Internet Keeps Dropping

[Pguy]

I tried unplugging modem and 3rd party router.

This problem seems to happen more frequently. I am now entering the info into my phone (notes) - time/day of disconnection and duration.

It went down Tuesday and now today. I don't recall how long it was out last time. Maybe 30 min or 1 hr total?

I also use a wifi Smart TV.

It has reconnected a few times only to drop 5 mins (estimate) later. Sometimes the speed is normal but often, the connection is at a much lower speed suggesting a problem.

I am wondering if there's an issue.

*Added Labels*

[PizzaBear]

@doctor80
@JohnGM

I also dropped at 9:30am this morning!!

[carolynfs]

I have exactly the same problem; have had several different recommendations from Rogers agents and technicians, but none seems to resolve the problem.  Now they are talking about relocating the modem, but I don't see how that will resolve the issue as  it will likely make plugging one computer into the modem by ethernet cable not feasible, and that is my current backup for having no internet on another computer.  Also, sometimes the computer on wifi has fast internet; i.e., over 50 mbps, and other times it has a speed in kbps to less than 5 mbps.  This is very frustrating and also jeopardizing presentations that I need to give from home.  I've spoken to others with similar problems.  Please let me know if you have a solution. 

[carolynfs]

Just had a conversation about the problem with the Rogers technician sent to move the modem.  He advised me that wi-fi is always unatable - explaining the huge variations that I'm seeing on wi-fi when the ethernet connected computer appears to experience so issues.  He agreed that moving the modem was unlikely to resolve the issue, and suggested that the only fix is to plug my computer via ethernet cable directly into the modem.  Unfortunatey, I am about 22 linear feet from the modem which is 2 rooms, 3 walls and a stairway entrance away, and would likely require a cable that was 60+ feet in length - a tripping hazard if it's  on the floor - to get around corners, doorways and walls.  I will be following up with Rogers technical support to find a solution that can work in this house.

[-G-]

@carolynfs  WiFi can be problematic.  It isn't inherently unstable and can perform exceptionally well.  However, it is "fragile", since it uses unlicensed spectrum that can also be used for non-WiFi purposes, is prone to interference, the radio signal can be blocked by common building materials, and if you have a number of active network devices with poor-quality WiFi connections, they can degrade the network performance of a device that is only a short distance away from the WiFi gateway.

In order to get good WiFi performance, you kinda need to know how it works, its limitations and what can make it perform poorly: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/03/802-eleventy-what-a-deep-dive-into-why-wi-fi-...

You also need to adhere to best practices when installing it: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2020/02/the-ars-technica-semi-scientific-guide-to-wi-fi-access-point...

... and make sure that you are not using the same channels/frequencies as your neighbours, or else their WiFi problems will become your WiFi problems as well.

Do you live in a house in a low-density neighbourhood or in a high-density area such as a downtown home or an apartment/condo with A LOT of neighbouring WiFi traffic?

[carolynfs]

Rogers installed our wi-fi when we got Ignite.

We live in an old (abour 100 years) 2 story house; immediate neighbours are also houses and have mostly Bell service although I'm sure that some have Rogers.  I suspect that most neighbours are using wi-fi.

There does not seem to be any pattern to the times when service degrades or disappears; this can happen in the middle of the day or 2 a.m..

[GuyWiththeHat]

@carolynfs.  Troubleshooting Wifi issues is an exercise in frustration.  Arstechnica has an article that they published at the beginning of the pandemic:  Your COVID-19 Internet problems might be COVID-19 Wi-Fi problems | Ars Technica  that can help with this (they lean hard on mesh networks as a solution).

I've used an application called WiFiman (from Ubiquiti) on a tablet to do a WiFi survey and see signal strengths when troubleshooting WiFi issues in the past.

A wire is the best way to connect but I understand the challenges of getting a wire to where your computer is.

Rogers also has a troubleshooting document regarding Wifi that I haven't read that techs have referenced me to.  Unfortunately, I'm experiencing issues with a wired connection.

Frustrated Customer

[MisterPinst]

@vikas-arora That's great to hear! I'm 20 days and counting (since Dec 18th) with a solid connection on the Technicolor XB6. I think I might have had a short disconnect last night of about 5 seconds, but that's the worst I've seen in around 3 weeks.

