Dect phone kills netgear router SNR

[ARRANPILOT]

Hello forum,

- yes, I am a newbie here - so hello everyone. I wonder if you can help me?

I have searched the FAQs here - no joy. So here's what I have got. I am on BTBroadband option 3, and have had a long history of dropouts, and poor line speed, so three weeks ago, I decided it was time to explore.

I have now moved the router to be adjacent to the phone line entry point, and phone and ethernet cables through the house are shielded. I have changed to an ADSL Nation face plate, and I am getting good base speed through the router - I am a long way from the exchange, but get 3500 plus, SNR 12.

Now - here's the fun bit. Since I started to use Routerstats, I have noticed two things.

1. I have an oldish Binatone Dect phone system, and all I have to do is to pick up one of the handsets, and start to dial, and the SNR falls through the floor, sometimes disconnecting the router altogether. Result - big stick form BT - IP profile reset to anywhere between 150 and 350. Ouch! Using a normal phone is fine.

2. I notice too that when one of my PCs at home connects top the DG834, it also hits the SNR, almost to the point of disconnection.

What whould I do now?

Do I change the router? Change my phone: Get rid of Dect, and go back to wired handsets?

ADSL24 - any ideas?

Thanks for your help - I am too embarrassed to tell you how many hours of my life this has consumed.

Arranpilot.

[Beta_Tester]

This is either related to an interference problem with your DECT phones (as you rightly suggest) or something like a high resistance fault on your line (when you pick up the phone the sudden voltage surge knocks out the ADSL signal).

I would suggest that you use a corded phone (at least whilst you are testing) and plug it and your router into the BT Test socket.

Do you get SNR drops then?

[tonys]

Like Betatester said .....

I also have a DG834. I had problems with an old DECT phone when I first got broadband but since getting newer phones I've not noticed any problems. Have you disconnected the bellwires - and (this may sound daft) have you tried moving your DECT base station to another phone/power point?

[James]

As others say, it could well just be a faulty phone or one that is using part of the ADSL frequency when it should not be.

Plug 1 filter in to the BT test socket and from that plug the phone in and the router - does it still happen?

[ARRANPILOT]

Thank you all who have come back to me.

Yes, I have tried moving the base stations around the house - same issue, and I have pared back the wiring in my house as suggested. With a corded (pulse!) phone - there is no issue. Trim phones all round my house then!!

I repeated the Dect test this morning, and my Routerstats showed a profile of the Rocky Mountains, quite spectacular, but not conducive to a good Internet experience - so I am gong shopping for a new Dect phone. Interestingly, my existing problem is not consistent. Some days I get just a minor SNR blip, and then this morning, the Rockies. See the attachment. Could that be something else that is masking the Dect issue sometimes?

I am now using a spare Router at the moment (Voyager 220V) - and interestingly, the issue that I had when one of my PCs connects does seem to have been resolved. Looks like a Netgear vulnerability there.

On we go - I will keep you updated, and thank you all once again for your feedback - much appreciated,

Mike.

[cliff]

Hi Arranpilot

I have been having issues regarding the dropping of my PPPoE and my profile being somewhat eratic.
Had the Netgear DG834GT router and even though the phone wiring was modernised by BT the PPPoE was dropping.

Changed my setup to an Airport Extreme Base Station with a Airport Express added in a WDS setup to give increased range, the airports require a modem which utilise the Vigor 100.(uses PPPoE not PPPoA) the filters used are AdslNation XF-1e filters.

With a complete change in setup, I was still experiencing the same issues. Had JamesL (ADSL24) run all the test possible and still Central Hopping Daily. Eventually traced the issue to the 'Panasonic Dect phone'. Have been rock solid over 8 days, not one drop out:)
The only issue is being stuck on Central 5:(


So very reluctant to even look at alternative Dects phones

[tonys]

One other thought. If you're getting crackles on your voice line it might be worth reporting a voice fault. When I started getting noise on my line a couple of years ago I reported it and within a few days my b'band connection became more stable. BT wouldn't confirm a fault so I can only guess they'd been doing something in the exchange and subsequently 'corrected' it.

[ARRANPILOT]

OK - time for an update.

First of all, many thanks to everyone for your support and help with ideas. I am delighted to be able to tell you that I think I have got to the bottom of the issue.

For 2 weeks, I pared back my wiring to the test socket, one dangly ADSL filer, and a phone (sometimes Dect; sometimes a conventional) and my router. Day after day I monitored my sorry line until one day I noticed that when the line disconnected and reconnected, there was no interference at all from any phone - conventional or Dect. On the next reconnection, the sensitivity to the phones would be back.... - I thought that this just HAS to be a line fault. I also used 17070, and at times, the noise on the line was deafening, and seemed to be associatd with the 'bad' connections. I had already had a voice (PSTN) engineer out, and as is most often the case, he had pronounced the line as OK. Now I called the BTBroadband team wiht renewed confidence, and convinced them that once daily dropouts was not sufficiently stable, and they sent out a BB engineer.

When the engineer arrived, I spent a good 10 to 15 minutes going through my notes, old 'routerstats' records (What a great poduct this is) and gave him the proof of my findings. He replied to me that a bad connection can cause leakage across into the BB signal from the voice frequencies. I am not a techie, but this fits with my experience.

As my estate was pronounced a 'buried' estate, options were limited on how to address the issue, and the first avenue was to try the 'other pair'. This was not in fact a change of footwear for the engineer, but a switch to using the incoming orange pair of wires, instead of the blue.

Now I got lucky. One visit up to the local connection box later, and using the new wiring I was monitoring a more stable line than I have ever had in 5 years of receiving ADSL. With Attenuation at 51dB, and 3.5 kM from the exchange, I am more than happy with the raw 3.7 Mb ADSL connection, and the now solid 3 Mb IP profile from BT that I am getting.

Interestingly, despite there have been no communication between the BB engineed, and BTBroadband as my ISP, my IP profile was unaffected by this exercise. Prior experience had been that when the line was dropped during my internal wiring changes; changing phones; changing routers - this caused the IP profile to be set to a draconian 135 kbps - ouch!!

Moral of the story?

1. Take ownership of resolving the issue yourself!!
2. Use 'Routerstats' to monitor the performance of your line/ router. I would not have understood the impact of my phone on the SNR without this. This is what convinced me it was a line fault.
3. Get lucky!!

Of course my issues may resurface, but until they do,

Good luck with improving your ADSL cnonections.

Cheers,

Mike.

PS : Anyone want a new router; a new Dect phone or 25 meters of Cat 6 cable?!!!

[Beta_Tester]

Sounds like good news to me. A bad connection can act like a diode, forcing the inaudible frequencies into the audible range, which makes the ADSL filters useless (as they are filtering the inaudible frequencies).

It's exactly the problem I had, except that the source of the problem was down to my pair not having enough insulation in the street cabinet.