Forum Discussion

particleman's avatar
particleman
New Contributor III
4 years ago

Packet loss, latency on gigablast in Scottsdale, AZ for the last few months

I've been battling issues similar to multiple other recent posts on the forums [1, 2, 3, 4].Since this problem has started, I've replaced the cabling in my house, gotten a new modem and a new router, but the problem has persisted.

As of today, I've had four different techs come to my house.
Techs 1 and 2 both replaced the connections from my house to my tap.
Tech 3 did that too, but also said he added a "boost filter" because of "low transmits" to my modem.
Tech 4 replaced connections as well, and then said he "lowered the signal" because it was "too high" at the modem (sounds like he removed the boost filter from tech #3 lol).

Today I noticed there is one especially bad host in the tracerts to both a sample Rocket League server and to Google, and several other hosts giving packet loss. Sunday and Monday had very bad packet loss all day, while it cleared late Monday night (9pm-1am). Today there was supposedly an outage in my area, but my Internet access was fine, and in fact had very little packet loss. Lo and behold, as the "outage" was clearing up, the packet loss came back.

Attached are several samples from yesterday and today. I chose a smattering of times from yesterday's samples to show that the problem was definitely exacerbated during peak times, but that there is still packet loss in the tracert on Cox's end even outside of peak, which persists even after today's supposed outage was fixed.

In addition to this, the last phone tech I spoke to via the Cox Cares (what a BS name) actually remarked that Arizona was the highest reporter of these issues in their personal experience. To me, that's pretty telling. Obviously it's anecdotal, but with my data and the rest of the data from others it seems to me Cox has some serious infrastructure issues that they are actively choosing to avoid dealing with. Lucky for them they have a monopoly here, huh?


https://drive.google.com/file/d/1irw5zdTEkkEb5818-UJJBkbLkP6DHzFM/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pkmfPBba58rBVsLE1dvU53BGUTjvKtNN/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gHbb7vwUXIT2FXpFvoeNbbpUsogvPwT7/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RmCGIvrtx1Sc1Q7w0yU7b6gbJP_ggy3G/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1TmK8voj4KXR4li6N7XahocB4uA6HC5m1/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bLOWFfg9vnDwZ6PAbCz1G_406JJmSeXe/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1LhWZxlJoREkhb7Fji6HAZ0X6EIC6J55d/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/19YF_sdIIG8sAyVAQorc_fYIj0X6cjlHO/view?usp=sharing


[1] Gaming and warzone/CoD in general packet burst - Internet - Internet Forum - Cox Support Forums

[2] Noisy node issues - Speed drops until reset - Internet - Internet Forum - Cox Support Forums

[3] Terrible packet loss and jitter. - Internet - Internet Forum - Cox Support Forums

[4] Another packet loss and ping spike issue - Internet - Internet Forum - Cox Support Forums

  • particleman's avatar
    particleman
    New Contributor III

    Response from the cox.help e-mail: 

    "At this time, our techs are currently aware of a noise issue that is causing packet loss in your general area. Our techs are working on resolving this issue as quickly as possible"

    I asked for more info but all I really got was 

    " This is a recent issue that was reported. I show we made some changes on the outside to help fix this issue. The escalation is currently still open and there are no updates showing at this time."

    and

    "For plant-related issues, we do have to get a tech out to verify the service from the home to our plant. They usually escalate the issue over to the plant group. We do have a group that monitors the plant as well and may open a ticket if they do see an issue going on in the area. Sometimes if the issue is intermittent, it may be hard to find as well."

    I'm not sure what they mean when they refer to a "plant", but I'm guessing it's referring to a node or a set of nodes

    • Patlock's avatar
      Patlock
      New Contributor II

      This is what I got yesterday:

      "I apologize for any inconvenience caused. It looks like the issue impacting your services has been referred to our engineering team to have the node split. Tentatively it looks like this process will take a few months to complete however no further information is available. If we can be of assistance with anything else in the meanwhile please let us know."

