DSL Problems? Am I right?

OK, well to start of I have Verizon DSL, the 768k/128k package (hey im on a budget) and I have had no problems until two weeks ago. My Westell 6100 no longer syncs up to the DSL signal. After about an hour on tech support they diagnosed it as a local problem and we scheduled a tech. Well he showed up and no one over 18 was here. I tried but he didnt buy it so he couldnt come in. He worked outside and told me that it wasnt a problem with the signal coming to the house. He gave me a test modem and i hooked it up and the line synced up. So his diagnostics was that it was a bad modem, seeing as we just had a freak thunderstorm. Odd thing to me was nothing on the power strip other the the modem went bad, so i was thinking maybe a surge through the phone line (i dont even know if thats possible, but i think it would be) so suprisingly next day i had a new, yet still crappy, Westell 6100. Plugged it in, all excited, just to find out this one wouldnt sync up either. After andother hour or so with tech support it was now diagnosed as a line problem. Another tech was scheduled and came out. He called my cell and told me he tested the line and all seemed fine and that maybe it was just another bad modem. Well i took my two bad modems to a friends and tested them both, and wow what do you know, they both synced up. So i ruled out bad modems. My conclusion is that A) the tech has a better modem that is picking up a weaker signal that the westell cant cause by B) a surge that fried something in "the box" outside our house. Only thing is all phones are working fine. So its either that or Verizon doesnt like me and is trying to get rid of me. Any other ideas?

 

Did you try getting a new telephone cable from the wall to your modem?

 

1) Are all telephone devices (telephones, answering machines, modems) on filters?
2) Have you tried disconnecting telephone devices?
3) Have you tried your DSL modem on a different extension?
4) Have you tried your DSL modem at the network interface box?

 

1) Are all telephone devices (telephones, answering machines, modems) on filters? yes
2) Have you tried disconnecting telephone devices? yes
3) Have you tried your DSL modem on a different extension? huh?
4) Have you tried your DSL modem at the network interface box? no

 

yes, three diff ones

 

Have you tested all phone jacks to confirm they are wired correctly, atleast the ones in use. I ran into some trouble with older houses that 1/2 the phone jacks were not wired correctly. All phones worked, the problem is that the phone will put noise on the line if reversed wired. An older cordless phone transformer was putting noise on the line, correcting the wiring, corrected the noise. In another case I found that the DSL signal was running low during peak times and the DSL line was bouncing up and down. My guess this is the intermitten problem you are having. And is the DSL line the first jack in the series. Phone lines are daisy chained from one jack to the next. So any bad connections compound the problem.

 

Do you have phones in different parts of your house?
Do they plug into the wall in those different parts of the house?
Have you tried plugging in your DSL modem in those jacks?

 

ok the modems been tried in all jacks. Bad wiring shouldnt be the case. House is only 5 years old has a wired ethernet network, done by me, throughout the house. Dont think i did anything putting in the network cause its still up and i did that about a month before we got DSL. and it worked for the first 6 months. The modem is in use on the first jack in the chain. Like i said it worked before, this problem just seemed to arise. i have done all the troubleshooting i could think of except going out and testing outside, but personally i can wait till it warms up a little, cause its freezing.

also its not intermittent. i havent had any DSL signal for about 2 weeks now. Verizon is telling me it has to be bad internal wiring and i asked them then why did it work perfect before. So far no one at Verizon can answer that question.

 

Sound like a bad connection. I have been to new houses and have found the wiring not to be correct. It's hard to believe that they can not match colors. Check you connection on the side of the house and make sure every thing is clean and tight. You can take your modem out there and test the connection before it goes inside. But wit no service for 2 weeks, I would be bugging them to get it fixed and to adj the bill due to no service. So with no DSL led on the modem that should tell them they have a problem, You need to ask for a supervisor on your next call to them.

 

Ive talked to supervisors, and they have already taken care of the billing issues (so far im covered for this month and next by them) yea ive seen what happens when wires get wired bad..... flukes go crazy, haha.nbut still the thing that gets me is that it has worked great for the past 5-6 months, so that is why im highly doubting bad wiring. ill look up the color code for rj-11, see if i cant find something wired backwards. the sad thing is how bad they are about getting this fixed, seems like im working more on it myself then with them. Hard to get a tech in though cause there hours are from 8-4 and my mom works fro 7 or 8 till about 6 and they wont come out on weekends. im about ready to tell them they have a week to fix it or they void the contract by not providing the service, then switching to cable. this is getting ridiculous.

 

Personally i would go to your mates house and make sure ALL firmware is the latest on the modem, small changes at your exchange can cause problems for older firmware. Secondly change your filter. thirdly try to make sure that the settings in your modem have not defaulted after the surge....(possibility) you will need to find the access address, normally something like 192.168.0.1 or 192.168.1.1. Make sure that the user and pass is set up correctly. It's clearly not a wiring problem in the house if it has been fine for the last few months. the last problem turns back to Verizon and the settings at your exchange not being right.

 

all settings on modem are right (thats first thing i checked). it has been tested with everything that uses the phone line unplugged, including filters the new modem has newest firmware. the old on i took and downgraded to see if maybe it was the firmware but still no good. ive talked to verizon and made sure they called the CO and made sure my stuff was right. right now they are telling me that they dont know whats wrong. my dad told me that where the line comes into the house there are sometimes surge protectors, and that maybe one of them went bad on the line.