Pipex Web Problems

I know most people think Pipex are rubbish, but I've had not real
problems with them for the last several years.

Having said that.... :-)

During the day yesterday, the wife was using the internet, all was well.
Last night, I tried to get on and got nothing.

Rebooted the router (Netgear DG834), all lights that should be on are
on, checked the router status page showing a connection to Pipex at 1672
down and 450 up, not quite the fastest it goes but then a long way from
the slowest.

Can't access the web at all, can't access email or newsgroups, I use
news.individual.net. Bittorrent seems to be working fine although the
trackers are showing red rather than green, but there is still a good
stream of traffic running in both directions, so there definitely
appears to be a connection there.

Tried IE7 and Firefox, can't connect to any websites at all. On further
fiddling late last night, I changed the MTU on the router from the 1468
it was on to 1500 and was briefly able to collect news and email and get
on the web. This only lasted around 20 minutes and then everything was
back to how it was before.

No programs are able to access the net at all (things like a weather
gadget in the Vista side bar, DVD Profiler, Digiguide and AVG).

I'm pretty sure it's not a PC problem, as I've changed nothing, aside
from the aforementioned MTU (which I changed back) an neither my PS3 or
my Xbox 360 can connect to the internet either.

It was too late to ring Pipex last night and I suppose it'll be pretty
pointless ringing them from work without access to my home PC, but will
ring them tonight, if things haven't righted themselves.

In the meantime, any suggestions as to what could be wrong would be
greatly appreciated.

Thanks.
--
Sean Black

"Sean Black" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:7$(E-Mail Removed)...
>I know most people think Pipex are rubbish, but I've had not real problems
>with them for the last several years.
>
> Having said that.... :-)
>
> During the day yesterday, the wife was using the internet, all was well.
> Last night, I tried to get on and got nothing.
>
> Rebooted the router (Netgear DG834), all lights that should be on are on,
> checked the router status page showing a connection to Pipex at 1672 down
> and 450 up, not quite the fastest it goes but then a long way from the
> slowest.
>
> Can't access the web at all, can't access email or newsgroups, I use
> news.individual.net. Bittorrent seems to be working fine although the
> trackers are showing red rather than green, but there is still a good
> stream of traffic running in both directions, so there definitely appears
> to be a connection there.
>
> Tried IE7 and Firefox, can't connect to any websites at all. On further
> fiddling late last night, I changed the MTU on the router from the 1468 it
> was on to 1500 and was briefly able to collect news and email and get on
> the web. This only lasted around 20 minutes and then everything was back
> to how it was before.
>
> No programs are able to access the net at all (things like a weather
> gadget in the Vista side bar, DVD Profiler, Digiguide and AVG).
>
> I'm pretty sure it's not a PC problem, as I've changed nothing, aside from
> the aforementioned MTU (which I changed back) an neither my PS3 or my Xbox
> 360 can connect to the internet either.
>
> It was too late to ring Pipex last night and I suppose it'll be pretty
> pointless ringing them from work without access to my home PC, but will
> ring them tonight, if things haven't righted themselves.
>
> In the meantime, any suggestions as to what could be wrong would be
> greatly appreciated.
>
> Thanks.
> --
> Sean Black


Try using Open DNS instead of the Pipex name servers.
Put 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220 in the preferred and alternate
DNS servers in the TCP/IP properties of the network interface of your
PC.
Alternatively you can put them in your router, on the Netgear 834
you will find that under "basic settings"

--
Graham.

