Possible Problem w/Cablevision (Optimum Online)

Posts: 51

For the past month, my Optimum Online internet connection has gotten progressively less reliable. My modem would periodically go offline, requiring me to power cycle my modem, router, and MTA.

I have been keeping a closer eye on when I lose internet service and I haven't been able to draw a direct correlation, but it seems like I may be getting booted whenever I connect my Vonage service. Has anyone experienced trouble like this with Cablevision?

My setup is modem->router->MTA. I had Optimum Online for almost 1 year and Vonage for about 2 months with flawless service before this started happening. Is it possible that Cablevision has begun monitoring bandwidth? Is it possible for them to boot me for using Vonage? I just can't pin this problem down and was wondering if others had had similar experiences with Cablevision (or any other broadband ISP for that matter...)

I will be happy to answer any questions as best that I can.

Posts: 183 · Vonage Forum Master Joined: May 05, 2004 Posts: 183

Did you call Optimum and ask them?

Posts: 110 · Vonage Forum Senior Joined: Mar 06, 2004 Posts: 110

I too am on Opt. online and while I'm not getting disconnected so routinely that it requires reboot, I am experiencing call drops that, using ping plotter, I have tracked back to my internet connection being down. I don't know if it always had this intermittent loss before or not.

I'm going to try getting a newer cable modem from them (mine is over 5 years old) and see if that helps.

You might want to also check out the LIOPTONLINE users group over at Yahoo.

I don't have the URL, but just search for the Long Island Optimum Online users group and you should find 'em. They cover all geographic areas where Opt online is installed and are most knowledgeable about the service.

Posts: 51 · Posted: Mon May 10, 2004 9:00 am Post subject:

plyons wrote:

You might want to also check out the LIOPTONLINE users group over at Yahoo.

I signed up for the group, but my membership is pending. We'll see if anyone has any input over there.

Did you ever contact Cablevision about your internet outages? I am finding out that Cablevision can be a real pain in the ass with their service restrictions - according to the user agreement you are not allowed to point any url to an OOL IP address, I don't know if they can use this requirement as an excuse to **** all over your Vonage service and force you to pay for Optimum Voice.

Anybody else having trouble with OOL/Cablevision?

Posts: 183 · Vonage Forum Master Joined: May 05, 2004 Posts: 183

ahealey74 wrote:

... according to the user agreement you are not allowed to point any url to an OOL IP address, I don't know if they can use this requirement as an excuse to **** all over your Vonage service and force you to pay for Optimum Voice.

That SOUNDS like they don't want people putting web pages up on their local 'puters, but maybe it includes clients like an ATA. I tend to doubt they were that forward thinking in their lawyer language department, though.

Posts: 22 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Mar 14, 2004 Posts: 22

I have been having fax issues for over a month now, and Vonage is now blaming latency on my line, which is optimumonline. Not sure if I believe this or not, but I was thinking about moving to DSL anyway though it's a little more money.

Posts: 110 · Vonage Forum Senior Joined: Mar 06, 2004 Posts: 110

My issues with dropped calls were resolved.

I did replace my cable modem free at a Cablevision office, but more likely than not, my problems were with my Linksys BEFSR41 router.

I got an 8 port BEFSR81 instead (version 3 by Cisco) and haven't had any problems for a couple of weeks now.

Posts: 1 · New Forum Member Joined: Sep 21, 2005 Posts: 1

For the past day i am having problems with making/receiving calls with Vonage on my optimum online connection. The call goes through but cannot speak or listen to the person at the other end.
Is it possible OOL is blocking Vonage calls?

Posts: 1179 · Member of the Week Joined: Feb 28, 2005 Posts: 1179

ahealey,

back to your original post. Some questions. What is your bandwidth currently upstream and downstream?

As far as I know, Vonage should use up no more than 100kbps of your upstream and downstream which should pose little concern to Optimum. It will use even less if you use the bandwidth saver option and lower it to 50kbps.

So my next question would be, are you also running a web server? In other words, what else is eating up all the bandwidth?

I suppose the answers to these questions would clarify your situation somewhat. Regarding the rebooting because of a lost connection, I am almost 100% sure that it is a Opt issue as I have faced similar situations here with Comcast, it was never a problem with my router or ATA. I hope this helps.

btw, one simple test could be to take the MTA out for a couple of days and see how if the disconnects continue. If so, then you know that the problem is with Opt.