Westel troubleshooting?

[thewalk]

I am using SBC/PacBell ADSL connections with a Westel WireSpeed modem. Everything has been running fine until about 5 days ago, when the modem the gateway would suddenly stop responding. I did notice sometimes the modem would also go out of "READY" and look like it was retraining. At first, I would just cycle power on the modem (about 30 seconds off) and everything would come back (3 solid greens and a flashing yellow - activity). This was a solution, however it seemed to be happening every 30 minutes to 2 hours. With over a year with no serious problems(I have a fixed IP), I decided to call tech support. They couldn't identify anything specifically wrong. (I did have to strip out my router, hubs and.... but I still had a problem with a single system.) If they tried to ping my IP from the network, the modem (which was showing READY) would start passing data. I believed my connections was being shut down at the DSLAM (the CO modem bank). They could not confirm or deny. We did agree that that it was probably one of the modems, the wiring or some gateway type control (possibly some error threshold setting at the CO). They could not tell me anything about the CO end status but they wanted to send a tech out.

The tech arrived and ran some type of DSL continuity/performance check. From inside, it showed an available bandwidth of about 3M available. With my limit set at about 1.5M toward me and about 400K away, there should be no problem. We did show about 20 transmission errors in about a minute. The same test on my outside connection showed an available bandwidth of about 5M.

Analog testing showed "stress failure" which the technician couldn't explain. He, therefore, said the problem was my inside wiring, I was being charged for a service call and he didn't have the time to fix it right then.


The bottom line -
I made any wiring changes (or remodelled anything near the wire runs in over 10 months). Nothing obvious has be done to change the wiring in my house.

I would have expected alot more information to have been available at the CO before making the field trip.

This raises my first question. Can you loopback a WESTEL DSL modem? (I don't know the exact model. The front says WireSpeed.)

Second, I believe there is a program available that will allow me to query my WESTEL modem status, which should include errors. I would like to use this to see if I can identify a pattern to the problem. Anybody know where I might find it? (The SBC tech had it on his laptop so I know it out there.) Any help or suggestions is appreciated.

Thanks.

 

[shaner71139]

generally if your ready light is going in and out of sync then you are having what is called an intermittent sync issue, atleast from the DSL I troubleshoot on a daily basis.
Does your ISP require filters on the phone lines?
If so have you changed them?
How much "stuff is running on your phone lines?(# of phones, satellite, house alarm...what is running on your phone line....the more stuff the more stress on the line.
Did you add any new phones lately?
Does that particular modem have specific VPI/VCI settings? and if so are they correct?
Have you swapped out the line cord from the modem and tried a different one? How long is the cord? Shorter is always better.
when your talking about looping back to the modem do you mean a ping? If so go into DOS and type in ping 127.0.0.1
generally this has nothing to do with sync issues though.
hope this helps a little

 

[thewalk]

Thanks for your reply.

I have observed failures without any devices or filters connected (although I normally have 1 filter and a fax telephone connected).

What I am looking for is a method of tracking errors detected by the Westell modem. My modem shows a model number of B90-36R516. My connection is a fix IP to SBC/Pacbel.

I normally use ping to confirm my connections but it doesn't report errors in transmission as it is at the wrong layer. I am looking for error detection reporting at the physical layer.

I am assuming that physical layer errors are exceeding a DSLAM threshold and causing the port to be taken out of service. I am also assuming it is a burst error condition as the connection hasn't failed in over a week, however, I was observing failures several time per day during peak failures. I am trying to increase my sensitivity to errors.

I know this modem doesn't have a telenet interface but I hope it has some diagnostic interface. I know there is a special program to set VPI/VCI parameters and the software can be upgraded (I am not sure how or if I have the latest).

I assume from your comments above, the the modem will respond to a ping at 127.0.0.1. Do you know of a way to get it to report frame errors, CRCs or traffic throughput information?

Thanks again for your help

 

[shaner71139]

Does the modem say westell wirespeed on it or just westell? Is it an off white colour or a bluish-grey colour?
The model B90 is a more to date model so it will not need an excelcius adapter for it, which is good.
There is an upgrade for the westell modem in question and can be found at westell.com I am more then sure. We have our cx's upgrade them if they are on that old of a modem and are having this type of problem.
It might be a good idea to see if your tech support people can run a line rest to see what your line capacity is running at. It should be 25% and under typically. Anything higher can cause no sync/intermittent sync or even "page cannot be displayed" errors.
The modem will respond to that ping yes, but generally is about how many packets it's sending/receiving....more throughput error then sync.(steady ready)
In the latter of the post I am going to assume traffic you mean how many people you are wired with at one point. No you yourself cannot check that, that would be something only your CO could do. You could check your own personal throughput by running traceroutes and see where you are "stalling" so-to speak.
Have they offered, or have you asked for a new modem? They do stop functioning after awhile. I have sent out many a new modem myself.