Frustrated U-verse Customer - RG Resets & Loss of Signal Failures

[horvatsa]

Hello,

I am a current U-verse customer in southeast Michigan.  I have been a U-verse customer since August 2008.  I had no troubles with my service until around this past Thanksgiving (2009).  I noticed the picture on my TV would freeze for 2-3 minutes on an intermittent basis.  As the problem became more frequent, I noticed that all the TVs would freeze, my phone line would go out, & my Internet connection down when this issue would occur.  I realized the RG unit (router/modem) was constantly resetting itself, not necessarily a full reboot, but a reset.

I have had techs out here five times already.  They replaced a splitter & filters on the outside, replaced the RG unit, changed the wiring (outside to inside) from coax to Cat5, and re-ran the DSL line to the RG.  Same issue.  I have a line tech coming out tomorrow to investigate.  When the signal is on, it is very strong, but it is dropping frequently.

I constantly monitor my RG stats and I can see the number of Link Retrains, Loss of Signal Failures, Uncorrected Blocks, & DSL Unavailable Seconds is typically very high.  My most recent stats are:

 I have researched this forum and will email my information to David.  Overall, I have been happy with the U-verse product, but being unable to resolve this issue is unacceptable.  I cannot fathom going back to the alternative, Comcrap...

horvatsa

[mibrnsurg ACE - Geek]

Think David is your best bet if this line tech doesn't produce any results.  Do the drops coincide w/a

particular time of day?

Chris

---

Please NO SD stretch-o-vision or 480 SD HD Channels
1-800-983-2811 to avoid Mr. Voice Recognition
YRMV IMHO Simply a U-verse user, nothing more

[horvatsa]

Hi Chris,

Thanks for responding.  Unfortunately, they don't coincide with a particular time of day.  Friday, it dropped three times between 10:45 & 11:30AM.  Quite an inconvenience since I was working from home that day.  Today, it dropped twice between 5:30 & 6:00PM.  No rhyme or reason to the drops.  They are very intermittent.

I will wait to see if the line tech can find anything.  Otherwise, I hope David can be of some assistance.

horvatsa

[horvatsa]

Well, it appears after seven tech visits, my issue has been resolved.  On the 7th visit yesterday, two outside line techs discovered a faulty coil in the VRAD box and replaced it.  Since then, service has been A-OK.  Such a lack of communication at AT&T, you would think a "communications" company would be more effective at that!  Regardless, I worked with David and others and finally got the issue resolved.  I happy about that, even though I had to go through hoops to get there.

[spd2demun ACE - Master]

Glad you got it fixed.

And totally agree that the communications company has trouble communicating with itself.

[horvatsa]

I may have spoken too soon.  Last night at 11:00PM, the signal dropped and then again at 2:10AM, 3:15AM, & 4:25AM.  It doesn't appear that this is normal.  So, I plan on monitoring the situation today.  I have several contacts at AT&T now, so it appears the problem is FINALLY getting attention from the right people.  Regardless, I'm still very frustrated!!!!

[horvatsa]

Today the RG resets / loss of signal failures are as bad as they've ever been. 11 times so far. I am following up directly with my tech and a "quality assurance" person from Tier 2. This is ridiculous. Anyone else from southeast Michigan experiencing similar issues today? A Tier 2 support rep indicated there was an outage earlier in the day.

[mibrnsurg ACE - Geek]

I'm in Grosse Pointe Park and not a single problem today or most any day.

Chris

---

Please NO SD stretch-o-vision or 480 SD HD Channels
1-800-983-2811 to avoid Mr. Voice Recognition
YRMV IMHO Simply a U-verse user, nothing more

[Bondman]

I have been having issues in the Southeast Michigan area over the past 2 week.  It has gotten real bad over the past week.  I can not even watch the Detroit Redwings game this afternoon with out interruptions.  The same goes with the Golden Globes tonight.  Last night Saturday Night Live had issues.  I have sent an email to David and hope he can find a solution.  I feel your pain.  My wife has made most of the phone calls because I am tired of talking to Support people that think they are getting phone calls from people that they can blow off and give up.  Yes I am a bit bitter but enough is enough.  How about getting id names or employee number of the person you talk with and who comes to your home.  There is a lack of accountablity of what a person does and does not do.

