November 9, 2001 - November 15, 2001
News - November 15,2001
Easynet Win Fibre Optic Contract
By:mark.j @ 9:05:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] Easynet, top UK ISP, is set to connect 19 British Waterways (BW) sites and provide STM-1 (155Mbps) and STM-4 (622Mbps) managed bandwidth across the UK thanks to its new contract. This will be done using the network they built through the merger with Ipsaris.
BW will use the managed bandwidth service to connect ADVERTISEMENT offices across the UK, giving full IP access on all sites as well as video and audio conferencing, video streaming and fast data transfer. The core network offers alternative data paths to keep the service running in the event of a breach or incident.
The project is the result of a close working relationship between BW and the ISP. Easynet laid 660km of its fibre optics on canal towpaths, reducing much of the environmental impact of laying fibre through densely populated urban areas.
BW is the public agency that manages a 2,000-mile network of canals and navigable rivers across the country, working with public, private and voluntary sector organisations to improve the social, economic and environmental benefits of the inland waterways. |
Hutchinson 3G Create New Jobs
By:mark.j @ 9:00:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] The UKs newest 3G broadband wireless mobile phone operator, Hutchinson 3G, is to create up to 600 news jobs in Scotland with its customer care centre in Glasgow:
Staff at the Glasgow offices will offer support to users who sign up for the company's third-generation mobile service. Last year Hutchison 3G won a licence to operate a high-speed mobile phone network, which is expected to launch towards the end of 2002.
In a similar vein Neil Ward-Dutton, research director at Ovum, said that issues such as working out the type of services and platforms 3G operators would offer quickly and easily would "keep chief executives awake at night worrying". More @ ZDNet. |
News - November 14,2001
3G Sharing Costs Cast New Doubt
By:mark.j @ 4:20:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] The potential savings offered by sharing 3G networking costs (building, construction etc.) with other operators may not be quite so fruitful as had once been hoped.
This revelation came after BTs mm02 admitted its collaboration with Dutch operator KPN may only save the operator “tens of millions”, which is less than 10% of the £1Bn observers had predicted:
with some observers predicting that the deal could generate combined savings of up to £1bn, an mmO2 spokesperson said: “It is too early to say but they are likely to be in the region of tens of millions, rather than thousands of millions.” This prediction applies to a ten-year period, the spokesperson added.
Ovum senior consultant Virtyt Koshi also believes that potential savings will not be as high as operators are currently claiming and sharing could cause management problems in the longer term.
In the same vein Nokia has announced that they're on track to deliver advanced 3G mobile phones to Europe in the third quarter of 2002. More @ netimperative.com . |
Telewest Dumps MS - Turns To Zeus
By:mark.j @ 4:12:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] In what's perhaps its wisest move since the CodeRED Internet worm caused major problems within their networks, Telewest has opted to ditch its Microsoft IIS to go with web servers from UK-based Zeus Technology:
The company has been using Zeus for the Web services to Blueyonder broadband customers, and will migrate the rest of its Web services to Zeus over the next few months, according to Zeus.
Zeus' push for new customers is centred on version 4.0 of its Web server. It is also capitalising on fears of the insecurity of Microsoft's IIS server to sell Zeus as a load balancing firewall for IIS server farms. Load balancing, which will be in Zeus version 4.1, has been brought forward as an add-on to existing versions, letting them act as a firewall, repelling DOS attacks by examining all requests and spotting ones which are repeated too often.
More @ ZDNet. |
Tiscali To Break Even
By:mark.j @ 4:02:PM - Comments (32) - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] The Italian based EU and UK ISP giant, Tiscali, is set to break even in the next quarter thanks to its process of major restructuring over the last year.
On top of consolidating a spate of ISPs around Europe, the group has also started consolidating websites it's purchased into a single portal. When all other IT/Telecom groups seem to be doing somewhat worse, this is good news. |
IC24 Preps Unmetered Launch - Friday
By:mark.j @ 3:53:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] One of our forum member/moderators, Keith, has let me know that IC24's long awaited unmetered dialup should finally go live this Friday (16th November 2001).
Earlier announcements by the ISP had pointed to a charge of either £14.99 or £12.99 per month; it's now confirmed as being £12.99. No finalised details have been issued for cut-off's and other system services. |
CloudNine Contracts & PDF
By:mark.j @ 9:52:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] We've had a few ISP complaints from readers regarding CloudNine's use of PDF (Adobe Acrobat) files on some of their forms and account cancellation flexibility.
