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2 problems in S. Calif. RoadRunner region

After bouncing around RoadRunner Nat'l Help Desk for almost an hour, I finally got to speak with the California Tier 3 Help Desk in Colorado(!).

After about 40 minutes of doing various tests and tracerts, and a cute test at

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which measures percentage of successful packets, it was determined that ROADRUNNER has a problem in the CA.RR.com and probably SoCal.RR.com regions, i.e previous Comcast and Adelphia regions.

Problem 1

The software that checks billing accounts to see what speeds you're entitled to is screwed up so that the wrong parameters are downloaded to your modem's bootup file. No matter how many times the tech rep tries to correct your modem's parameters, the billing account-checking software will override it and not allow you to get the level of speed you're entitled to.

Problem 2

No matter how much speed you get as measured from TimeWarner's speed website

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a router upstream of the RR.com domain is apparently choked or is malfuntioning so that less than 2 thirds of your packets get between other websites and the RoadRunner network.. Thus speeds measured from DSLreports.com or Reviews.CNet.com are much lower.

Both these problems are systemic and not a problem with your PC or cable modem, and the Colorado Tier 3 techs have notified both the Network Ops Center and the billing software departments about these problems. But who knows how long it will to get them fixed. I'll wait until January 1. After that, I'm off to DSLextreme if nothing improves.

*TimDaniels*
Reply to
Timothy Daniels
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I regularly get just under 5Mbps to my outside news service, but your site says I'm only at 1.5Mbps.

Reply to
The Kat

What you measure is probably bps sent or received - NOT what bits are received without a request to retransmit. When packets are received with errors, a request is sent back for a retransmit. The InternetFrog site measures how many bits are received unmangled.

*TimDaniels*
Reply to
Timothy Daniels

Huh? No way. Like all so-called speed test sites, this site is a poor indicator of actual performance. In fact, this one seems to be worse than most others I've tried.

Reply to
Bill M.

On what do you base your opinions? For some reason, Tier 3 RoadRunner tech support seems to think the InternetFrog site is a useful measure (more useful than TimeWarner's site and more useful than DSLreports and Reviews.CNET) of actual information transfer, i.e. error-free packets received. That is what the % factor represents - percent of packets received error-free. As corroborated by a treaceroute, these errors were occurring in the routers just outside RoadRunner's network. In other words, their backbone provider was screwing up, and RoadRunner has to get together with them to get it solved.

*TimDaniels*
Reply to
Timothy Daniels

Just personal experience over the years. Speed test sites aren't sophisticated enough to be trusted, other than as a novelty. They have relatively small files available for download/upload, they typically don't allow multiple connections, and they're unlikely to saturate your pipe. Instead, get a program that monitors your transfer rate in real time, (I use DUMeter but there are others), and find a way to open multiple connections (either to the same server or to multiple servers). I use ReGet Pro and have it set to open 8 simultaneous connections. Some people are able to max out their pipe with fewer connections, but 8 does it for me, any time of day or night.

The site you provided tells me I'm getting 11.9 Mbps down, but its files are simply too small for it to realize that I only get 6.5-6.8 Mbps down after you factor out the initial SpeedBoost surge. I'm on a

6 Mbps plan, BTW.

For the vast majority of us, TCP packet retransmissions aren't enough of a problem to affect throughput speeds, and the problem would have to be pretty darn severe to drop throughput from 5 Mbps to 1.5 Mbps.

Reply to
Bill M.

The site was reporting an effective packet rate of 59%. IOW, the effective speed was dropped by 41% due to packets that had to be re-transmitted. Couple that with congested local nodes, incorrect modem parameters, and I end up getting 700 kbps for a "6 Mbps" line.

*TimDaniels*
Reply to
Timothy Daniels

As much as I hate dealing with TWC as I find them arrogant and rude, their tech support staff is first rate. Best I've deal with. And their in house ability to get down and dirty and know what is going on is way above what others (in central NC, especially BellSouth) have. I've give them a bit to get things switched over to their way of doing things.

Reply to
DLR

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