Bondman

Message Edited by Bondman on 01-17-2010 09:36 PM

[horvatsa]

Hey guys,

My signal loss problem is as bad as it has ever been.  I have another tech coming out later today (8th time).  I've emailed David and his team again as well.  The Tier 2 tech I spoke with yesterday ran some tests and indicated tons of upstream errors.  He thinks the problem is inside my house.  The whole house has essentially been re-wired.  I did realize that I had been using a CFL bulb in my outside light last night and promptly removed it.  Everything was fine until I went to bed.  Since then, I've had seven DSL link retrains from 1:00AM to 7:45AM (I'm at work now), coinciding with loss of signal failures.

Anyone have similar issues or ideas as to what could be causing the upstream line errors?

Scott

[tojo6940]

Hey Scott, Are you watching tv through my back window? You just described my U-verse connection perfectly. I'm in West Bloomfield and have also had techs out several times. If anything the problem is getting worse. Now they tell me "I'm too far from the box".  I also have the "Upstream errors" This system worked fine for 6 months. They now tell me they can't do anything for me.

Tom

West Bloomfield 

[horvatsa]

Hi Tom,

There are a few of us in SE Michigan experiencing the same symptoms.  From what I've been told, AT&T is aware of this issue and it is a 22-state wide problem.  I've been in regular contact with a manager over the last 10 days or so.  I know I'm not too far from the box (I'm about 1200 feet), so that is not an issue.

I will keep you posted if I hear of anything, but as of now, I'm still in wait and see mode.  Luckily, the drops haven't been as frequent over the past couple of weeks.

Scott

Plymouth

[yukonguy]

I live in Fort Worth Texas and I have had the exact same problems since the first of December.  I have had over 12 technitions and multiple line men out to my apartment and they can't find the problem.  My record number of drops for just one day was 70 times.  There is no rhyme or reason for any of it.  There doesn't seem to be an underlying cause for it either.  I have had every piece of equipment replaced, they have rewired both my inside box and the outside box, my RG has been traded out at least 3 times, and they have even messed with what little wiring they can change out inside the apartment.  It worked fine for 6 months and just randomly started dropping in the first part of December.  They thought it might be a programming problem so I canceled my account, waited 24 hours and signed back up and had to wait 2 weeks for an install.  The tech and lines men were here for 3 hours that day and it is still having issues.  The problem seems to have gotten a tiny bit better in the fact that it isn't dropping quite as much but it is still dropping intermittenly.  A random thought I had is that maybe some of the security cameras the apartment complex has put in is causing a wifi interference.  I don't know how those things work so I don't know how to block it or stop it from interferring if it is.  I am at my witts end with all of this at this point.  Does anyone know something that could help or what I can do?

[mibrnsurg ACE - Geek]

Contact David and his tier 2 team here:
http://www.uverseusers.com/index.php?option=com_openwiki&Itemid=36&id=david

Provide all info required and it might take a short bit of time before they contact you. Give a good
phone # and time to call. They will solve your problems.  Good luck

Chris

---

Please NO SD stretch-o-vision or 480 SD HD Channels
1-800-983-2811 to avoid Mr. Voice Recognition
YRMV IMHO Simply a U-verse user, nothing more

[DrewF]

I live in NE Ohio and have been having the same problems since around Christmas.  I have already posted several threads about these issues but thought I would jump on this thread as I'm very frustrated as well.  Luckily, for us, there are a lot of helpful and knowledgeable people on this board, but we shouldn't have to endure this pain and we get nothing for helping ATT diagnose and fix their system.  Lets just hope we don't have major problems during the Super Bowl because that will just send me over the edge!

[horvatsa]

DrewF & yukonguy,

It definitely sounds like we're having the same problem.  I have already contacted David and his team and I know they are working on it, but it's obviously not yet resolved.  I am still very frustrated, considering it worked fine since August 2008.  The manager I had been in contact with is on vacation for the next two weeks, so I am trying to follow-up with some other knowledgable U-verse people.

The service is great when it works.  My guess is it is a programming issue that will need to be resolved with a hotfix of some kind that they can push down.  I'm not sure if it's related to the 32/5 profile push or not.  My profile is still at 25/2.