After receiving several of these we decided to chase the issues up C9 directly and it looks as if they've taken note:
1) Contract - this is all under review and we are going to have a 7 day cancellation period as standard if the account is not used. We realise this is causing some problems and will be changing very shortly.
2) PDF - we have had quite a few complaints about this ourselves. We used to use .doc documents and got lots of complaints about that too :-( which is why we moved to PDF in the first place. I think the solution will be to use .RTF files but these have some limitations when it comes to displaying info. Several word processors display differently.
Note that this will probably only make sense to those who’ve E-Mailed the ISP complaints page, otherwise the full situation might not be so clear from the above. |
Japanese 3G Gets Video
By:mark.j @ 9:45:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] Despite earlier concerns that 3G broadband wireless mobile phone technologies wouldn't be able to bring video-to-video communications until much later (network issues), Japan has started proving people wrong.
In a sign of what could be to come for the UK during late 2002 or 2003, NTT DoCoMo (Japan's top mobile telecoms operator) said it will deliver video clips over a new 3G / UTMS mobile phone to go on sale from next week.
This signals that at least some of the earlier technical problems may have been overcome, although it'll still be a short while before phones can make proper use of the Video-To-Video communication side of things. |
ISPA Backs Data Retention Plans
By:mark.j @ 9:24:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] While we already know that the ISPA has been working with the government on new anti-terrorism laws (ISP side), while the group still backs the agreement, they've said that some things still need resolving.
Note that there doesn't appear to be anything new here over what we published on 25/26th October last month:
Nicholas Lansman, Secretary-General for the ISPA, told The Register: "We are behind this Bill and we have been working with Government and law enforcement agencies on this. It is largely as we expected. But, as ever, the devil is in the detail," he said.
Mr Lansman said that ISPs need to know exactly what information Government and law enforcement agencies require so that the right data can be retained.
And since any move to retain information could be expensive - especially to smaller ISPs - ISPA wants service providers to be able to recover the cost of retaining information.
On another note and the government has published its Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Bill, aiming to make it law by Christmas. More @ The Register. |
Most Corporate E-Mails = Junk
By:mark.j @ 9:19:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] The recent introduction of laws that allow businesses to monitor the E-Mail communications of their staff has also turned up a few interesting statistics.
The security consultancy group, Email Auditing Programme (EAP), believes that 4 out of every 5 E-Mails in the work place contain junk, or personal / non-business related material. That'd be why some e-commerce sites can often be so poor at technical support via E-Mail then, they’re always sending personal messages =)? |
EU Backs Cookie Restrictions
By:mark.j @ 9:12:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] The European Parliament has opted to back draft proposals that restrict the use of digital tracking devices known as "cookies", which can be found in almost every website around the world.
Cookies are used by web site operators to track the activity of Internet users and can record user names, passwords and language preference etc., often without the user's knowledge. The Parliament and Commission concluded that this was an intrusion of personal privacy.
Industry representatives criticised the move, citing extra costs for operators. The requirement to give explicit consent every time a user visited a web page risked also slowing down Internet access making the medium less user-friendly.
"The legislation would require explicit prior consent from users every time they go to a site," Angela Mills, executive director of the European Publishers Council. "It would render the whole Internet experience very unfriendly."
Thankfully there's still 'some' time before the draft becomes final after Christmas, although sadly there doesn't seem to be any obvious way for individual webmasters to have their say. |
News - November 13,2001
Opera v6 Beta 1 Released!
By:mark.j @ 3:59:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] After Microsoft's Internet Explorer, Netscape and Opera are often regarded as the two most obvious 'browser' competitors under the PC platform. During COMDEX today the Opera team announced the immediate availability of Beta 1 for their Opera v6 software.
Most of the changes and improvements seem to be in the Interface itself, sadly HTML rendering quality still doesn't appear to have been improved over v5.1.
Download HERE (Remember it's BETA software). |
BTO Finalise Gilat Satellite Deal
By:mark.j @ 3:46:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] Finally some good news from the troubled broadband and unmetered dialup ISP, which has today formalised its arrangement with Gilat to supply satellite communications equipment and wholesale services:
Under the agreement, Gilat will act as a wholesale provider of VSAT (Very Small Aperture Terminal) communications equipment and operations support for OpenWorld’s broadband satellite service.