      They also offered me like a 70 dollar credit for this happening for the past 4 months. 

      What am I supposed to do now? Months to fix a known issue is insane

      • No_Up_Speed's avatar
        No_Up_Speed
        New Contributor II

        It means their infrastructure can't handle the amount of traffic they have.

    • Patlock's avatar
      Patlock
      New Contributor II

      This is basically what they had told me the last few times I have emailed them.

      jonathanj Can anything actually be done about this or do I just have to wait until they fix whatever infrastructure/node is causing the problem?

      I have to tether internet from my phone hotspot at the end of work days because it gets so bad. Feels pointless to pay for a service that isn't working correctly for months. 

      • SharonL's avatar
        SharonL
        Former Moderator
        Hello,

        I am sorry to hear you are experiencing issues with your internet. This appears as if you may need someone to investigate your account personally. We would be able to assist you with this. Please reach us on Twitter at @CoxHelp, visit us on Facebook, or email us at cox.help@cox.com. Provide us the name on the account with the complete service address with a link to this thread so we can get started.
         
        Sharon
        Cox Support Forum Moderator
    • Dave9's avatar
      Dave9
      Contributor III

      The "plant" is basically everything that is owned by Cox and not on your property. Nodes, amplifiers, fiber converters, CCAP, etc.

  • Budrose's avatar
    Budrose
    New Contributor II

    It's not just AZ its in So Cal as well. I've sent a couple of emails to cox.help with detailed trace routes with other info and game logs but have not got a reply. Just a bunch of lip service on the forums.

    • JonathanJ's avatar
      JonathanJ
      Former Moderator
      @Budrose

      I've checked the modem signal levels and not showing any packet loss or latency. I've also pinged a few modems on the node and not showing any issues. For testing purposes, are you able to bypass the router and hardwire directly to the modem to see if you getting the same results?

      Jonathan J
      Cox Moderator

  • MarkM1's avatar
    MarkM1
    Former Moderator
    Particleman,

    We would like to look into your issue to see what is causing this problem for you. Would you send us an email to cox.help@cox.com in reference to this forum post so we can check your account about this as well?

    Mark M.
    Cox Support Forums Moderator
  • Thoreau's avatar
    Thoreau
    New Contributor II

    I'm in what seems like the same boat (at Scottsdale/101.)

    Could be worse.  I had support asking me whether I was on 2.4ghz or 5ghz after clearly stating, twice, that my computer was plugged directly into the cable modem for testing.  =)

    I haven't had many issues in the last few years, if any really, but over the last week I noticed that there was sufficient packet loss that the monitoring/auto-reboot functions of my Ubiquiti network were triggering cable modem reboots to try and fix itself.  I initially chalked it up to Ubiquiti's latest gizmo being a bit buggy, but it still triggered on the 20th, 21st, 22nd, and multiple times on the 25th.  Simple video streaming of Youtube TV became a buffer nightmare, remote access to my home network got sluggish, and I noticed packet loss on continuous pings to google.com and 8.8.8.8.  (Losing about 4-8% now.)

    There have been zero changes to anything between the cable modem and the outside world (barring anything out at the street, who knows) and it's just been a gradual downward slope into oblivion.  Today, I can still hammer out almost 700mbit down, but upstream is 2.41mbit.  That's a kinda massive problem.

    Just for giggles, I even did a full reset on the SB8200 (little reset button + paperclip) and let it do it's thing.  Still managed to bring downstream online at docsis 3.1 (blue light) but upstream remains 3.0 (green light.)  I honestly have no idea if thats always been that color scheme, or if upstream should also run blue/3.1 (maybe not since it's only supposed to be 35mbit anyway?)  Regardless, the service is pretty much unusable at this point.

    After dealing with the *** in chat who couldn't figure out that hardlining via ethernet used neither of the common wifi bands, and trying to sell me on 'advanced support' for $10/mo, I did speak with a support rep on the phone (is it bad that I still have 623-594-1000 memorized from back in the Cox@Home days?) and they actually did show an outage/issue in my area.  The Cox app and ensuing sms alerts just before that corroborated the story.  Unfortunately that has since cleared and things continue to degrade.