I've been monitoring 24x7 with PingPlotter and ping traces. I might have an OCD problem. 🙂

Would love to hear if you have issues going forward. Are you running in Gateway or bridged mode?

[vikas-arora]

@MisterPinst happy to hear that yours is running without any troubles as well! I don't have my monitoring machine connected to the router because Technicolor XB6 has only two ethernet ports and I would have to move some equipment to be able to spare one port for the monitoring machine. Also, I had kind of developed an OCD to keep checking its logs every couple of hours - don't want to get back to that same state again 😀

However, I am quite glad that my connection is most stable that it has been in several months now. I guess CODA wasn't able to handle OFDMA in upstream properly. I have exact same setup as before - Technicolor XB6 in gateway mode and my Netgear Orbi in AP mode. XB6 seems to be a pretty good device. It has almost all the features that my Orbi has, and I can control it using an app as well. If this works well for me then I might not even enable bridge mode in XB6 at all.

One thing that I noticed with XB6 is that it appears to have different QoS characteristics as compared to CODA. I regularly used fast.com to check my connection speed and ever since I have switched to XB6 it no longer hits the peak throughput with default settings. I have to edit settings on fast.com to increase the number of streams to hit the peak throughput. Maybe there are some QoS rules to limit the throughput on each Netflix (fast dot com is provided by Netflix) stream.  Or it is just a coincidence that Rogers started to throttle fast.com just when I switched my connection to ignite Or maybe it is just due to some changes in CMTS for Ignite customers.

[Tmhage]

My Arris XB6 modem loses connection multiple times per day and then reboots itself (orange flashing etc). Is this what the modem is always doing when losing connection?

It happened maybe once or twice per day before, but today has been brutal, just every 10 minutes all day long. 

Does this sound familiar to anybody?

[davidair]

Another update on my end - it's been seven days and smooth sailing so far with 1Gbps service from Acanac using the TC 4400 modem (with the exception of daily ~10x latency degradation at around 8-9pm that my provider acknowledged as a known infrastructure problem). This trade-off works for me since ultimately I've gotten (so far) a stable connection I can trust.

[PizzaBear]

I experienced connection issues again at around 1:25pm today.

[GuyWiththeHat]

Today has been a rather frustrating day.

Going through the second bout of disconnections for the day.  Dropped connections to the first hop from my modem (99.254.22.1).

1/8/2021 12:59:31 PM - Request timed out.
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Nothing in the event log on the modem regarding the disconnects.  Right now I'm considering doing as others have and moving to another provider that can supply consistent Internet.

BTW.  I did engage Rogers through the 'Share a concern' (

https://www.rogers.com/consumer/contactus/share-a-concern) route and didn't hear anything back from that channel.

Frustrated Customer

[davidair]

One more update - given that my internet problems were resolved by switching providers (ultimately, staying on the same physical last-mile infrastructure but changing modems), I have decided to file a complaint using Rogers" share a concern" web form.

I have cited Rogers's inability to solve the problem over two months of interactions with support and I have requested refund of service fees during the duration of the problem. I have mentioned the unreasonable amount of time and money I had to spend to solve the problem (conversations with support, developing monitoring software, purchasing additional hardware) as additional justification. I have also cited this thread in my complaint.

Given that I am no longer a customer, I will be satisfied if Rogers refunds my service fees. Otherwise I would feel obliged to file a formal CCTS complaint.

Good look to all of you folks dealing with similar situations, I know this is hard and frustrating, especially amidst the pandemic!

[tulowindow]

Hey all, 

You may remember me from this thread about a month ago where I was in here complaining everyday about my micro disconnects. Well, eventually OFDMA was disabled and those completely stopped. It's pretty clear to see that it was the culprit. I had relatively smooth sailing internet for almost a month. I only had one disconnect that lasted about 5 minutes. I can deal with that occasionally. However, now a new issue has cropped up. During day time hours my connection is absolutely terrible. It's not unusable for browsing because it doesn't disconnect and maintains relatively good speed, but my latency jumps all over the place, all day long. Spiking. I basically can't play any ping dependent video games until after midnight. Rogers has got to be the most inconsistent and terrible internet of all time. Hope you're all having success with your various issues. I'm basically going to need to find an alternative. I've had enough and customer service doesn't care.

tulo

[carolynfs]

Other than a momentary loss of internet one day, plugging an ethernet cable directly into my laptop has allowed me a more reliable connection to the internet.  However, having a cable trailing over the 20 to 25 feet between my home office and the modem in another home office is both inconvenient and potentially a tripping hazard.  I wish that the wi-fi service were more reliable.  In addition, the TV service was interrupted (freezing pictures, loss of sound) last Sunday from 9 to 10 p.m..  Rebotting the TV box did help, and I don't know whether this issue was related to wi-fi challenges. 