In short the netimperative.com item means that BTO will soon bring one of the most flexible and affordable consumer and business broadband Satellite ISP options to our shores. Hopefully they won't introduce bandwidth limits, which is what makes all the difference.
Tiscali still plan to launch their £40-£60 per month service using the same group, Gilat, sometime next year. We'd expect them to stick with the pre-official details of £49.99 per month for the residential option, although that could easily change. |
BTOpenworld Suffers ANOTHER Outage
By:mark.j @ 3:39:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] While it's the first we've heard about it, apparently there was a major network outage yesterday morning that knocked out nearly the entire R/ADSL network and took some dialup connections with it:
According to a report on its status page a connection problem affected all gateways and BT was "looking into a problem with the BTopenworld broadband service" which appeared to be preventing users from connecting to the internet.
However, some disgruntled users were still reporting problems with receiving and sending email up until 16.00 GMT yesterday afternoon.
The problem appeared to be rectified at some point yesterday, but some users were concerned that BT was covering up some of its fault reports.
The VNUNet item ends with the comments from one of the ISPs users stating how appalled he is at the way the ISP keeps removing old service statements, namely the ones that contain details of past problems. |
Energis Axe 350 Jobs
By:mark.j @ 3:34:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] | Energis, the telecoms and network group that still supply ISP services to some providers, has today axed a further 350 jobs in order to save £20,000,000 per year, 250 will come from the UK. The move may have improved shares, although that's another 250 people without jobs in the sector. |
Excite UK Seeks Buyer - BT Pull Support
By:mark.j @ 3:30:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] Excite UK (search engine, ISP etc.) claims to be on the hunt for a buyer after BTOpenworld opted to pull out of its 42% stake combined with the recent sale of its US parent, Excite@Home:
Excite UK, which is 42%-owned by BTopenworld, has maintained throughout the troubles of Excite@Home that it was confident of the support of both companies. However, it has now told its 48 employees that if a buyer is not found within the next 30 days, then it “envisions closure before the end of the year.”
BT had first option on Excite’s 58% stake if ever the US company decided to sell up, however, the telco giant turned down the option thanks to its own financial nightmares and its decision to focus on internet access through its own brands rather than portals or third party-branded ISPs. It also sold its half-share in ISP LineOne at the start of the year.
Excite is now touting for buyers with cash in the bank, but will close before the end of the year should a buyer not be found in order to wind up in an orderly fashion.
More @ netimperative.com . |
AOL Cut-Off & GMTV Unmetered
By:mark.j @ 10:16:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] We noticed a couple of interesting things over @ Net4Nowt this morning, first up is AOL, whom has started a semi-40 minute cut-off policy. After the allotted time has passed a window will show and if you don't click it then the service disconnects you.
While it's a manual and not ENFORCED system, it does mean those wishing to use third-part (non-AOL) browsing apps, such as Internet Explorer, are left in the cold due to the way AOLs system works.
Thankfully you can get around this by downloading Anti-Idle v2.6, this software will click the pop-up for you. There are also some other apps out there that do the same thing.
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Moving on and although NeonHippo hasn't issued an official press release or any info. to us yet (we don't think they like us =]), the VISP group has given GMTV its own ISP.
Many will know GMTV as one of the more feminine orientated breakfast TV programs that shows every morning during weekdays. As with other ISPs, NeonHippo's GMTV service will start at a special price of £10 for the first three months (per month prices) and later go back to the normal £14.99.
We may soon adjust our listings to show all NeonHippo ISPs in one block since they appear to be nearly identical to each other. Please give feedback on this in our special website discussion forum, should we keep them separate or in one group? Up to YOU. |
EU Votes To Outlaw Cookies
By:mark.j @ 9:57:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] As reported several weeks ago the European Parliament will today be taking a vote on whether to outlaw Internet "cookies", identification tags that most surfers unknowingly carry when browsing the web.
This is easily the most ridiculous thing we've ever heard because the EU has been acting on the assumption that cookies are purely related to the online advertising industry. In fact the ID technology is used in almost all automated systems to make access easier, such as our own forums and surveys.
