internet failed with X2 dual bonded lines

[neilh]

I’ve been a sonic customer since the days of ISDN in the 90’s - the early DSL. Of course I switched to Sonic’s excellent fusion service early on.
Some years ago (5?) I upgraded to Fusion X2 and rented Sonic’s equipment Pace 5268AC .
Part of my reasoning was that with two bonded DSL lines and sonic specified equipment, a single failure on a line should keep the internet working.
Well this assumption provided to be false.
I had a complete failure of my internet access –both physical lines apparently not able to transmit data – which as a telecom equipment designer/engineer is not expected. Typically the assumption is there is one physical failure at a time – in this case my Voice line running on ATT lines got co-opted.
The other data line should still have worked but didn’t - so was it two co-opted lines at ATT or a Sonic equipment setup failure.
I’m curious if anybody else has this experience?.

Diary of events
Oct 7th Wed 12:30 Sonic Internet failed and no dialtone – Called support@sonic One hour discussion with a friendly support, checking the lines, but not able to get data through the lines. The 2nd data line did indicate it had SYNC, but no data. The sonic support put a ticket on Voice line and then data line . Possibly putting a ticket on the data line was a mistake at this point.
Oct 9th Fri am ATT Linesman Ticket for Data line ~ couldn’t find anything wrong, escalated it I think
Oct 10th Sat am ATT Different linesman looking at the Data line again – hadn’t got ticket for Voice line. Said the voice line did have battery on it.
Oct 10 Sat pm Called Support@sonic and couldn’t figure out when ATT would come for voice line. Downgraded Sonic service to X1 for only voice line X1.
Oct 12 Mon am ATT different linesman – fixed it. He said he had replaced wire pair. I'm very happy voice and internet back
Oct 17 Sat – got true physical line data backup from 2nd service provider, My Synology RT2600 router supports dual WAN.
Oct 18th Email from support@sonic saying that “The AT&T notes indicate that the circuit had gotten co-opted and switched to another pair in error by another tech at the junction box. They got restored continuity and got the circuit going once again at that point. The battery he must have heard was from an entirely different circuit on either their or our DSLAM.”

[syntaxsid1]

Hello,

We sincerely apologize for that experience. This situation is absolutely rare as most of the upgrades or downgrades go much smoother than that. The main issue was the coopted line that was delivered to the wrong circuit at a junction box "upstream" from you. Sonic can handle an issue at your phone box on the side of the house if the trouble is found there. Anything beyond that box to the pole and onward from there would be 100% AT&T territory since they don't allow us to work on their exterior lines. Since the issue was at the junction box and this work was done by AT&T, the failure would be with them unfortunately. We're sorry for the trouble with that and hope this clarifies. Thank you for your patience with this. Has everything been working fine for you since the work was completed on 10/16? We look forward to your response. Have a great day.


All the best,

Jeff M.

[neilh]

What I'm observing is that I had TWO physical lines ~ Dual BONDED. Both where working and then, one physical line being Coopted by an ATT technician I can see is a mistake, and outside of Sonic's control.

Its the 2ND line that I'm suggesting should have carried on working and seems unlikely that it would have failed at the same time. Just an observation. There wasn't any guaranteed level of service with TWO lines, but I just don't see how the 2nd line would have physically failed at the same time through the same mistake.

Now my sonic account only has ONE physical line as I downgraded it, and I've got another suppliers physical redundancy.

[syntaxsid1]

Hello,

Sorry for the late response. On X2 service, they are not necessarily individual lines. Both lines are "bonded" together so if you have a clean line and a dirty one is delivered, this can inadvertently effect the "clean" one. This happens at times and the solution would be to get AT&T back out there to test both lines with us, find the culprit one and swap that out for a new/alternate wire pair. Once both lines are free of errors the service works as intended. We're sorry you struggled with that and hope that this clarifies what happened.

Kind Regards,

Jeff M.

[neilh]

Appreciate the response.

Interesting that though they are separate physical lines, they weren't able to be managed as separate lines by the Pace 5268AC. Typically, a random co-option on a pair of ATT wires , is only likely to affect one pair of lines at a a time. I did go with Sonic equipment and rented the recommended equipment over the years, so that if anything like this happened it would be all sonic supplied solution. I seem to remember checking it that it would work with either line down - but maybe I'm wrong. Certainty DSL crosstalk has to be continuously characterized to be able to manage it, the equipment does report on both lines the signal to noise.

As a telecom equipment designer I designed some fiber equipment that would provide a level of service that would survive single breakages, and I 'm just pointing out that the X2 failed to keep me connected. As a result of this, tor my location I'm going with another internet provider on cable so I get better redundant backup, and this turns out, its a lot faster.
ATT is also coming in with fiber on the next street over. Sonic is not providing details of where its fiber is being installed.

[syntaxsid1]

We are building out our Fiber Network in Petaluma and some parts of Cotati already but we just started installing our infrastructure there just before COVID hit so that slowed our build out somewhat. If AT&T builds their Fiber there sooner than us, we may be able to "resell" that Fiber so you could stay with Sonic. AT&T Fiber is more expensive than Sonic's own proprietary Fiber but this would be more of a "stop gap" until we do have our Fiber in your area. It would be the same service you get through AT&T but when the service is through us there are no monthly data caps so you don't have to worry about going over your monthly "allotted usage" and get billed for additional data usage. We will still offer unlimited data so you can use as much as you want whenever you want and you would also maintain using us with our privacy policy and net neutrality stance intact. These are some of the main reasons why our customers stay with us aside from our local (not outsourced to other countries) support team which takes much less effort to get through to us so we help you quicker. When AT&T gets their Fiber installed there, just give us a call to see if they are sharing those lines with us in your location and we can get you moved over as soon as we can. I hope this information helps.