[SuperStacks742]

Hi all,

Is this supposed to be normal to have 15-30% packet loss at the modem and the point beyond? I've been running this for about 45 min.

 ***Link Removed for Privacy***

Similar to OP, i am having micro disconnects where my internet randomly drops at any point during the day. It disconnects for about 1 minute then connects for about 10 seconds before dropping again. It repeats itself for about 5 times before it stops for the rest of the day. Happens maybe every 1-2 days. Really frustrating to have it happen since August last year with many calls to Rogers and technicians showing up.

[PizzaBear]

@SuperStacks742 

we have all been experiencing this issue that you mention.. its due to the OFDMA being enabled. I believe you can check your cable modem signal page and near the bottom it should tell if it is in disabled or operate mode. I assume its operate, and hence why you have been experiencing these issues.

I've had multiple tickets, multiple line being monitor requested, multiple tech visits, and all has not been able to resolve my issue.

It is totally ridiculous that we all have to put up with this and getting absolutely no help to resolving this. I went to share a concern, and guess what, they replied that it is best to work with technical support. Technical support level 1 never seems to find anything wrong and blames it on my home networking equipment when I have done enough isolation test to know it isn't my own router. Not to mention how many times I ran using Rogers in gateway mode and still experience the same issues. 

At this point, I also think there is zero hope of getting this properly addressed by Rogers. Switching provider may be the only solution.

"some" people has been with better luck, switching to Rogers ignite wifi plan, but only with the Technicolor modems. However, I refuse to pay extra to Rogers in my monthly payment to resolve this issue which is clearly due to a Rogers infrastructure issue.

[SuperStacks742]

@PizzaBear 

Oh wow. I just checked the signal page on the modem and i see the OFDMA enabled on channel 0 but disabled on channel 1. I didn't think such a feature could cause such a large headache for months on end without resolution.

At this point, i don't think it would get solved either considering how long it is happening. If rogers isn't able to fix this problem, i would hate to pay more and get the same crazy service as what i'm getting now with Ignite.

Much appreciated for your help.

[carolynfs]

I have Ignite and am using Roger's modem.  My internet was still dropping regularly when I was using wi-fi to connect to the internet.  After the last technician advised wi-fi would always be unstable even if I relocated the modem, I followed his advice and connected my laptop via a 50 foot ethernet cable to the Roger's modem.  I had one instantaneous drop but reliable internet since then.  Unfortunately the cable presents a major tripping hazard, so I will either have to disconnect it when not using the computer, or have someone reroute it so that it is off the ground and ideally not an eyesore.  The other house laptop is in the same home office with the modem and also connected via ethernet cable. When the internet dropped via wi-fi on my laptop, the other laptop connected via ethernet cable continued to be connected to the laptop.  Unfortunately, this solution will not work if / when I need to use the laptop elsewhere at home.

[-G-]

---

@SuperStacks742 wrote:

@PizzaBear 

At this point, i don't think it would get solved either considering how long it is happening. If rogers isn't able to fix this problem, i would hate to pay more and get the same crazy service as what i'm getting now with Ignite.

---

Ignite Internet is based on the exact same cable Internet technology as the legacy Rogers Internet service.  The only thing that will be different is the modem, and you may or may not consider it an improvement.

[davidair]

This is probably going to be a final update for me:

1. Since I switched away from Rogers, I've experienced bouts of high latency but no observable drops of connectivity, so I am considering this a win (not sure if it's just the new TC4400 modem - my last mile is still Rogers infra anyway).

2. Rogers has acknowledged my request to refund the last two months of service fees - I therefore consider the matter resolved.