The legislation claims the cookie is a threat to consumers' personal privacy as it collects data on their comings and goings without asking for their consent. While this may be true for online advertising, it's not for the rest of its uses; almost EVERY website you visit will use them for other things.
We're not quite sure how this would impact us in the UK because of a special UK-side regulation for the technology, we'll have to wait and see the results. Either way it’s not something any site could simply STOP using. |
3G Phones To Get Linux
By:mark.j @ 9:33:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] It was bound to happen eventually, these days you could probably even get a cut down version of Linux for a BBC Master computer. Either way 3G Lab has launched Trigenix, a Linux-based platform for mobile manufacturers to create more personalised user interfaces for 2.5 and 3G devices:
The Trigenix system separates the “logic layer” in mobile devices from presentation functions, allowing it to run independently from the device operating system. It allows users to personalise and brand different functions within devices beyond the operator logo and ring-tone, such as the calendar and mobile internet applications. HTML, WML and XML-based updates to the user interface can be pushed to the phone over the air.
Trigenix is compatible with the major mobile phone operating systems, including Palm OS, Pocket PC and Symbian.
The netimperative.com item goes on to state that 3G Lab believe it'll be another 18 months or so before phones using its technology finally go public. |
3G KPN Delay Causes BT Problems
By:mark.j @ 9:10:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] The Dutch carrier KPN has decided to delay launching its new 3G / UTMS broadband wireless mobile phone technology until 2003, thus not launching in 2002 as had been previously planned.
This is expected to come as a big blow to both BT and Vodafone whom have related interests in the group:
News of KPN's cautious approach - reported by sources within the company - will come as a blow to Vodafone and BT who are planning to share 3G infrastructure costs with the Dutch carrier.
BT and Vodafone both have interests in the Dutch market. BT owns Telfort while Libertel is a Vodafone subsidiary.
More @ Silicon. |
WonkyPig's New Dialup Number
By:mark.j @ 9:05:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] For anybody whom may miss WonkyPig's E-Mail with the new unmetered dialup number, they've now sent us an update with the data:
Please Update your DIAL UP number to the following: 0800 161 3074, this will ensure you have no more dialup problems with our service. The old number will stop working at 12pm tonight.
Apologise for the problems over the last week, we are working hard to resolve outstanding issues.
As usual we're always interested to hear from people using the new number, has it solved any problems you might have previously been experiencing? |
Service Outage - NTL Maintenance
By:mark.j @ 8:59:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] | There should have been a brief service outage for NTLs Internet services this morning following some pre-planned maintenance. This was not a network fault and all should now be back to normal. |
News - November 12,2001
WonkyPig Improve Unmetered Dialup
By:mark.j @ 4:24:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] Finally some good news from the world of unmetered dialup ISPs, WonkyPig will apparently complete their upgrades tonight:
0800 - 0808 Access
Over the weekend we have been installing more connectivity equipment to ensure there are no more problems with the service, we are pleased to announce that by 6pm existing users will receive a new 0800 and 0808 dialup number to access the service.
Please DO NOT call the service desk for these as they will be sent via email.
Hopefully WP will also mention the number on their website to avoid the usual GAPs where for one reason or another, people don’t get the E-Mail. |
BT Responds - FRIACO Allegations
By:mark.j @ 3:31:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] Having heard from several ISPs, BT themselves have now responded to CloudNine's earlier allegations of poor FRIACO quality:
However, BT maintains that it did suffer a major networking problem on October 19. A third party contractor severed 11,000 2Meg lines in Cambridgeshire causing severe network disruption.
While the problem was fixed it did take time for it to be fully resolved. A BT spokesman described Cloud Nine's allegations that the telco is favouring its own ISP at the expense of others as "absolute nonsense" and was swift to deny any suggestion of improper conduct.
He admitted that the network problems on October 19 did hit some ISPs - but not all of them.
Much as with PlusNET, The Register's quote from BT appears to be as a response to the original press release and not the ones that followed shortly afterwards, which slightly corrected the initial output.
It's hard to know what the truth is, some ISPs have used the situation for propaganda, BT has typically denied everything (no surprise there) and customers to all those involved appear split. Some users see improvements, others have never noticed any problems, such is always the way. |
American Airlines Plane Crash
By:mark.j @ 3:25:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] In case you haven't noticed the live coverage on various TV stations yet and the sudden halt to almost all other news, another airliner has just crashed outside of JFK and hit a petrol station.
