Options for Domestic Wired Networking / Broadband

[Trev]

It's a 3700, but not sure about the v2

 

[everthewatcher]

Not sure you can turn off the WiFi (and the public WiFi) though.

Of course you can - you can still access it via the secondary router.

The public one needs BT to throw the switch of course.

 

[Trev]

But as a temporary DSL test who cares about the WiFi?

 

[everthewatcher]

It's a 3700, but not sure about the v2

If it doesn't say V2 in on the bottom it's V1.

Which means you can put Richud's DGND3800 firmware on it...

 

[Trev]

I can't check that as I no longer have it. BH does.

 

[Black Hole]

But as a temporary DSL test who cares about the WiFi?

The discussion was heading towards permanent rather than temporary.

 

[Black Hole]

It's a 3700, but not sure about the v2

It's a V2. I recall being a little annoyed that there was no custom firmware for it.

 

[prpr]

Frankly, I find it astonishing that a small box at my end (and presumably a more sophisticated box at the other end) is able to selectively process 200-odd sub-carriers and combine the data transport capabilities of each into a multi-tens-of-megabits-per-second data stream.

I'm astonished that you're astonished by this.

Our HDR-FOXes only process two data streams, each from one carrier.

Huh? Broadcast TV uses the so-called 8K carriers (in reality 6 thousand something or other, that I ought to remember, but don't).

I am using a second-hand Netgear modem/router

Me too. The venerable DG834 V4 (in bridge mode). I paid about £12 for it. And similar for the other location. I bought a spare last year for a fiver. They are pretty good in my opinion.

As line negotiations are limited at the highest common standard, the modem at my end could be the limiting factor.

I doubt it.

 

[Black Hole]

Broadcast TV uses the so-called 8K carriers (in reality 6 thousand something or other, that I ought to remember, but don't).

I see what you mean, my bad. I can't help being boggled by the complexity and speed of the process, having cut my teeth in electronics when a 16MHz clock rate was a bit quick. The technical description for DVB-T talks about using FFT to recover the sub-carriers... how bloody fast does that have to work?!!!

 

[everthewatcher]

It's a V2. I recall being a little annoyed that there was no custom firmware for it.

There's a V1 here going spare...

 

[everthewatcher]

Frankly, I find it astonishing that a small box at my end (and presumably a more sophisticated box at the other end) is able to selectively process 200-odd sub-carriers and combine the data transport capabilities of each into a multi-tens-of-megabits-per-second data stream.

Homeplug uses the same tricks.

 

[Black Hole]

There's a V1 here going spare...

Hmm... might take you up on that, I'll let you know.

 

[Black Hole]

Ooohhh! There's interesting:

This page contains all the custom firmware files for Netgear's DGND3700 V1 / N600 (ADSL/VDSL(FTTC)/WAN Router).

(The DGND3700 V2 is a different Broadcom chipset and only supports ADSL, NOT VDSL!)

 

[Black Hole]

Because I had set up the 3700v2 and the HomeHub4 identically (or as close as), it was a very simple thing to turn off the 3700v2, swap the connections, and turn the HH4 on before I went out this morning. Tonight, I'm getting very similar stats from it as I had from the 3700v2:

Downstream: 5.592 Mbps
Upstream: 1.017 Mbps

(no reading available for noise or noise margin).

The last sensible line from the 3700v2 RouterStatsLite log reads:

Noise Margin (dB)= 9.5, Connection Speed (Kbps)= 5392, Upstream NM= 14.5, Upstream Sync= 848

(Not sure what "upstream sync" is, but the figure is very close to the graph plot upstream connection speed in kbps)*

So yes, maybe the HH4 is a tiny bit quicker, but I fancy the 5GHz WiFi isn't quite as strong, and in any case the lack of user configurability isn't made up for by the few percent gain. In particular, without a means to get a continuous line stat log out of it, I have no means to present BT with evidence for a complaint!

* Update: it seems "sync rate" is synonymous with the connection speed, as the maximum data rate the two ends have negotiated (or sync'ed to).

 

[Trev]

Yes, lack of VDSL was why I got rid of it when I switched to FTTC and bought a NG D6400

 

[Black Hole]

Here's an interesting pair of plots for the 3700v2 from this morning (yes, the "upstream sync" figure in the log does seem to correspond with the upstream connection speed graph):

 

[Black Hole]

Yes, lack of VDSL was why I got rid of it when I switched to FTTC and bought a NG D6400

No FTTC* here, nor any likelihood of it in the foreseeable future, but I was worried the v2 superseded the v1 technically... apparently not - the v2 actually looks like a cost reduction.

Question: Is the v1+CF going to give me all the bells and whistles I am likely to want, or would I be better off splashing the cash on a fully open router with community supported firmware?

* I have seen a reference on the web (maybe an American page) that "FTTC" means "fiber to the curb". A subject for AvP I think!

 

[prpr]

You've got an obvious line fault. But convincing the b@st@rds at BT is another matter. They won't be interested in your graphs. They weren't in mine. Luckily mine failed catastrophically, after months and months of misery, and they were forced to do something about it (I got swapped on to another pair).

 

[Black Hole]

I'll tell them if they don't sort it I'm taking my business to Virgin...

 

[Black Hole]

I notice the v1 isn't supported by RouterStats Lite, but I presume the CF for it can be configured to capture that sort of info anyway?