%Profound_observation%

In message <gqcuq9$kr3$(E-Mail Removed)>, Graham. <(E-Mail Removed)>
writes
>
>"Sean Black" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
>news:7$(E-Mail Removed)...
>>I know most people think Pipex are rubbish, but I've had not real problems
>>with them for the last several years.
>>
>> Having said that.... :-)
>>
>> During the day yesterday, the wife was using the internet, all was well.
>> Last night, I tried to get on and got nothing.
>>
>> Rebooted the router (Netgear DG834), all lights that should be on are on,
>> checked the router status page showing a connection to Pipex at 1672 down
>> and 450 up, not quite the fastest it goes but then a long way from the
>> slowest.
>>
>> Can't access the web at all, can't access email or newsgroups, I use
>> news.individual.net. Bittorrent seems to be working fine although the
>> trackers are showing red rather than green, but there is still a good
>> stream of traffic running in both directions, so there definitely appears
>> to be a connection there.
>>
>> Tried IE7 and Firefox, can't connect to any websites at all. On further
>> fiddling late last night, I changed the MTU on the router from the 1468 it
>> was on to 1500 and was briefly able to collect news and email and get on
>> the web. This only lasted around 20 minutes and then everything was back
>> to how it was before.
>>
>> No programs are able to access the net at all (things like a weather
>> gadget in the Vista side bar, DVD Profiler, Digiguide and AVG).
>>
>> I'm pretty sure it's not a PC problem, as I've changed nothing, aside from
>> the aforementioned MTU (which I changed back) an neither my PS3 or my Xbox
>> 360 can connect to the internet either.
>>
>> It was too late to ring Pipex last night and I suppose it'll be pretty
>> pointless ringing them from work without access to my home PC, but will
>> ring them tonight, if things haven't righted themselves.
>>
>> In the meantime, any suggestions as to what could be wrong would be
>> greatly appreciated.
>>
>> Thanks.
>> --
>> Sean Black
>
>
>Try using Open DNS instead of the Pipex name servers.
>Put 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220 in the preferred and alternate
>DNS servers in the TCP/IP properties of the network interface of your
>PC.
>Alternatively you can put them in your router, on the Netgear 834
>you will find that under "basic settings"
>
Thanks, will give that a try when I get home and hopefully I won't have
to resort to using their tech support :-)

Interestingly, checking their daily service status on their site, from
work, the last "daily" update was from October last year!
--
Sean Black

In message <gqcuq9$kr3$(E-Mail Removed)>, Graham. <(E-Mail Removed)>
writes
>
>
>
>Try using Open DNS instead of the Pipex name servers.
>Put 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220 in the preferred and alternate
>DNS servers in the TCP/IP properties of the network interface of your
>PC.
>Alternatively you can put them in your router, on the Netgear 834
>you will find that under "basic settings"
>

Just had a reply from "tech support" having emailed them this morning
about my problem, basically saying due to data protection issues, they
can't deal with my problem, without the following information, full
name, address, phone number, date of birth, account number, email
address and payment method, addressed to "to whom it may concern"

All this, despite having to fill in all that information, apart from
payment method, in order to be able to submit the support email anyway.

They are also asking for all the technical info (Windows version, make
and model of router, status of lights on the router etc...) all of which
I had submitted in the original mail to them.

I'm beginning to see why people might have a problem with Pipex :-)

Now, I could understand them requiring all that info, if I had a billing
query or wanted to cancel or something, but I don't see how it's
relevant for them to diagnose a fault. I've told them what's wrong, all
they've got to say, whether it's a fault at their end or a fault on the
line (which it probably is, as it was all working perfectly yesterday
afternoon) and nothing has changed from my end and the router seems to
be working fine, otherwise I wouldn't think it would connect at all and
certainly not allow 2 way traffic on Bittorrent.
--
Sean Black

Sean Black wrote:

> Graham. <(E-Mail Removed)> writes
> >
> >Try using Open DNS instead of the Pipex name servers.
> >Put 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220 in the preferred and alternate
> >DNS servers in the TCP/IP properties of the network interface of your
> >PC.
> >Alternatively you can put them in your router, on the Netgear 834
> >you will find that under "basic settings"
>
> Just had a reply from "tech support" having emailed them this morning
> about my problem, basically saying due to data protection issues, they
> can't deal with my problem, without the following information, full
> name, address, phone number, date of birth, account number, email
> address and payment method, addressed to "to whom it may concern"

Bizarre. Dump them.

Graham

Sean Black wrote:
>
> Just had a reply from "tech support" having emailed them this morning
> about my problem, basically saying due to data protection issues, they
> can't deal with my problem, without the following information, full
> name, address, phone number, date of birth, account number, email
> address and payment method, addressed to "to whom it may concern"

That sounds too much like the activities of someone phishing. Say to
them that you don't return that sort of information in un-encrypted
email and your only remaining alternative to identify yourself is to
cancel the direct debit ...

--
Adrian C

Ato_Zee wrote:

> ALL problems reads "reformat your hard drive and
> re-install your operating system".
> Well yes that might fix it.

I've NEVER had to. It the wussies' way. Christ, once I even made my tech
recover a HD he 'accidentally' reformatted. We got everything off it we
needed.