At the time of writing it's not yet known exactly what happened or whether this was the result of a hijack attempt. Most of the Internets news sites have already started slowing down with demand.. |
Europe To Ban 'Hate' Internet Content
By:mark.j @ 10:08:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] In a move not dissimilar to the one made by Australia where posting content considered offensive to children would be illegal, Europe is now set to follow a similar trend.
The Internalional Herald Tribune newspaper has stated that the 'Council of Europe' is actively seeking to ban racist and other hate-based content/abuse from the Internet. This would apparently be done through an addition to the new CyberCrime convention:
The new protocol would add racist Web page content and hate speech over computer networks to the list of cybercrimes, the council said.
Due to some slight cross-border disagreement the council decided to make this part of the convention flexible, if a country doesn't sign then it won't apply within their border controls.
While we've yet to see a definitive response from the UK, it's worth noting that some similar laws already exist here. It’s not made clear exactly what level of hate-speech would be considered a CyberCrime. |
CloudNine Update / The Fixes Work
By:mark.j @ 9:54:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] Just a brief update because it's worth noting that some of the suggestions CloudNine made regarding the issues with BTIgnite seem to be working for quite a few people who previously couldn't connect.
If you missed the fixes then check the news from the last few days for more or visit CloudNine's Press Release section. Some users of the unmetered dialup ISP, V21, have also reported the Dialup Networking (DUN) changes to work. You can see some examples this in the following V21 FORUM POST.
Then there's the issue of PlusNET, whom yesterday seemed to attack CloudNine's stance by using some level of propaganda. C9 have chosen to respond to this, starting:
We must express a degree of surprise ourselves at the response from PlusNet to our statements on the BT Ignite FRIACO service.
Then follows two or three paragraphs of CREDIT given to PlusNET for how they've managed to improve their service, finishing up with:
We understand that they are trying to continue to provide the impression of improvement but their statement that "that PlusNet are simply not experiencing this kind of problem at all" simply does not square with service announcements on their own public status pages.
CloudNine then continue on to highlight a wealth of PlusNET's own service updates, which indeed do exactly what C9 say and highlight the same issues with BT.
We've also seen this among some reader complaints about PlusNET, which doesn't quite show them as telling the whole truth. More wonderful propaganda? You decide. |
News - November 11,2001
ISP Review Weekly Update
By:mark.j @ 11:17:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] Just a brief update since I'm quite busy and the gas heating system won't start, typing is kind of difficult with icicle fingers.
Next week should see the start of public testing for our new 'Readers Top ISPs' system covering all the broadband and unmetered dialup solutions. We'll need YOU to help find any bugs and suggest possible improvements.
On top of that a majority percentage voted in favour of the new 'Reviews' method we put forward last week, as such we'll start designing it for introduction before Christmas. We may also re-design the Reviews index page to match.
Finally there may be some extra features added to the forum next week, time depending. |
PlusNET Disagree - CloudNine Outburst
By:mark.j @ 10:24:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] PlusNET has today been the first to 'officially' respond to CloudNine's recent outburst with a press release that seems to take a very different stance:
PlusNet express surprise at ISP's outburst
Our unmetered services don't suffer this level of problem, say PlusNet
(10th November 2001 Sheffield UK) PlusNet, one of the UK's more popular ISP's, today expressed surprise at the vitriol conveyed in yesterday's press release made by Cloud Nine. In a statement published on the Industry-recognized ISP Review website (www.ispreview.co.uk), Cloud Nine have made the claim that their unmetered Internet access service has been performing particularly poorly recently, with up to 20% of their userbase affected.
What is more, the Basingstoke-based ISP went on to lambaste BT in no uncertain terms, declaring that Cloud Nine's problems, including 'busy engaged tones', 'password failures', and dropped connections were due to the FRIACO platform becoming a 'national disgrace'.
FRIACO (Flat Rate Internet Access Call Origination), first introduced by BT in June of this year, is the new generation of fixed-cost access solutions for the UK. The service allows a service provider to provide 'end-to-end' unmetered Internet access for their customers, provided they have a BT telephone line.
PlusNet's own, well-subscribed Connect range of unmetered Internet access accounts for home and business is likewise based on FRIACO; the difference being however, that PlusNet are simply not experiencing this kind of problem at all.
