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Tech Support thinks DSL does WHAT?!
By TheEmperor | April 18, 2008
This morning I had a client who was having some internet problems. Surfing the web was very very slow, email queue on the server was backed up really bad, just general slow internet issues. I fire off a ping to see if they are actually up and responding or if “Slow” means “broken”, sometimes clients can’t tell the difference. My ping comes back with a response time of 2600ms. At this point I think to myself, “Self, something is not right.”
So I head out there with my trusty laptop preparing to unleash the fury of the Empire upon the network until it “acts right”. Since I’m troubleshooting DSL I know the first thing that the ISP is going to ask me to do is unplug the rest of the network and plug in a single PC for testing. I yank the cable and hook up my laptop (which is named Saucer, incidentally, in honor of the Alien technology required to construct such awesomeness), so Saucer fires up a ping to google and lo and behold it’s 35ms. This is worth a raised eyebrow, so I raise one.
Now I let the ISP off the hook for a time while I explore the network, after checking out all of the machines I find that the mail server is the cause of the issue. Suspecting an infection I scan and clean it thoroughly, it comes up clean. I plug my laptop back into the modem and start downloading a few more tools. As I start the download I notice my continuous ping to google (Yes, I left it running while I carried the laptop around, I am that lazy. In fact, it’s still running now) has suddenly jumped from 35ms to 1500ms. I fire up a download of OpenOffice as well and the latency hits 2600ms. This is what we refer to as a “clue”.
Armed with my new information I call up the ISP again and describe the effects. The conversation goes thusly:
Me: Yeah, Hi. I’ve got a problem here, when I’m not downloading anything my response time on a continuous ping to google is 35ms, when I start downloading stuff it jumps up to 1500 or even 2500ms. Can you guys check that out and see what’s wrong?
Lvl 1 Tech: Uh, what do you mean what’s wrong? When you download stuff the connection gets slower. It’s supposed to do that.
Me: Ohh reeeallly…? I believe you are mistaken, downloading things should not result in latency spiking to 50 times the normal amount for the duration of the download. Maybe a small increase, sure, but nothing like this.
Lvl 1 Tech: So you think it should stay just as fast no matter what you are doing on the connect?
Me: Well, since the bandwidth and the latency are only vaguely related to each other. Yes. It should stay within a reasonable percentage of the baseline.
Lvl 1 Tech: No, this is how DSL works, when you use the bandwidth the response time goes up.
Me: I beg to differ, my DSL at home does not exhibit this behavior, nor does the DSL of one of our other clients whom I happen to be remoting into and performing this same test, nor did this DSL 3 days ago. This is not normal for DSL.
Lvl 1 Tech: This is the first time I’ve ever heard anyone say that. Let me put you on hold.
**Insert 8 minutes of ungodly elevator music**
Lvl 1 Tech: Yeah, my level 2 tech says that’s normal. Do you want to talk to him?
Me: *Moment of stunned and incredulous silence* Yes, Yes I would.
Lvl 2 Tech: Hi, this is ill-informed tech support guy level 2, what seems to be the problem?
Me: *Insert same description of problem* Also, I ran a traceroute to google before the download, during the download and after the download, this is definitely not normal behavior.
Lvl 2 Tech: Well, Let me see if I can reproduce the issue here. *Tech downloads freebsd while pinging google* Yes, it does the same thing here.
Me: And you don’t think that’s a problem?
Lvl 2 Tech: No, that’s how DSL works.
Me: No. It’s not. This DSL didn’t work that way 3 days ago, and the DSL of our other clients doesn’t work that way, and my DSL at home doesn’t work that way. Something is wrong.
Lvl 2 Tech: Let me put you on hold and check with our network administrator, ok?
Me: Sure. That would be awesome.
**Insert 8 more minutes of ear stabbing hold music during which allow myself a glimmer of hope that the Network Admin will know WTF he is doing**
Network Admin: Hi this is OMFG I can’t believe I’m a Network Admin, what seems to be the trouble?
Me: **Restates issue again, with full details**
Network Admin: Well, let me see if I can reproduce it. **Reproduces it** Yes, that’s how it’s supposed to work.
Me: Are you serious? You think it’s NOT a problem that whenever you start downloading something your latency goes up by 50 times the base amount?
Network Admin: Yes, what do you want to happen instead?
Me: I want the latency to stay within 30-40ms of the base latency, at least. On most of our clients saturating the pipe doesn’t change the latency at all.
Network Admin: Well, this is how DSL works. When you saturate the pipe the latency increases.
Me: Perhaps, but not by 50 times the base. This DSL didn’t do that 3 days ago, and none of our other clients do that.
Network Admin: Yes, well, bellsouth does traffic shaping differently for their clients than they do for other ISPs.
Me: So you’re saying I should switch this guys to Bellsouth?
Network Admin: No, it would do the same thing, that’s how DSL works.
Me: No, it isn’t.
While this is going on I’ve been putzing about, downloading things and running pings to google and trying different routes.
Me: Hmmm, this is curious, I just got a traceroute while doing a download that doesn’t result in massive latency. Now my ping times are normal. Interesting, this third hop in the route changed.
Network Admin: Oh. Really? Well, can you email me a copy of the traceroutes?
Me: Sure. Hmm, yeah, I did it again and it switched back and the latency returned. If I force the third hop to be this other IP there is no latency spike. Looks like the problem is that router.
Network Admin: Oh, ok, well let me get those traceroutes and I’ll get in touch with the people who maintain that router for us and see what they think.
Me: Thank you, let me know when they get that taken care of.
This conversation took TWO hours. Two. 2 techs and a network admin were completely convinced that if you started downloading a large file on your DSL connection it was normal for your latency to go from 50ms to 2500 ms. Are they even training them anymore?
And if you’re curious, the ISP is NEGIA, North East Georgia Internet Access. So, yeah. Not the sharpest knives in the drawer, but eventually even the dullest knife can make it through a stick of butter.
Topics: funny tech support, isp, negia, tech support nightmare |
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