I would encourage you to contact David (if you haven't already done so).  The more people they are aware of with this issue, the better off we all are.  From what I've been told, this issue has been escalated to the U-verse VP and it is the top priority of all their engineers.

I opted to go elsewhere to watch the Super Bowl.  I can't risk it freezing during the game.

Scott

[DrewF]

Scott,

Thanks for all your legwork!   I sent an email to David on Thursday.  I'm sure he's swamped!  I also have the 25/2 prof and agree that the service is great when working properly, which it has been for me the last few days, except for a few errors.  This is a great board and hopefully all involved will help get our issues resolved.  One thing that really bothers me, though, is changing light bulbs?  That should not be an option as we need to become more enviromentally concious these days.

Keep up the good work!  BTW I am risking watching the Super Bowl at home.   I hope that I don't miss it like I did the Rose Bowl or when I had to watch the ball drop on my computer New Year's Eve.

Drew

[Bondman]

Drew:

   I like Scott have been having issues.  It is true I have not called in for the past week or so since the visits from techs have stopped finding any new fixes to the freeze activity.  I just hate it when a freeze takes place during the key play of any hockey game or reveal of who done it on any TV show.  Your comments reminded me of the New Years Eve ball freeze and the Rose Ball Game.

I don't have the opportunity / funds to watch the Super Bowl tonight on something other than through U-verse service.  Tonight is worse in that I want to catch the key plays and the commercials  .

Message Edited by Bondman on 02-07-2010 12:38 PM

[DrewF]

Well, here we go just in time for the Super Bowl and getting retrains and loss of signal.  Also lost internet briefly.  System just came back up after a hard reboot (2nd today).  This is not looking good!

[horvatsa]

Looking at my stats, I had about six retrains during the Super Bowl game.  Luckily, I was watching elsewhere.  Still no updates on this issue.  I think it's time to seriously consider a switch.  I cannot fathom how a company like this has NO IDEA what this multi-state wide issue is.  Unbelievable.  Way to roll something out.  Quite a quality product.  15 retrains so far today and the night is still young!!!

[RCSMG ACE - Master]

I haven't followed this thread so i don't know if you have requested a tech to be sent to your home.  If you have and you still are having problems contact David at this link.  He or a member of his staff will be in touch with you.  Give him all of your info.

http://utalk.att.com/utalk/board/message?board.id=calling&message.id=344#M344

[horvatsa]

Thanks RCSMG.  I have been in contact with David and his team for about a month now.  Unfortunately, I'm still experiencing the same issues as are a lot of people.

[zoonunit]

I too, have had these problems in Atlanta and it's getting to the point that I may just dump the whole system and move on!

I don't think this issue is related to local equipment.  (I've also had the techs replace all my splitters and verify signal integrity)  As a computer tech, it looks more like an overuse, traffic, software issue to me.  Here's what I notice:

1) Every time ATT sends a software update or a special message, the whole system craps out and I have to reboot everything.  This happened last night when I received a "message" from u-verse about Olympic coverage.  After I "dismissed" the message, all recordings vanished and all live programs went blank.  Rebooting the pvr did not fix the problem.  I had to reboot the router and then the pvr for the problem to "fix" itself.  Meanwhile, all the programs I was recording were kaput.

2) The stutters, freezes, and pixelations seem to get much worse when watching popular programs, such as the Super Bowl.  This appears to be a traffic issue.  In other words, too many people are watching the same channels and probably maxing out ATT's system-wide bandwidth.  American Idol is famous for freezes and the audio getting out of sync with the video.

I fear that ATT has underestimated the demands on their infrastructure.  The sheer popularity of their system will probably spell its doom, unless they can bolster bandwidth somehow.  Since they are already pushing the old copper technology to the max, I'm not optimistic about a fix.  :-(

It will be a shame, because the service is great when it works.  But it's getting to the point that the system is almost unwatchable.  I hope ATT doesn't become the next Toyota.

[horvatsa]

Well said zoonunit.  I work in the IT field too and it certainly seems like a bandwidth issue.  They're pushing out these new 32/5 profiles and I wonder what the impact is on everyone else.  I'm still on the 25/2 profile and I shutter to think what my problems will be like when they do increase my individual bandwidth.

