My battle with Earthlink

Sun Feb 24 11:00:19 MST 2013

Derek,

I'd be curious what the results of the following tests are:

http://broadband.mpi-sws.org/transparency/bttest-mlab.php

http://www.psc.edu/index.php/npad/645-pathdiagserverinstall

http://www.internet2.edu/performance/ndt/

The second two have public servers you can use a client against.  Start
with the first one and do a compare of HTTP vs. SSH transfers.

I'm not sure what your terms of use are not what the ISP is claiming, but
if they say they aren't throttling an you can present evidence, escalate
until you can't. Ask for refunds, etc.

-Mike

On Feb 24, 2013, at 10:49 AM, Jason Spatafore <jason_online at spatafore.net>
wrote:

 Derek,

I think your best approach will be engage the tech when he's out with the
suspicion of throttling as being the root, and ask them if maybe they are
over-estimating the thresholds. 1MB is still a good connection but if it's
resulting in timeouts, maybe ask them if they can take the threshold to 3MB
for 2 weeks to see if you have a better experience. Once you get that
attention focused on the potential issue, most network admins (being
contacted by the tech) would be curious on why you experienced it and will
start digging a little more on their own to see if it's some other problem
that is causing the throttle to choke the line.

Your goal should be to engage and encourage them to look into it while
being their "test subject" in an "experiment". People typically eat up that
type of approach since it really appeals to their curious side, which is
what most-likely got them into network administration to begin with.

Remember, the technician is your gateway to the network admin. He'll
confirm all the physicals for the admin and yourself.

Just my two cents. Very interested in seeing how this challenge works out.

On 02/23/2013 06:31 PM, Derek Trotter wrote:

 The more I think about it, the more I think you're right.  I did some
usenet harvesting using encrypted connections and had no problem.  If only
I could call earthlink and get in touch with someone in this country.  I'm
guessing they don't tell their overseas tech support very much.

 On 02/23/2013 05:28 PM, Jason Spatafore wrote:

 This is a classic example of QoS usage.

The VPN connection doesn't experience the problem because the QoS settings
for VPN would have a no throttling policy attached. SSH would typically be
non-throttled as well.

On 02/17/2013 08:02 PM, Derek Trotter wrote:

 For several weeks I've had a problem with my earthlink dsl service.
Anytime I'm doing something that uses all or most of my downstream
bandwidth, all data coming into or going out of my apartment stops.  At the
same time I'm downloading something a series of updates for kubuntu and
listening to streaming audio, both stop.  If I'm using my windows box to
download something else, that too stops.  After a pause lasting anywhere
from a second or two to 15 or 20 seconds, the downloads resume.  A few
seconds later, there's another pause.  This cycle repeats itself until the
download is complete or I give up.

Each computer has two nics.  The problem persists no matter which one
either machine is using for it's internet connection.  If I remove the
router, connect the dsl modem directly to either computer, the problem
persists.  I even went to the closet and got the modem when I had dsl from
AT&T.  I set it to work with the earthlink service and the problem persists.

Saturday an AT&T technician was here, checked the line from the cord that
plugs into the dsl modem and says the line is in excellent shape and noise
levels are very low.  This is not surprising since I live less than 1/4
mile from AT&T's local office where all their equipment is.

Since I've tried two computers, 4 nics, two dsl modems and removed the
router, and the problem still persists, I'm guessing the problem is
somewhere at earthlink's end.

Tonight at 21:30 EST, an earthlink tech support person from somewhere in
India called to tell me they had fixed the problem.  While he was on the
phone I tried downloading something else and guess what.  The problem was
not fixed.  As near as I can tell, the dsl connection does not go down.
The earthlink people say it stays up.  The lights on the modem that are on
when the connection is up never go off or blink.

The man asks me what dns settings I use.  I tell him 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4.
He says I should try earthlink's dns servers.  To humor him I changed the
settings on the windows box and guess what.  The problem did not go  away.

Maybe I'm missing something, but it's my understanding that once the
download has begun, that dns has already done it's job and has no further
role to play.  One more thing.  If I use a VPN connection, I have no
problem with it.

Any idea what's going on?  If you were to venture a guess, would you say
the problem is at my place, with AT&T or with Earthlink?

Thanks

Derek

-- 
"I get my copy of the daily paper, look at the obituaries page, and if
I’m not there, I carry on as usual."

Patrick Moore

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