Looking for working DSL equipment

[jrodman]

Trying to get my sonic.net DSL connection up again in a good state.

I have a *quite* long run, and only really want bridged 500Kbps that works reliably without my ISP blocking/shaping my packets and screwing up routing regularly (AT&T & Comcast).

I've had degraded service since a week before Thanksgiving.

I believe what happened is some kind of power fluctuation damaged the old ZTE (I lost power at the time). It's never been the same since, lacking in sync or having trouble syncing, or steadily getting worse over time.

Sonic staffers said it might take 5 business days to get a replacement, and that it required a *rental*. So I purchased replacement equipment myself the next day.. two different models.

The two different models (netgear) were never able to establish sync in any reliable fashion (for around a week there was no sync, leading me to believe the line was misconfigured in initial troubleshooting.) We went down the route of sending out staff to test at the MPOE. There was no sync with known good modem, so AT&T was called, etc. Fingers were pointed, tears poured.

In the end, poking at the line configuration made the netgear equipment work. Sort of. Only no bridging.

So I bought two Actiontecs which were considered good quality DSL modems. Yay bridging!
Only they don't have reliable sync.

So I tried the ZTE again, which would work flawlessly for like a day. Then start failing again.

So I bought a Pace 411N, as mentioend by a tech on the phone, which are supposed to be snazzy and Dane Jasper says are much higher quality (it came with a very robust phone cord and all, which I like). But it came with some flash-load from AT&T that doesn't want to work. I can't even figure out what IP address it might respond to. Anyone know?

Sonic says "we didn't flash it so we can't help you" on the phone. Oh, thanks for letting me know this ahead of time.

At the moment the Netgear basically works although it briefly drops link every so many hours, and the static IP address I pay for don't work.

Does anyone have any ways out of this mess?

Are there DSL devices that work very reliably and do bridging for sale?

Does anyone know how to configure an AT&T provided Pace 411N. Their manual was .. not a manual at all. No solid information is on the internet anywhere I can find it.

Are there other troubleshooting steps I should have been undertaking? I've tried various devices, cables, splitters, and removing other phone equipment. I've tried using a battery operated AM radio to look for EF noise (nothing notable, but as ethernet and power cables are both detectable, I've ensured neither is anywhere near any phone cables). In the room where the DSL is plugged in there are zero other electronics devices even powered on. Not even lights. The power to the devices is now running through an active USB (battery in-ilne).

Nothing is working.

At this point I'm willing to seriously consider finding another ISP in the area, provided there are any who do not require rentals and are able to provide a working link. So suggestions in this area are welcome as well (It's an apartment, so certain installations like line-of-sight wireless may be difficult).

[jrodman]

Update, found magic ip address not in the manual anywhere: 192.168.1.254

Got Pace 4111n configured to not expect PPPoE.
Got DSL syncing.
Got Pace set to bridging mode (required two configuration steps, first disable PPPoE then switch to bridging.. such bad code.)

However, Pace does not believe internet is up.

What more could it want? If DSL is working and it's set to bridge and to not need to login... Isn't it done?

In the status page we get the following:

DSL Synchronization UP

G. DMT ATM Signal UP

PVC Connection Could not find an ATM circuit

So I guess although the G.DMT link is operating, the ATM that's run over it is not in agreement? Or something?

This appears to be more detail about its attempts to search for same:

pm_bb_apvc
Dependency State: CLIMBING
Link State: CLIMBING
Link Detail: NET_SEARCH
Timeout: 316707
File Descriptor flags: 00000001
Reported error string:
File Descriptor State: Count: 10 Active: 8 Events: 27

Module State Change History:
To State DOWN at 00:01:03.66

AUTO PVC state searching, searchtype 0
Final Encap: 0
Final VPI: 0
Final VCI: 0
Prefered set: 1 0/35
MAC 28:16:2e:58:ee:a0
Always up: false

Search list: 0/35,8/35,0/43,0/51,0/59,8/43,8/51,8/59
Backoff count: 32
Service Types:
PPPoE:

Search list:
PVC: 0/35 8/35 0/43 0/51 0/59 8/43 8/51 8/59
TX count: 97 97 97 97 96 96 96 96
RX errors: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
RX unknowns: 957 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
RX unwanted: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
RX ok: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Overall, I'm not very impressed with this device.

• Lots of settings are not available (arbitrarily).
• You can't set the LAN IP to something convenient (like matching the other devices i'm shuffling around).
• There doesn't seem to be a clear way to turn off the firewall.
• There are various settings that if you pick them and save are set back to the prior value without any explanation
• There is no proper documentation
• Overall, this device was designed to subvert its owner, and obey some third party (the ISP) without even clearly admitting what it's doing.

[dane]

When you switched from PPPoE to DHCP, did that work? Or did you skip right to bridge mode?

[jrodman]

Neither worked. The device is claiming a lack of a virtual circuit. Isn't that a blocker?

[dane]

Odd. I have heard of customers using Pace equipment from other carriers on our network, simply by switching from PPPoE to bridging. But, there is no telling how ATT had the device custom configured for their network.

[jrodman]

When the topic of the rental program was initially undesirably raised, and we discussed the equipment used, I discussed the topic of the external model names for the pace equipment with sonic staff. There was no mention of this matter of custom firmware loads. Certainly that was a missed opportunity to be clear about this issue.

At this point, I certainly have a device which is the same device as the one that you send to your customers, so it should be a simple matter of providing the load that you send to the box.

Unfortunately it seems that for some reason Sonic is unwilling or unable to do this.

I'm not sure if the contracts with AT&T/Pace are unconscionable, or whether the device is considered fundamentally insecure so flashing it to the desired state is somehow problematic. Either way the situations is unpalatable.

[dane]

Unable. The devices are customized for each service provider, and tied into a dedicated management system. So, we can manage and upgrade only units which are owned by Sonic.net. AT&T has management access to a unit you buy for their ISP.

All of that said, I know we have customers who signed up before our equipment program was in place who brought over Pace/2Wire equipment from other carriers with success. Typically, a change to DHPC on the WAN side is all that is required.

[cduran]

jrodman,
Have you tried disabling PVC search and manually setting the VP/VC to 0/35?

We identified a bug in the 4111N's handling of bridged mode on our static fusion circuits and are actively pushing a firmware update to our devices in the field to address that bug. That being said, non-Sonic 4111Ns will not be configured to call home to our ACS, and as a result will not receive this firmware update.

My above suggestion is a confirmed workaround for our Pace hardware, and I suspect it will work for you too.