Weird pause at the beginning of some calls

Posts: 8 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 10, 2005 Posts: 8

On some calls, I get dialtone, place the call, and instead of hearing the other line ring, I will get dead silence, and then the call will connect and I'll either be in the middle of a voicemail message (if the person isn't there) or the other end going, 'Hello? Hello?' Why does this happen? It's sporadic and there's no pattern. Razz

Posts: 3198 · Posted: Mon Jan 10, 2005 8:46 am Post subject:

possibly some bad packet loss. what is your set up? what Vonage device? what ISP and if applicable what cable modem? what are your detailed results at testyourvoip.com and what speed (upload and download) does your connection give you? try a speed test too. the one here at vonage-forum has never worked for me, but there are a few at dslreports.com

Posts: 8 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 10, 2005 Posts: 8

i'm using a Motorola VT1005V. the results:

TO BOSTON:
mos: 3.66
codec 0.58 43%
latency 0.10 7.7%
discards 0.66 49.2%
codec: g.711
rt latency: 272ms
packet discards: 3.7%
packet loss: 0%
loss periods (min/avg/max): 60/180/440ms
jitter (min/avg/max): 0/4/326ms
post dial delay: 119ms
call setup time: 158ms
media delay: 308ms

FROM BOSTON:
mos: 3.42
codec 0.58 36.5%
latency 0.11 7%
discards 0.76 48.1%
packet loss: 0.13 8.3%
codec: g.711
rt latency: 272ms
packet discards: 3.7%
packet loss: 0.6%
loss periods (min/avg/max): 20/60/440ms
jitter (min/avg/max): 0/1/351ms
post dial delay: 162ms
call setup time: 197ms
media delay: 260ms

even though nominally w/ comcast i should get 4mbps down and i think 768kbps up, my dslreports results were 566/232kbps.
cable modem is a toshiba pcx1100.

Posts: 3198 · Posted: Mon Jan 10, 2005 6:25 pm Post subject:

ouch, another example of a comcast and PCX1100U meltdown.
here are some others with similar problems (and the motorola cable modem that solved them):

http://vonage-forum.com/ftopic2172.html
http://vonage-forum.com/ftopic2257.html
http://vonage-forum.com/ftopic2267.html
http://vonage-forum.com/ftopic886.html

Posts: 8 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 10, 2005 Posts: 8

A tech support guy from Comcast confirmed what all these threads said. According to him, the PCX1100 is a six year old pre-DOCSIS 1.0 modem that isn't even fully compliant with the DOCSIS 1.0 standard (which wasn't released in its final form until 2001). It uses a lot of older, discrete components which are prone to going bad over time (capacitors and resistors especially), and provide less flexibility than ASIC's. Comcast doesn't even hand them out anymore. He recommended that I go to my local office and turn this piece of **** in and get something modern.

Posts: 227 · Vonage Forum Master Joined: Dec 10, 2004 Posts: 227

Actually, the 1100(U) is DOCSIS 1.1 certified. It is the 1000 series that is not 1.1 compatible. Check it out: http://www.comcast.com/Support/Corp1/FAQ/FaqDetail_2427.html

Posts: 227 · Vonage Forum Master Joined: Dec 10, 2004 Posts: 227

You can also check out the product info at: http://www.toshiba.com/taisnpd/products/pcx1100u_datasheet.pdf

Posts: 8 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 10, 2005 Posts: 8

I exchanged my Toshiba PCX1100 for a Thomson/RCA device and reran the speed and Voip quality tests -- it's like night and day. Latency is way down...packet loss and discards way down...speeds are up...as an added bonus, downloads are way faster and webpages load way faster...I can't believe I've been putting up with such a bad cable modem for four years.