Appauling BB in France

[smurkin]

Here in France I have Orange DSL with a livebox - the service is appaling - it disconnects frequently, and when it does, I also lose my DSL telephone. For a while, there was no service between 7pm and 7am. I know other people with the same problems and its not just l limted to me

I asked orange and France telecom to repair it - which they were supposed to have done (they said there was a fault on the line) - but there has been no change.

So I have been monitoring the connection using a ping to orange.fr - the attachments show ping at 1 minute intervals. First thing I notice is that the ping is never below 50 ms - which is appaling for DSL. The second thing is that at about every 10 mins, the ping hits the roof, and this is the most likely time for the connection to the router to drop.

Does anyone have any ideas what is going on here? Could it be that the french internet infrastructure is just broken? I am guessing that the regular increases in pings are not just due to a bad line......

 

[Dudley52]

I used to be with Orange. The service they provided was terrible. I phoned them several times but it was never right, was always disconnecting.

Now I'm with Be I have no problems what so ever.

 

[cHodAX]

Hmm, line conditions could be the problem bud, either look into some kind of bell wire fix (if it exists on French lines) or perhaps a high quality microfilter.

http://www.broadbandbuyer.co.uk/Shop/ShopDetail.asp?ProductID=1652

A French verison of that if available.

 

[smurkin]

Aye, I did try three different microfilters - French ones are not of this planet - they are a big hunk of mis-shapen stuff, made from some sort of bakelight or bone, or something, and they don't fit in with ROW.

I can't understand why the connection goes stink every 10 mins - like clockwork. I already disconnected all of the other devices in the house. I even opened up the burgular alarm to check the phone line was not connected.

 

[Chilly]

is your connection from pc to router OK?

 

[smurkin]

I can't say for sure. But the router drops connection even when the pc is not connected accordong to the lights on the front.

 

[caLLous]

Which bit of France are you in smurkin?

Firstly be thankful that you have ADSL in France! There are still a huge number on dialup (villages too far away from exchanges because there's just so much damn room between the larger towns) including me.

Having said that, a friend had a Livebox with Orange which I regularly abused. It was good except for a 2 or 3 week period where it was doing exactly what you describe. Frequent disconnections and CRC errors were through the roof. I can't remember what the problem was but it was something to do with synchronisation.

Have a look at this, it won't really help with your problem but it's an interesting read anyway. I'm not sure how unbiased it is but it will tell you how shite the French way of doing things can be. And pitfalls to avoid.

Anyway, I will try to remember what the term for the problem was. Incidentally, she is now with SFR and hasn't had a single problem.

Edit - Are you aware that Orange have an English speaking helpline? I'm only saying it because when my friend had her problems, she didn't know the technical knowledge to be able to tell the guy what was happening and I didn't have the French. So it was much easier for me to call the English one. Either way, the number (from a French phone) is 0800 364775.

Edit 2 - And yes, the French microfilters are a thing to behold.. sometimes it feels like the entire French telephony system is still clambering out of the 70's.

 

[smurkin]

Thanks for that, CaLLous - quite a useful read. I'm actually on the French-Swiss border near Basel, and there are a few major towns quite near - so theres no excuse for the line sitting in a pond) although nonthing would surprise me). I have used the english speaking line, but they didn't fix the problem.

The frustrating part is that one mile away in swiztzerland, the internet is outstanding. Here in France, I can trace pings within the country, and the latency is appaling. I'm actually considering dumping DSL and going for swiss wireless broadband through a sim. Its just the cost thats prohibitive.

 

[Scouse]

caL - you missed out a smiley at the end of one of your paragraphs above

 

[caLLous]