pole. It is curious that I used the same URL and got totally different IP addresses. Tracing route to www.yahoo.akadns.net [216.109.117.109] over a maximum of 30 hops: 1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.0.1 2 * * * Request timed out. 3 8 ms 9 ms 9 ms ge-2-2-ur01.norristown.pa.panjde.comcast.net [68.86.216.237] 4 48 ms 9 ms 9 ms po10-ur02.norristown.pa.panjde.comcast.net [68.86.209.102] 5 21 ms 17 ms 12 ms po21-ar01.wallingford.pa.panjde.comcast.net [68.86.209.106] 6 13 ms 11 ms 12 ms po90-ar01.401nbroadst.pa.panjde.comcast.net [68.86.208.29] 7 15 ms 16 ms 16 ms 68.86.211.14 8 13 ms 14 ms 14 ms 12.119.53.49 9 15 ms 18 ms 14 ms tbr2-p012401.phlpa.ip.att.net [12.123.137.49] 10 17 ms 16 ms 16 ms tbr1-cl9.wswdc.ip.att.net [12.122.2.85] 11 17 ms 16 ms 18 ms gar1-p300.ascva.ip.att.net [12.123.8.49] 12 * * * Request timed out. 13 19 ms 19 ms 18 ms ae1.p400.msr1.dcn.yahoo.com [216.115.96.181] 14 17 ms 19 ms 18 ms ge9-3.bas2-m.dcn.yahoo.com [216.109.120.155] 15 18 ms 19 ms 19 ms p24.www.dcn.yahoo.com [216.109.117.109] Trace complete. __________________ If TSF has helped you, Tell us about it! or Donate to help keep the site up! Microsoft MVP - Windows Desktop Experience

05-26-2005, 07:35 PM	#13 (permalink)
JamesO Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: Fairfax, VA USA Posts: 2,289 OS: 98SE, W2k Pro, XP Pro	Unfortunately, Yahoo, Google and some of the other heavily used web sites tend to use distributed web hosting/caching and sometimes dynamic load sharing on the DNS. It appears that Yahoo uses Akamai, this is where the akadns.net comes into play. This can make for some unusual trace routes and unrealistic ping response times if the web mirrors are on site at the ISP. See this link, may offer some interesting insight! http://www.cse.nd.edu/~surendar/teac...s/Lecture7.pdf I will look for a single hosted web site to use for future trace routes and pings, as this will give some consistent results. JamesO Last edited by JamesO; 05-26-2005 at 07:43 PM.

05-27-2005, 06:15 PM	#14 (permalink)
johnwill Manager, Networking Forums Join Date: Sep 2002 Location: S.E. Pennsylvania, US Posts: 41,720 OS: Windows 7, XP-Pro, Vista, Linux Blog Entries: 1	You're right James, I totally forgot about large distributed sites. __________________ If TSF has helped you, Tell us about it! or Donate to help keep the site up! Microsoft MVP - Windows Desktop Experience