Plusnet/Force9 FTP Prob (rant) but help appreciated :-)

Hi Guys,

After 4 days of bashing my head against the wall with Plusnet/F9 (total
lack of sensible) Tech Support Dept, I totally give up and publicly beg for
any helpful and relevant suggestions ! Whenever I try to upload large
files via FTP, the session is always terminated with the following error
message (or similar, dependent on the specific FTP app being used):

> Netout :10054 Connection closed by remote host.

In addition, I have subsequently established beyond any doubt whatsoever
that this occurs exactly 2 hours into the session for a single file - well
give or take 1 min errors in the file time stamps anyway - or possibly
after approx 2 hours and approx 200M of data transfer with several
concurrent sessions running. So my problem/question is: What the hell is
timing out my sessions after 120 +0 -1 minute or after ~200M of data
transfer ? My money is on the FTP server but it could no doubt be the FTP
apps, OS or Router etc. and I have run out of ideas for things to try.

So far, good old Plusnet/F9 (total lack of sensible) Tech Support have been
completely unable to read/understand the problem and choose not to answer
any of the specific questions I have asked. It is quite clear that they
only read as far as "ftp problem" and therefore the suggestions so far have
included such really helpful things as:

try using passive mode
try it w/o antivirus running
try it w/o any firewall running (yeah right !)
try using passive mode
try reinstalling the network card/drivers
try using passive mode
try checking/tweaking MTU
try checking/tweaking RWIN
oh yeah, did I say try using passive mode ? :-]

Whilst I'm happy to be proved wrong, I fail to understand quite how any of
the above could contribute to a timeout problem in any way ! Since the FTP
server appears unable to resume or append to files this problem makes it
completely impossible to upload large files. A summary of the established
facts is given below and any advise, suggestions or help would be very much
appreciated :-) Many thanks

PROBLEM: FTP upload sessions are terminated after 2 hours or ~200M data
SYSTEM: Various Win98 and WinME machines on the same network
ROUTER: Vigor 2600
CONNECTION: Plusnet 512K *unlimited*
TRANSFER RATES: Near perfect u/l and d/l speeds
OTHER PROBS: Nothing obvious - everything else seems to work just fine
FTP CLIENT: Have tried several - all suffer with the same problem
FTP MODE: Active or passive mode - the same prob using either
MTU: Still set at 1458 to cope with old BT issues but same prob at 1500
RWIN: Various settings between 4x and 12x MSS - always the same prob
AVIRUS: Doesn't matter if running or not
FIREWALL: Doesn't matter if local (software) f/w is running or not (*)
TIME: Doesn't matter - always the same prob at any time of day/night
OTHER CONNS: Doesn't matter whether there is any other traffic or not

(*) For obvious reasons I am not really prepared to seriously tweak the
router setup at the moment or try putting a machine in DMZ or similar :-)

--
Mike
e-mail: mikeb <at> twowheels <dot> plus <dot> com

In article <(E-Mail Removed)>,
(E-Mail Removed), a.k.a Look At End Of Message For Real Address
says...


> After 4 days of bashing my head against the wall with Plusnet/F9 (total
> lack of sensible) Tech Support Dept, I totally give up and publicly beg for
> any helpful and relevant suggestions ! Whenever I try to upload large
> files via FTP, the session is always terminated ...

Could it be that you only have a 250MB bandwidth allowance per day, and
that overall, the amount of data being transferred (up/down) exceeds
this?

I know a 50MB 'overhead' on a file seems a bit excessive, but it's the
only plausible answer i can come up with!

Look At End Of Message For Real Address wrote:

> Whenever I try to upload large
> files via FTP, the session is always terminated with the following error
> message (or similar, dependent on the specific FTP app being used):

To which FTP server?

it's possible the server has a session time limit, if your router is NAT
based perhaps it has a bug/feature which time limits sessions ..

In an earlier contribution to this discussion,
Look At End Of Message For Real Address <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

> Hi Guys,
>
> After 4 days of bashing my head against the wall with Plusnet/F9
> (total lack of sensible) Tech Support Dept, I totally give up and
> publicly beg for any helpful and relevant suggestions ! Whenever I
> try to upload large files via FTP, the session is always terminated
> with the following error message (or similar, dependent on the
> specific FTP app being used):
>
>> Netout :10054 Connection closed by remote host.
>
<Gory details snipped>

As far as I can see, you haven't said *what* remote host you're sending this
lot to - presumably not your PlusNet webspace, 'cos you'd fill that up
pretty damn fast with 200MB a throw.

So how do you know that this is a PlusNet problem - and not something to do
with the (presumably third-party) remote host?
--
Cheers,
Tim
______
Please reply to newsgroup. Reply address is invalid.

On Wed, 19 Jan 2005 12:12:33 -0000, Tx2 <(E-Mail Removed)>
wrote:

>Could it be that you only have a 250MB bandwidth allowance per day, and
>that overall, the amount of data being transferred (up/down) exceeds
>this?