    I also took a look at the modem's status page and while I deal with networks and IT for a living, the channels and signal levels it reports might as well be Greek to me.  Nothing pops out as an obvious issue, other than the lo screen showing something about some 'dynamic range window violation' repeating a few times.  (Lots to see about that on google, but nothing useful so far.)

    In any case, packet loss begins immediately after leaving my network, so the issue would appear to be between the cable modem and the upstream connection at Cox.  No luck getting past the script-reading support types to actually take action on any of this though.

    • Patlock's avatar
      Patlock
      New Contributor II

      I also had support asking me to unplug my router after telling them I was hardwired into the modem. Like come on man. 

      What are our options at this point? Every single skype work call/meeting I have cuts in and out every 5 seconds. Jitter, ploss, and ping spikes are terrible throughout the day and can provide ample proof to back up all of these claims.

      Is cox going to actually fix their infrastructure or are we just out of luck? Only other option I have in this area (Gilbert and the 60) is Century Link DSL. I have seen 50+ cox trucks in my neighborhood over the last month so I am assuming my neighbors are experiencing issues as well.

      • particleman's avatar
        particleman
        New Contributor III

        The best option I can see is to organize a campaign around informal FCC complaints. There are a lot of customers out here not getting what they're paying for, and I think plenty of us are fed up. 

        My post here was to hopefully get some eyes at Cox to look at the case, so I'll be a little more patient in that regard, because just like Thoreau I'm totally over trying to get the folks on the phones reading scripts to get to the root of things. The last time I tried it they wanted to send another tech out so I just hung up.

  • Patlock's avatar
    Patlock
    New Contributor II

    I have been experiencing this same exact issue over the last several months in Mesa, AZ. I have had 5 techs come out and they did various things but still the issue persists.

    All the traceroutes I run are garbage and show incredibly high spikes on local cox nodes. Problem also tends to get worse around 5pm AZ time.

    It is impacting work for me and my wife and there does not seem to be any solution in sight. Gaming is nearly impossible with the high packet loss all day long. I don't know what else to do at this point. 

    • particleman's avatar
      particleman
      New Contributor III

      The entire reason I went to the forums is to hopefully get more eyes on the problem. I'm convinced at this point that it's systemic, and it's clear that Arizona is a market that's simply won for Cox. There are "competitors" as long as you want to go through middlemen or deal with DSL (in 2021?), so the competition is a joke. 

      I'm probably going to start asking around the neighborhood to see if people have noticed the same thing. I assume they have, but don't realize what's causing it. My plan from there is to organize folks into asking Cox to finally fix their infrastructure here, and if that doesn't work, going through the FCC for an informal complaint, and if even THAT doesn't work, probably contacting the EFF to help file a formal complaint

  • particleman's avatar
    particleman
    New Contributor III

    I should note that this causes problems for me beyond just gaming. I've seen huge drops in quality from streams [1], and I often drop in and out of voice meetings for work (and working from home means that's a problem)

    [1] drive.google.com/.../view

  • particleman's avatar
    particleman
    New Contributor III

    Just took a quick sample from my latest Rocket League logs for a server from the west coast:https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-NMfPxBlck3ojUE9KdaWpx3krXlI3rBe/view?usp=sharing

    That 68.1.0.191 IP sure seems bad, let's see who owns it via WHOIS IP Lookup Tool | UltraTools...

    Source: whois.arin.net
    IP Address: 68.1.0.191
    Name: NETBLK-AT-INT-68-1-0-0
    Handle: NET-68-1-0-0-1
    Registration Date: 4/7/14
    Range: 68.1.0.0-68.1.31.255
    Customer: Cox Communications Inc.
    Customer Handle: C04977143
    Address: 1400 Lake Hearn Dr
    City: ATlanta
    State/Province: GA
    Postal Code: 30319
    Country: United States

    Surprise! It was Cox the entire time!