[Tech] Internet Connection Problems

[Dragon]

Guys, I need your help!

Since several months now I have a constantly arising problem with disconnects of my internet connection. This makes most onlinegames unplayable. Around evere 15 to 30 minutes my Internet shuts itself down for about 1 or 2 minutes throwing me out of every Warcraft, Starcraft or whatever game and leaving behind sad teammates who then can't win the game anymore as they are vastly outnumbered.
(Right as I wrote this, I had a disconnect, too, but thats what I have Copy&Paste for )
Strangely during the nighttime the span of disconnects thins out a bit to only one disconnect every 90 to 120 minutes. ( 1 1/2 - 2 hours )
As and additional information I can tell you, that we have a constantly changing Ip over here (thanks to my father being a greedy bastard).

In desperate need for help,
Dragon

 

[thatbloke]

If your IP is changing every 30 mins then you need to tell your ISP to stop it - every time your IP changes your net connection will be reset to allocate your router a new IP address.

Also check your router, if you have a different router then try that. It may be that your router is resetting periodically and that is what is actually causing your IP address to change all the time - because your router resets itself then it has to talk to your ISP's hardware to get a new IP so it can connect to the net.

Another thing to check - (btw I am assuming you are on a DSL connection with a router here) make sure that EVERY phone socket in your house has a microfilter connected to it. This is regardless of whether you actually have a phone plugged into that socket. If you were to plug a phone into that phone socket and you could dial out from that phone socket, put a microfilter into that phone socket. You don't need to have anything else connected to that socket for it to be interfering with your line.

Make sure the router is connected to the master phone socket in your house.
Check/replace/remove any extension cables you are using to connect your router to the phone socket.

 

[elDiablo]

I'm gonna put my money behind thatbloke's idea of your ISP kicking you off every 30 minutes. Especially if it thins out during the night. Who are you with, and what package do you have? If you have a dynamic IP, and it's a smallish or bastardish ISP, they will be kicking you as the number of people they are trying to provide service to is probably more than their number of IPs. If it's every 30 minutes for a few minutes, it sounds like they are cycling users to keep people in the IP pool.

If it is, tell they to give you a static IP (might cost you £5 extra a month or so) or get a new ISP. The only way to get good service is to leave bad providers. Sad, but true.

 

[Ronin Storm]

I think when Dragon refers to a "constantly changing IP" he means his IP is dynamically allocated, which is common for larger ISPs or cheaper DSL.

You might find that part of your network is malfunctioning and flooding your router, especially if you have torrents running somewhere in the background. Anything else running over your network? How's everything plugged together?

 

[Dragon]

I think when Dragon refers to a "constantly changing IP" he means his IP is dynamically allocated, which is common for larger ISPs or cheaper DSL.

Thats exactly the case.

Concerning the aspect of a broken router: No, we don't have a second one. Allthough I think if it was for the router being broken, then there wouldn't be less disconnects during nighttime, right?

Concerning that microfilterthingie ... whats that? ^^" I don't have any idea and have never heard of that before.

And maybe I can persuade my father to give me all information about our internet provider. But what I know for sure is that I won't be able to make him pay any extra money. (He's fine with those disconnects and, as said before, a greedy bastard )

EDIT: Oh, and of course, thanks for the help so far!

EDIT 2:

You might find that part of your network is malfunctioning and flooding your router, especially if you have torrents running somewhere in the background. Anything else running over your network? How's everything plugged together?

We have 3 computers (sometimes a fourth via WLAN) connected to the router by cable. The router is connected to the DSL modem which is connected to a spreader for telephone and internet. In the lower storey there is a second phone socket, which is not connected to the spreader. The network consist of those 3/4 computers mentioned before, a network laser printer and eventual laptops connected via WLAN.

What I found out is that if the internet connection breaks, it is broken for all people in our network (the router showing that there is no internet connection) but the telephone is still working.

 

[Traxata]

The router is connected to the DSL modem which is connected to a spreader for telephone and internet. In the lower storey there is a second phone socket, which is not connected to the spreader.

Microfilter is that "spreader thingie" you described

 

[thatbloke]

Microfilter is that "spreader thingie" you described

Not necessarily - This could simply be a case of there not being enough microfilters to go around.

A microfilter is a small adapter that would have come with your router (most nowadays come with more than one). This adaptor plugs directly into your main phone socket and has on it two sockets, one for the phone and one for the phone cable from your router.

This little box, while not seeming to do much, actually filters out all interference that could stop your internet connection from going down.

Let me ask you: If you are on the internet and someone calls your phone, does your internet stop working while the phone call is in progress? If so, then you need to make sure that you have one of these microfilters plugged into every LIVE phone socket in your house, whether or not anything is actually plugged into those sockets.

When I say live phone socket, I mean ANY phone socket in your house that you could plug a phone into right now and you would get a dialling tone from it.

 

[Traxata]

Not necessarily - This could simply be a case of there not being enough micro filters to go around.

Bloke, Dragon didn't know what you meant by microfilter, his terminology for our jargon in laymen's terms is "spreader thingie" I'm just trying to bridge the gap so Dragon understands what the hell you're going on about.

 

[Ronin Storm]

Concerning the aspect of a broken router: No, we don't have a second one. Allthough I think if it was for the router being broken, then there wouldn't be less disconnects during nighttime, right?

You say this has been going on for months, yes?

Presumably, before that, on the same equipment, everything was working okay?

To me, that reduces the likelihood it's anything to do with wiring or micro-filters, though there's always a chance a cable has become badly twisted or trapped or loose.

The most likely situation, I believe, is that your router is failing. Why would the pattern vary? Different types of load at different times. It may be a case of overheating in certain components or even, perversely, overheating causing a reduction in the symptoms. Consumer electronics are almost designed to fail.

Beyond that, you've got your ISP connection which involves your phone line, the local exchange, the magic that happens from your exchange to your ISP and the terminating modems at your ISP. Of those, your line and the exchange are the highest likelihood of problems though if your ISP is overloaded they may be having trouble maintaining stable connections or have a misconfiguration that just drops your connection.

When your connection goes down can you bring it back up straight away?

These sort of issues are always painful to debug. I ended up buying new hardware and changing ISPs and even then can found it's nothing to do with either and it's all down to one PC's network card malfunctioning and syn-flooding the network at random intervals.