A (probably daft) Micro Filter question

I helped someone set up their new Pipex broadband account the other day and
it was working fine until last night (email send and receive problems).

I've just been round to have a look and the pop3 and smtp ports were blocked
(according to outlook express). After fannying on for a bit I decided to
phone Pipex. The recorded message was very hissy then became clear at which
point I noticed the modem had disconnected and would not reconnect.

I found out he didn't have the phone I was using plugged into a micro
filter. So I plugged it into one and lo and behold everything worked hunky
dory again. And just to test, I took it back out and it stopped working.

So (just out of curiosity and future reference),

A) would the lack of a micro filter on that phone cause a problem where the
connection works fine (you could still browse ok) but the email wouldn't.

B) are micro filters supposed to stop the broadband interfering with the
phone, or vice versa, or both?

Anth

> A) would the lack of a micro filter on that phone cause a problem where
the
> connection works fine (you could still browse ok) but the email wouldn't.

No, as E-Mail travels over the exact same connection as normal browsing in
this sense

> B) are micro filters supposed to stop the broadband interfering with the
> phone, or vice versa, or both?

What else do you think they're there for ;-)....Yes, they are to split the
ADSL and Phone signals so neither interfere with eachother.

> A) would the lack of a micro filter on that phone cause a problem where the
> connection works fine (you could still browse ok) but the email wouldn't.

Probably not. If you've got the internet connection, you've got the
internet connection. The modem/phoneline shouldn't really care
whether your emailing or browsing.

> B) are micro filters supposed to stop the broadband interfering with the
> phone, or vice versa, or both?

Both.

Regards,

James
Zen Internet.

In article <40c876ac$(E-Mail Removed)>,
Anthony Bowles <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> A) would the lack of a micro filter on that phone cause a problem where the
> connection works fine (you could still browse ok) but the email wouldn't.

Unlikely, but possible.

>
> B) are micro filters supposed to stop the broadband interfering with the
> phone, or vice versa, or both?

Both.

ian

Anthony Bowles <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> I helped someone set up their new Pipex broadband account the other day and
> it was working fine until last night (email send and receive problems).
<snip><>
> I found out he didn't have the phone I was using plugged into a micro
> filter. So I plugged it into one and lo and behold everything worked hunky
> dory again. And just to test, I took it back out and it stopped working.
>
> So (just out of curiosity and future reference),
>
> A) would the lack of a micro filter on that phone cause a problem where the
> connection works fine (you could still browse ok) but the email wouldn't.

Certainly not, if the ADSL connection is established, and you can browse,
then it'll be fine for email.
>
> B) are micro filters supposed to stop the broadband interfering with the
> phone, or vice versa, or both?

Both.
Close to the exchange, ADSL and phone can work without filters.
As you get further away, the phone kills the ADSL connection when
picked up, and even further away the ADSL connection requires a filter
to work at all.
(phones may vary)

On Thu, 10 Jun 2004 15:03:21 +0000, Ian G Batten wrote:

> In article <40c876ac$(E-Mail Removed)>, Anthony Bowles
> <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>> A) would the lack of a micro filter on that phone cause a problem where
>> the connection works fine (you could still browse ok) but the email
>> wouldn't.
>
> Unlikely, but possible.

How? To have the system do this deliberately would be more trouble than
it's worth. If it were just a matter of intermittent connection it would
affect browsing far more, as it requires a more continuous connection than
SMTP or POP.

--
Ian.

EOM

In an earlier contribution to this discussion,
Ian Stirling <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

> Close to the exchange, ADSL and phone can work without filters.
> As you get further away, the phone kills the ADSL connection when
> picked up, and even further away the ADSL connection requires a filter
> to work at all.
> (phones may vary)


That's extremely interesting! Until recently, I tended to believe the
assertions made by some that ADSL wouldn't be affected by phones, but phones
*would* be affected by ADSL in the absence of filters.

However, my own experience - when I recently upgraded to ADSL - didn't bear
this out. My ADSL got turned on a bit sooner than I expected, before my
filters had arrived - but I did have an ADSL modem. The modem wouldn't synch
when *any* phones were in circuit (not in use, as in off-hook, just in
circuit). When I unplugged all the phones (or otherwise disconnected them by
plugging my ADSL modem into the master socket's test socket with the
faceplate (and hence extension wiring) removed, ADSL worked perfectly. [As
soon as my filtered faceplate arrived, and I installed it, everything worked
perfectly *with* the phones in circuit, much to my relief].

All of this fits very well with Ian's statement that the extent to which
phones interfere with ADSL depends on distance from the exchange. I am
relatively far away, and my line loss is such that 512k is fine, but 1M or
2M seem unlikely.
--
Cheers,
Tim
______
Please reply to newsgroup. Reply address is invalid.

Tiscali Tim <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> In an earlier contribution to this discussion,
> Ian Stirling <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>
>> Close to the exchange, ADSL and phone can work without filters.
>> As you get further away, the phone kills the ADSL connection when
>> picked up, and even further away the ADSL connection requires a filter
>> to work at all.
>> (phones may vary)
>
>
> That's extremely interesting! Until recently, I tended to believe the
> assertions made by some that ADSL wouldn't be affected by phones, but phones
> *would* be affected by ADSL in the absence of filters.
>
> However, my own experience - when I recently upgraded to ADSL - didn't bear
> this out. My ADSL got turned on a bit sooner than I expected, before my
> filters had arrived - but I did have an ADSL modem. The modem wouldn't synch
> when *any* phones were in circuit (not in use, as in off-hook, just in
> circuit). When I unplugged all the phones (or otherwise disconnected them by

Phones vary in design, the above information was from the BT engineer
who installed it. (well, came to remove my HH box, and test the line).

You have a dud microfilter. I have had the same problem and the replacement
fixed it.

"Anthony Bowles" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:40c876ac$(E-Mail Removed)...
> I helped someone set up their new Pipex broadband account the other day
and
> it was working fine until last night (email send and receive problems).
>
> I've just been round to have a look and the pop3 and smtp ports were
blocked
> (according to outlook express). After fannying on for a bit I decided to
> phone Pipex. The recorded message was very hissy then became clear at
which
> point I noticed the modem had disconnected and would not reconnect.
>
> I found out he didn't have the phone I was using plugged into a micro
> filter. So I plugged it into one and lo and behold everything worked
hunky
> dory again. And just to test, I took it back out and it stopped working.
>
> So (just out of curiosity and future reference),
>
> A) would the lack of a micro filter on that phone cause a problem where
the
> connection works fine (you could still browse ok) but the email wouldn't.
>
> B) are micro filters supposed to stop the broadband interfering with the
> phone, or vice versa, or both?
>
> Anth
>
>

In article <(E-Mail Removed)>,
Ian Hastie <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
> >> A) would the lack of a micro filter on that phone cause a problem where
> >> the connection works fine (you could still browse ok) but the email
> >> wouldn't.
> >
> > Unlikely, but possible.
>
> How? To have the system do this deliberately would be more trouble than
> it's worth. If it were just a matter of intermittent connection it would

I have had LAN cases where a cable will pass telnet and ssh but passes
precisely zero NFS or SMB traffic: if the error rate is high enough 200
byte packets get through, albeit with quite a high loss and
retransmission rate, but larger packets will always fail. Indeed, pings
with varying packet sizes are standard practice here, and I still have a
bug open with Sun requesting sweeping sizes for their multipath link
detection bode. I was thinking that if you had a high-ish upstream error
rate, browsing might just about work (small requests, lots of acks, no
bulk transfer) while mail transmission wouldn't (bulk transfer).

ian