"Whilst we of course sympathize with any ISP that is experiencing service affecting problems of this scale, we simply cannot agree that FRIACO is anything but a resounding success as far as PlusNet is concerned," stated Alistair Wyse, Product and Services Director of PlusNet. "Since launching Connect and presenting our customers with a range of unmetered options starting from as little as £6.99 a month, we haven't looked back."
Obviously pleased with FRIACO based service then; but hasn't PlusNet suffered any problems with BT at all?
"As with all providers that use BT's network, we are in a position where individual customers may be affected by issues with their local exchanges and so on. For anyone so affected we have well-trained support staff on hand 24-hours a day, 7-days a week and we pride ourselves in a quick resolution to any such problems," continued Mr. Wyse.
"We simply are not seeing any such level of problem to our unmetered services but rather the opposite, receiving many, many compliments and testimonials in both public discussion forums and directly from our userbase."
PlusNETs response is a justified one because C9 attempted to highlight them as one of the ISPs suffering problems; however one or two complaints shouldn’t classify a whole ISP as being troubled.
It’s also worth noting that FRIACO comes in several different forms (BTSurfPort24 etc.) and from several different sources (third party Telco’s), it doesn’t appear as if C9 is using quite the same system as PlusNET, although we’re not clear on that. Something else to note is that this was issued before C9’s second press release (below).
Ultimately the problems seem to be restricted to those using BTSurf/WebPort24 products, which are BTs own ‘FRIACO BASED’ systems. BT themselves have stated that some problems exist, perhaps it’s a combination of things (BT + Dun Settings?), we’ll continue to investigate. |
CloudNine Find BTIgnite Network Bug?
By:mark.j @ 10:02:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] This should have been posted yesterday, however the weekend is traditionally a two day holiday for most of us and thus it never got mention. Either way CloudNine has issued a second press release somewhat following yesterdays.
Apparently the unmetered and broadband ISP has found a bug in BTIgnite's FRIACO network that could be responsible for some of the problems:
Cloud Nine debug BT Ignite's network yet again!!
We are now getting strong indications that, in conjunction with a couple of helpful and persistent customers, we have managed to debug a possible issue that has been causing BT Ignite FRIACO ISP's major problems since 19th October.
90% of the problems we have been seeing are affecting Windows 2000 and XP customers. We have discovered that changes occurred to the BT Ignite platform in certain places that have rendered Windows 2000 PC's setup with default Dial-Up Networking problems unable to dial in, generating a variety of responses ranging from total inability to dial the 0808 numbers to invalid username/password, error on registering on network, to inability to connect to servers. The rest of the problems (the minority) are probably related to the old issue of congested local exchanges but we are still investigating this. It is possible there are more inconsistencies or changes on the BT Ignite platform that we haven't yet found.
We have now started informing users of the fix that we have identified and the big majority these users on Windows 2000/XP are now coming back to us saying that the connection problems are solved by this.
This is the note from a customer, following the application of this fix by another customer on ISDN, that followed our new line of enquiry:
"I have some information for you which I hope you will find helpful. I went into Windows NT and connected first time, no problems whatsoever. So I went through lots of different settings in Windows 2000 and eventually found that the problem is caused by the "Negotiate multi-link for single link connections" which you refer to below - even though I don't have an ISDN connection. It seems that Windows 2000 and Windows XP have this setting even for normal connections, and it has to be unchecked for the connection to work.
Note that, even with the setting checked, the connection worked fine until last Tuesday.
I hope this might help some of your other users with the same problem.
Basically what users need to do is go to Dial-Up Networking, select your Cloud Nine connection. Right mouse click and select properties. Then you want to select the "Networking" tab, followed by "Settings" button. You will pop-up a box that has 3 options.
If your "Negotiate multi-link for single-link connections" is turned on then turn it off.
Another function on the same page that seems to cause problems is the "Enable LCP extensions". This seems to vary from area to area and some need it to be turned on and some to be turned off.