I am very disappointed because as you say, the service is great, when it works.  I will give it a little more time, but may be forced to jump ship if this cannot get resolved sometime soon.

Scott

[ukd1984]

Hi Scott,

It is an ongoing problem for me too (started from Nov.,2009) as you all are experiencing the same.Today just couple of mints ago U-Verse Tech guy came & checked again. According to him "There is certainly some problem in the line" ,.....They all say the same words, every visit! I know for sure that this time also it will be unsolved ! Do you guys think if this service could be hacked by someone...since we all have modems ? 

Thanks,

UKD1984

[horvatsa]

Well, I just received another update from an AT&T manager and she said 40-50 customers are experiencing the intermittent drops / signal losses (from Plymouth to Lansing).  They have been working for the last couple of weeks, but still have not identified a cause for the issue.

Regarding ukd1984's question, could the system be hacked?  I'm sure it could, but I'm sure every system can be hacked, depending on the skill of the hacker.

I will keep you all posted as I hear more.

[scomella]

---

zoonunit wrote:

2) The stutters, freezes, and pixelations seem to get much worse when watching popular programs, such as the Super Bowl.  This appears to be a traffic issue.  In other words, too many people are watching the same channels and probably maxing out ATT's system-wide bandwidth.  American Idol is famous for freezes and the audio getting out of sync with the video.

---

My expectation would be that the bandwidth limitation would occur when many users are watching different channels.  I would think that the system would be configured such that if every single user on a VRAD were watching the same channel that the fiber from the head end to the VRAD would contain only a single stream (that one channel) and that the control unit in the VRAD would be smart enough to send that single stream to every user.  In the case of multiple users all watching different channels, I would expect the head end to have to send each of these streams (channels) to the VRAD, and then the control unit at the VRAD would have to deterime which user to send each channel to.

- Steve

[RxDrugLord]

I stumbled upon these forums doing a google search for my uverse issues. I am having the same problem with constant link retrains and loss of signal failures. Symptoms include internet disconnects, pixelation and TV freezing and general poor voice quality on my phone. I've had 3 prem techs and 2 line techs out to troubleshoot. Repairs have included removing a bridge tap on my line, removal of some "old phone wiring," grounding my main splitter and swapping my port on the VRAD. I have recently contacted David and his team (thanks to the forum regulars for the link/suggestion!) and emailed a tier 2 agent (as suggested on the dslreports.com forums). Most recently, I was called by an ATT rep saying that my latest prem tech would not be coming to service this issue again as it is a "known problem" for many ATT customers in my area and surrounding cities. I was assured that the tech team is "...diligently working to resolve the issue..." but at this point its still a work in progress. I live in a north suburb of Milwaukee, WI and I'm approx. 2600 feet from my VRAD. The line technicians have told me that, although far from the VRAD, my line noise is within normal limits. My RG stats show about 1 loss of signal failure about every hour. I, too, notice that the signal failures seem to coincide with system demand. In otherwords, if all my connected devices are off I notice less errors reported on my RG compared to when my connected devices are operarting or idling. I'm not trying to hijack the thread, I figured I would add a "me too" voice to the problem along with echoing a seemingly new message ATT is sending out about this issue as horvatsa has eluded.

[horvatsa]

Hi all,

I just got off the phone with the AT&T manager and still no news.  They still have not identified the cause of the problem.  It's been as bad this week as it has ever been.  I'm supposed to get a follow-up call at the end of the week.

I'll keep you posted, but don't hold your breath on any progress unfortunately.

[Bondman]

I had a visit to my home on Saturday by an inside tech and his supervisor.  They confirmed that I have the:

""41 second reinit issue", which I have learned is very easy to spot in lsbbt. In the 4 hour report you will see things like 10 reints, 410 second uas, It only fails on upstream, downstream is always clean." 

They have no idea when this issue will be solved.  It does make it harder to accept these freezes that happen multiple times a day when others, especially over at uverseusers.com make you out as the bad guy when you try to keep the issue alive and not allow them to burry it.

Message Edited by Bondman on 02-15-2010 05:50 PM