BT socket and Broadband speeds - Any BT engineers on here?

[Joyrider1]

Apologies if my descriptions here are a bit basic, but a mate of mine has problems with his broadband connection - keeps going really slow, dropping out etc....have just been round and changed the router to rule that out, and still had the same problems. So looked at the master socket and it seems that if you unscrew it then there appears to be a socket behind it (circled in red in pic below)...



If I plug the router straight into that socket he gets an uninterrupted 4Mb connection with no dropouts. If the front plate is screwed back on then the router plugged into that (or any other extension socket around the house), it goes back to 1.5Mb and starts dropping out again.

BT say they won't have anything to do with it as the line is fine to the house, so I wondered if anyone on here might know what the problem is...Have attached a pic with a closer view of the wiring in case there's anything obvious someone might notice...



Any help greatly appreciated before they get an independent phone engineer out...

Cheers!

[agent006]

That socket inside is where BT's responsibility ends. The problem is to do with the wiring in the house (there's an extension off that socket, isn't there?).

[Joyrider1]

Yeah, there are quite a few extensions off that socket...but why would just that front plate cause such a difference in connection speed? If it's wired up wrong then surely it wouldn't work at all...

[plasticpig]

Joyrider1 said:

Yeah, there are quite a few extensions off that socket...but why would just that front plate cause such a difference in connection speed? If it's wired up wrong then surely it wouldn't work at all...

Because none of the extensions are connected to the line with the faceplate unplugged. It could be a faulty phone so try unplugging all the phones and see what happens.

ETA: You could also try fitting one of these http://www.shop.bt.com/products/bt-iplate---bt-bro...

Edited by plasticpig on Wednesday 20th October 20:02

[Man-At-Arms]

Joyrider1 said:

Yeah, there are quite a few extensions off that socket...

have you overloaded the REN ?
IIRC the max is 4

[bimsb6]

Man-At-Arms said:

Joyrider1 said:

Yeah, there are quite a few extensions off that socket...

have you overloaded the REN ?
IIRC the max is 4

ren number irrelevant to adsl speed ,pull off the orange wire and try again and check all the extns have filters where necessary .is there a burglar alarm connected to the extn wiring ? does it have an adsl filter in it ?

Edited by bimsb6 on Wednesday 20th October 19:59

[Accelebrate]

plasticpig said:

ETA: You could also try fitting one of these http://www.shop.bt.com/products/bt-iplate---bt-bro...

Looks like a recent OpenZone NTE5a with the bell wire filter. At least I think that's what the lump on the back of the front plate is? If so I don't think an iPlate would make much difference.

Edited by Accelebrate on Wednesday 20th October 20:05

[Joyrider1]

bimsb6 said:

Man-At-Arms said:

Joyrider1 said:

Yeah, there are quite a few extensions off that socket...

have you overloaded the REN ?
IIRC the max is 4

ren number irrelevant to adsl speed ,pull off the orange wire and try again and check all the extns have filters where necessary .is there a burglar alarm connected to the extn wiring ? does it have an adsl filter in it ?

Stupid question here, but I think they only have a filter on the extension socket that they are plugging the router into....Do they need a filter on all extensions? They do have a burglar alarm and the house is only about 3 or 4 years old so would expect it is connected.

We tried having both the router and their phone plugged into that main socket behind the front-plate and all worked fine.

[Joyrider1]

And what would pulling off the orange wire do? Would that make the other sockets in the house unusable?

[Accelebrate]

Joyrider1 said:

bimsb6 said:

Man-At-Arms said:

Joyrider1 said:

Yeah, there are quite a few extensions off that socket...

have you overloaded the REN ?
IIRC the max is 4

ren number irrelevant to adsl speed ,pull off the orange wire and try again and check all the extns have filters where necessary .is there a burglar alarm connected to the extn wiring ? does it have an adsl filter in it ?

Stupid question here, but I think they only have a filter on the extension socket that they are plugging the router into....Do they need a filter on all extensions? They do have a burglar alarm and the house is only about 3 or 4 years old so would expect it is connected.

We tried having both the router and their phone plugged into that main socket behind the front-plate and all worked fine.

In that configuration you need a filter on every extension, and a filter for the alarm.

Or, if the router will usually connect to the master socket then get a filtered faceplate such as the one below and wire the extensions into that. Then you won't need filters all over the house as the ADSL will effectively be filtered off before the extensions are attached. You can also wire ADSL only/unfiltered extensions with most faceplates as well as filtered ones, so you could have the router on an extension in another room with another filter if required.

http://www.adslnation.com/products/xte2005.php

Edited by Accelebrate on Wednesday 20th October 20:32

[bimsb6]

Joyrider1 said:

And what would pulling off the orange wire do? Would that make the other sockets in the house unusable?

the orange wire is the bell circuit which extends the ringing through to the extns this can also play up a broadband signal,if adsl filters are fitted on all the extns as they should be ,these have a capacitor built into them which is what makes the phone ring .the 2 blue/ white wires carry the dial tone .

[Who me ?]

As said - the problems are due to the capacitor in the master socket . I've had a solution,I've put forward in place of all the talks of adsl sockets.
1) - TAKE line on a dedicated pair of wires to a socket adjacent to computer .( from pins 2 & 5 on BT master)
2) - Fit secondary socket at computer , fit filter to socket ,and extract adsl to computer .
3) - fit telephone socket to filter and connect to master socket .
4) --fit line to pins 2 & 5 , and bell wire to pin 3 - extend round house .

It works - I've done it many times, and had it approved by one filter maker .It's just simple telecomms transmission filter principles .

[Joyrider1]

Thanks for the help guys, will give him the suggestions tomorrow and see what happens...