This is detailed on our page at http://www2.cloud-nine.com/newsroom.asp?id=152
What this is beginning to indicate is that BT Ignite have made changes to their dial platform on the weekend of 19-21 October that caused the first wave of problems and this was followed by some further changes on 4th-6th November which caused a larger second wave of problems. The changes have not been applied consistently across all BT Ignite dial-up equipment because this problem is not affecting all dial-up customers at all times, which indicates that sometimes they are managing to get to equipment that has not been upgraded. Some Windows 2000 customers, like our own test facility, are never affected and they can connect whatever this setting is set to. These dates appear to coincide with reports of authentication and connection problems on their system status by ISP's such as V21, Vispa, Plus Net, BT Internet, Sonnet Internet, Free 24-7, and many other BT Ignite ISP's.
We have scores of fully documented cases that bear out this version of events.
CloudNine's press release then carries on discussing the issue of BTIgnite's involvement and a number of other things, which is far too much for our site to post on the news page. You can read the full PRESS RELEASE HERE.
C9 has also issued a small update to state that Win98 and NT4 users are seeing similar problems, although they can't identify the settings behind this yet. To be honest we're somewhat confused, there seems to be a bland contradiction between BTIgnite and trivial DUN (Dialup Networking) settings.
It looks as if we'll just have to let this one play out and see what others have to say, since right now it's all too confusing to call. |
News - November 10,2001
V21s Official Press Release / Response
By:mark.j @ 9:16:AM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] While most won't have seen the V21 unmetered ISP news post we were asked to remove yesterday (see end of CloudNine item), they have today issued an official statement / press release covering the matter:
Following the reports made earlier V21 would like to make it clear that the statements made are not the official views of the company. This was an email sent to a customer, and not a public attack against BT. The member of staff has now been dismissed due to the seriousness of the allegations made.
As I am sure you and your readers are aware we have been experiencing problems with BT and their FRIACO system. The majority of these problems appear to have been rectified and BT Net is investigating several other problems on our behalf so that we can resume a full and proper service to all our users.
We would also like to take this opportunity to thank ISPReview, its readers and our users for the support they have shown during this difficult time.
Steve Kaye
Director V21.co.uk Limited
While V21 may well be getting their issues sorted, other ISPs such as CloudNine and several we've spoken to 'privately' are still frustrated with BTs lack of competence in managing its own network. We'll continue to investigate the issues ISPs have been highlighting and report when there's more to say. |
News - November 9,2001
CloudNine Attack BTs FRIACO Problems
By:mark.j @ 3:27:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] We're now aware of a growing number of ISPs that seem to be becoming increasingly hostile toward their supplier, BT, whom appear to be unable to deliver them a reliable and quality product.
Today CloudNine has added its weight to the problems being experience by BT supported ISPs. Full press release follows - it's long!:
The FRIACO delivery platform has become a public disgrace and we have checked other ISP's forums and are seeing the same problems reported on nearly ALL FRIACO delivery services. These include:
1) Busy engaged tones
2) Name and Password failures
3) Voice on the line saying "connection unavailable"
4) Session drop-outs once customer is connected
We are also seeing a new problem as of today where the user name and password is verified but the connection fails on "registering name on network".
The problems began after a major BT network "failure" on the evening of Friday 19th October. Cloud Nine do not believe the BT line that there was a failure. We believe that changes were made to the FRIACO platform in response to complaints by BT Internet customers and we believe that these changes may have benefited BT Internet but they have been to the detriment of all other FRIACO providers.
BT initially tried to claim that this was because we were approaching our capacity limits. Since then Cloud Nine have since increased capacity and also taken action to suspend accounts of heavy users but, no surprise, the problems have persisted at the same levels despite the fact that we are now more than 20% below capacity at most times.
This is a very serious issue and Cloud Nine would like to ask all media reporters to demand a full statement from BT Ignite as to what happened on the night of 19th October and why these problems seem to have coincided with that date? Quite frankly it is a disgraceful state of affairs when ISP's pay an expensive price for ports and the calls are not being delivered to these ports and our reputation is being damaged in the process whilst BT buries its head in the sand!
From August until 19th October Cloud Nine only had 20 logged support calls relating to inability to dial and these almost all were due to the exchange congestion problems highlighted and acknowledged by BT Ignite. Since then the calls run into the hundreds and our suspicion is that as much as 20% of our FRIACO user base is affected at one time or another.