Hi

Thanks for suggestion but I don't think this is the case because I have
been able to make several consecutive attempts and each one always dies
after the 2 hours. With the number of times I have tried so far this week
I must be getting pretty near the top of the Plusnet Badboy List and
risking imminent banning or b/w clobbering tho ! Anyway, all the other
Plusnet users will be very pleased to hear that I am now giving up for the
day. I am just going outside .... I may be some time and all that :-)

--
Mike
e-mail: mikeb <at> twowheels <dot> plus <dot> com

On Wed, 19 Jan 2005 12:18:35 +0000, Andy Burns
<(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

>To which FTP server?
>
>it's possible the server has a session time limit, if your router is NAT
>based perhaps it has a bug/feature which time limits sessions ..

Hi

f9 webspace: homepages.force9.net.uk plus other aliases (212.159.8.1)

Yes, my money is on the session time limit but Plusnet don't seem to know
or want to tell me that. And yes it could obviously be the router but I
can't find any evidence to suggest that this is the case either.

--
Mike
e-mail: mikeb <at> twowheels <dot> plus <dot> com

On Wed, 19 Jan 2005 12:20:58 -0000, "Tiscali Tim" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

Hi

>As far as I can see, you haven't said *what* remote host you're sending this
>lot to - presumably not your PlusNet webspace, 'cos you'd fill that up
>pretty damn fast with 200MB a throw.

f9 webspace: homepages.force9.net.uk and other aliases (212.159.8.1)

AFAIK, the space is (was) unlimited or at the very least is significantly
larger than the total needed for all files I have stored there although I
may be wrong here. However, I can have as many (failed) attempts as I want
to leaving numerous ~200M partial files of rubbish lying around !

>So how do you know that this is a PlusNet problem - and not something to do
>with the (presumably third-party) remote host?

I don't which is why I have been asking them questions relating to time or
size restrictions applied by Plusnet/F9 or in relation to FTP clients or
relevant to the FTP procedure in general. Despite numerous responses to
the tech supt ticket so far, none of my specific questions get answered in
any way.

--
Mike
e-mail: mikeb <at> twowheels <dot> plus <dot> com

In article <(E-Mail Removed)>,
Look At End Of Message For Real Address <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>After 4 days of bashing my head against the wall with Plusnet/F9 (total
>lack of sensible) Tech Support Dept, I totally give up and publicly beg for
>any helpful and relevant suggestions ! Whenever I try to upload large
>files via FTP, the session is always terminated with the following error
>message (or similar, dependent on the specific FTP app being used):
>
>> Netout :10054 Connection closed by remote host.

I know how frustrating this type of problem can be. I've experienced it
once, in a totally different context - not sure if it helps you or not.

For a large customer, we procured ATM PVC circuits from BT from London to
Northern Ireland. There were two switches and a router between the PCs and
the ATM circuit, and a router, switch and firewall (and another
switch/VLAN) to the servers. We got a very similar problem - after a
certain time or data volume, we got a remote connection timeout.

As we had quite a bit of control over each element (we ran the ftp server,
client and part of the network) we were eventually able to locate the
problem - which was a slight mismatch in what the ATM router on the far
side from the client thought the PVC bitrate was, and what it actually
was. This cocked up something in the router, and after a certain data
volume it would reset itself, losing the ftp connection. Somehow it didn't
drop any other connections (eg ssh, telnet).

So, while we spent ages looking at the ftp client and server, convinced
that it couldn't be something on the network, it was. If you can, try to
borrow another router or a USB modem and try, to ensure you can eliminate
your router/firewall.

Zane.

Look At End Of Message For Real Address wrote:

> f9 webspace: homepages.force9.net.uk plus other aliases (212.159.8.1)

I don't suppose homepages was designed to allow 200MB+ files, perhaps
that's their size cutoff. What are you hiding behind your fake 404 page
anyway?

On Wed, 19 Jan 2005 14:17:24 +0000, Andy Burns
<(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

Hi

>I don't suppose homepages was designed to allow 200MB+ files, perhaps
>that's their size cutoff.

You may well be right and I could fully understand it but again, Plusnet
don't seem to either know that or don't want to tell me !

>What are you hiding behind your fake 404 page anyway?

Hahaha. Absolutely nothing, that's just for amusement so don't bother
wasting your time trying to hack or anything although do feel free to have
a go if you've nowt better to do but I can assure you there is nothing of
any interest unless you want a few avatars, smilies or festival photos and
so on. I'm sure that a quick google on the url if you haven't already been
there - done that will most likely reveal all :-)

I'm not running a live site at all, although I sort of did ages back. I now
only ever use the space to temporarily store stuff for colleagues/friends
to d/l or to link to forums and other sites etc. The particular file in
question is actually just a recording of a TV programme which is why it is
so d@mn big. It's normally a very quick and convenient way to send stuff
which is way too big for e-mail and would take too long if bunged in the
post to someone.

--
Mike
e-mail: mikeb <at> twowheels <dot> plus <dot> com