Graham

Adrian C wrote:

> Sean Black wrote:
> >
> > Just had a reply from "tech support" having emailed them this morning
> > about my problem, basically saying due to data protection issues, they
> > can't deal with my problem, without the following information, full
> > name, address, phone number, date of birth, account number, email
> > address and payment method, addressed to "to whom it may concern"
>
> That sounds too much like the activities of someone phishing. Say to
> them that you don't return that sort of information in un-encrypted
> email and your only remaining alternative to identify yourself is to
> cancel the direct debit ...

I totally agree ! In fact their request may be in breach of the Data
Protection Act. I'd contact the 'Data Registrar' with a very stong
complaint, I think that's his title. You also might want to contact these
guys too.
http://www.ispa.org.uk/

Graham

In message <(E-Mail Removed)>, Eeyore
<(E-Mail Removed)> writes
>
>
>Sean Black wrote:
>
>> Graham. <(E-Mail Removed)> writes
>> >
>> >Try using Open DNS instead of the Pipex name servers.
>> >Put 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220 in the preferred and alternate
>> >DNS servers in the TCP/IP properties of the network interface of your
>> >PC.
>> >Alternatively you can put them in your router, on the Netgear 834
>> >you will find that under "basic settings"
>>
>> Just had a reply from "tech support" having emailed them this morning
>> about my problem, basically saying due to data protection issues, they
>> can't deal with my problem, without the following information, full
>> name, address, phone number, date of birth, account number, email
>> address and payment method, addressed to "to whom it may concern"
>
>Bizarre. Dump them.
>
>Graham
>
Thanks for the replies guys. Happy to report that by the time I got home
from work everything was pretty much back to normal, obviously something
their end.

Only thing not working properly, I was not able to retrieve my email, I
could read it online, but just not download it. Of course, it may be
working by now, didn't have time to check this morning.

Of course, there's still no mention on their website of any service
issues, last one was last October, apparently :-)

You could definitely be right about dumping them though. Especially with
all the rumours flying around about them. Just out of interest, I wonder
what happens if your ISP does go belly-up? Do you just get cut off?
Would you still need to get hold of a MAC to migrate somewhere else, or
could you just start completely afresh with someone new?

In all honesty though, I know they have a bad rep, but in my experience,
dodgy info requests from tech support aside! The service has been pretty
solid in the 7 years I've been with them, the speed I get is (1.8meg on
a good day) probably about the best I could expect to receive, with my
line length and tech support did respond within a few hours all for a
fiver a month.

Aside from Sky any other similar deals out there?
--
Sean Black

In article <7$(E-Mail Removed)>, (E-Mail Removed)
says...
> I know most people think Pipex are rubbish, but I've had not real
> problems with them for the last several years.
>
> Having said that.... :-)
>
> During the day yesterday, the wife was using the internet, all was well.
> Last night, I tried to get on and got nothing.
>
> Rebooted the router (Netgear DG834), all lights that should be on are
> on, checked the router status page showing a connection to Pipex at 1672
> down and 450 up, not quite the fastest it goes but then a long way from
> the slowest.
>
> Can't access the web at all, can't access email or newsgroups, I use
> news.individual.net. Bittorrent seems to be working fine although the
> trackers are showing red rather than green, but there is still a good
> stream of traffic running in both directions, so there definitely
> appears to be a connection there.
>
> Tried IE7 and Firefox, can't connect to any websites at all. On further
> fiddling late last night, I changed the MTU on the router from the 1468
> it was on to 1500 and was briefly able to collect news and email and get
> on the web. This only lasted around 20 minutes and then everything was
> back to how it was before.
>
> No programs are able to access the net at all (things like a weather
> gadget in the Vista side bar, DVD Profiler, Digiguide and AVG).
>
> I'm pretty sure it's not a PC problem, as I've changed nothing, aside
> from the aforementioned MTU (which I changed back) an neither my PS3 or
> my Xbox 360 can connect to the internet either.
>
> It was too late to ring Pipex last night and I suppose it'll be pretty
> pointless ringing them from work without access to my home PC, but will
> ring them tonight, if things haven't righted themselves.
>
> In the meantime, any suggestions as to what could be wrong would be
> greatly appreciated.
>
> Thanks.
>
Just dumped Pipex after a year of restricted usenet, constant dropouts
and appalling throttling during peak. as bad as dial/u in fact.

I'm now with the minnow that is Titan dsl and they'rew superb.

£20 for 30gb with no thropttling. Highly recommended (top class customer
service too).