Given the seriousness of this situation we are also releasing a full copy of a letter received from BT Ignite's European Marketing Manager at the bottom of this statement because the local exchange issues have not gone away despite their statement that the problems would be fixed by the end of September. We believe that it is in the public interest that this admission should be made public and give credibility to the recent speculation that BT's local exchanges cannot cope with the growth of traffic and that BT's investment programme is running seriously behind demand. This is despite the
fact that ISP's are paying BT for adequate capacity that BT cannot then deliver to.
Cloud Nine are NOT looking to change providers. On the whole we have found BT to be the most reliable Telco with the widest coverage. Cloud Nine have been using BT for the last 5 years and once they finally get things right they still have an excellent track record of keeping things ticking over reliably. The problem is forcing them into getting things right! We saw similar problems with the Surftime platform in January and it was only because we made a lot of noise at that time that the problems were fixed and since that then platform has been rock solid. Indeed we have found ourselves migrating frustrated users to the Surftime platform where the problems then go away.
We have seen many statements praising the FRIACO platform. These problems are making a mockery of that. FRIACO is a great concept but BT's inability to fix these problems of congestion and technical instability are creating an adverse impression to many users.
Quite frankly, as we said at the start, this is becoming intolerable and is fast becoming a national disgrace. We would like to apologise to customers who have experienced problems as a result of this. We fully sympathise with their dilemna since we face the same dilemna with BT Ignite.
BT are, unfortunately, burying their head in the sand on this issue. We have been logging ticket after ticket only to find that these were being closed without our permission and without even an investigation. This is an intolerable disregard for customers that is not acceptable to Cloud Nine. Only the weight of public opinion is going to force BT to get their finger out and work with their customers to fix this problem. We would ask other ISP's that have experienced problems to stand up and be counted. BT have to be held to account for their failure to deliver an acceptable quality FRIACO service.
Cloud Nine are continuing to try and work with BT to resolve these problems. Below is the letter from BT about the exchange problem issue:
Due to the success of BT Ignite's new Surfport24 product, a small number of exchanges are experiencing congestion at busy times when end-users dial in. Remedial steps have already been taken to increase capacity in these localised areas, and current congestion will be relieved by mid September.
BT Ignite will continue to monitor the network and implement increased capacity as and when necessary.
Cloud Nine would like to point out that many of our "closed without fix" tickets have related to local exchange issues! This is hardly indicative of a "pro-active" monitoring policy to identify problem areas. Surely their customers are the ones that are best placed to tell them where the problems are. This does not indicate that the will exists within BT to fix this problem.
Cloud Nine are seriously considering an official complaint to Oftel about the problems afflicting FRIACO delivery in the UK.
ISP Review is also investigating these issues, although typically there's not much a tiny group such as ours can do against BTs goliath.
Note that some other sites may make mention of a V21 statement, as you can see from a few posts below this was removed by the ISPs request. It wasn't supposed to be made public and we were asked to remove it, which we did because it could make BT angry in a way that wouldn't help customers.
Hopefully C9’s latest PR (above) will help get the larger media involved, which is a force even BT dare not reckon with. |
R/ADSL Gateway Problems Resolved
By:mark.j @ 3:06:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] According to ADSLGuide the problems broadband R/ADSL providing ISPs such as BTOpenworld, Zen and Nildram have been experiancing with their Gateway routers should soon be resolved.
While both Zen and Nildram will soon be upgrading their systems, BTO has already converted and upgraded a couple of their 40 gateways, the improved performance is apparently noticeable by users. Note that Zen has also put new registrations on hold until this is resolved. |
Clara.net Extend AnyTime Trial
By:mark.j @ 2:14:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] Clara.net's residential AnyTime unmetered service has often been touted as a trial, however that trial was previously due to end and or be reviewed/changed.
In their latest newsletter Clara.net has stated their intension to extend the trial by another three months:
As some of you already know, our Freetime Anytime account was launched on a trial basis earlier this year. We can now confirm that this trial period has now been extended for a further 3 months. Freetime Anytime will be under revision until the end of the trial.
For details on the Freetime Anytime account visit:
http://www.clara.net/homeaccess/options/ftanytime.phtml
Quite why Clara.net has opted for this extension isn't made clear, although we'd be interested to see whether the package will change come the end of this extension. |
V21 Service Troubles - Retraction
By:ross @ 1:16:PM - - SendNews [HERE] / PrintNews [HERE] | V21 have asked us to remove the post titled "V21 Service Troubles - Appology". Their retraction shall be posted shortly. |
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