# Intermittent Cable Internet Connection



## PFOD19 (Nov 25, 2009)

For the last three weeks, we have been having internet disconnectivity in our house off and on. It started late at night, and by late at night I mean 1-5am. We work 2nd shift, so that is the time we're home and on our computers/gaming consoles. We have Time Warner Cable, and know they tend to do their updates/changes late at night when fewer people are on. So we didn't think much of it at first...until it started getting into its 3rd week.

What happens is we would be playing or surfing the net and it would disconnect. Most of the time these disconnects are so brief, but they are enough to log us out of the game we are playing (mainly this is noticed while playing WoW, but is not exclussive). We can then, usually, log right back in. So they are very short outages, but this can happen upwards of 15-20 times a night, it gets very frustrating.

I'm not the most tech-savvy person, but I like to think I have a decent head on my shoulders, so this is the trouble shooting I did on our side: The first thing I did was unplug from our router, and plug directly into the modem. Still got disconnected, so I knew it wasn't our router. The next thing was we tried a non-computer system. Namely my husband's Xbox360. Still got disconnected, so we've eliminated computer and router problems. So at this point I'm looking squarely at our ISP.

We talked to TW, and they sent out a service tech. The first guy said they were doing some major system changes, but that they just finished, so everything should be ok now. He lied. We called TW again, and the second tech came out and checked our lines and modem. He replaced the modem, even though he did not think that was the problem. Instead he professed it probably had to do with the colder temperatures at night, and there was something wrong with our outside cables then, but since our modem hadn't been changed, he'd try that fix first. We tried, it failed. So we call a third guy out to change the lines this time. Instead the guy says 'Oh your modem just needed an update, that should fix it.' And left after doing that -_- No, it did not fix it. So, we got a fourth guy out today, after explicitly telling the TW call center we wanted our line changed this time! The guy comes out knowing nothing about this, and tells us that a line change is a four person job and we'll have to wait six weeks! Instead he looked at the outside line and found one of the connectors was striped, which he said could go out with cold weather. He replaced it. But less than 20 minutes after he left, it was disconnecting again, and the frequency seems to have increased. This was also much earlier in the day that the previous ones. Up until then the earliest I was ever disconnected was 7pm, but this was a 3pm. Now, the temperates have dropped here during the daytime the last week, but our high today was in the lower 50's/upper 40's. I would not think that that would be cold enough to cause problems, but maybe I am wrong.

After talking to four seperate techs, I followed a few more things to trouble shoot. We have bundled services, so when the internet goes out, I watched the TV and our phone, both worked superbly, so it is entirely just our internet. I also researched cables and cold weather, but I find those results conflict with just an internet outage, as most of the stories I read mentioned tv problems as well. On top of that, it hasn't really been freezing temperatures here, so the cold water expanding theory I don't think applies. I also watched our modem when the internet went out, and all the lights stayed lit.

At this point I'm sick of waiting on TW to figure out the problem, and would like to trouble shoot further on my own if that is possible. If someone could suggest to me what to look for, what to log, what to test, that would be wonderful. I just want to have my solid internet back. Thank you in advance for any help you all can give.

Oh, and if it also helps, we've put all three of our machines on the internet at the same time through our router, and we all get disconnected at the same time. The three machines are: One computer using Windows XP and IE, One using Windows Vista and IE (and WoW), and an Xbox360. But as previously stated, I do not think its the router. Oh, and everything is hardwired, we do not have a wireless anything.


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## stuking2002 (Dec 9, 2009)

I have a similar issue. I lose the internet connection and can only get it back if I log off Windows and log back on. This happens with wireless and hardwired both. We have three different computers this happens to.


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## johnwill (Sep 26, 2002)

*stuking2002*, please start your own thread.


*PFOD19*, please do this.

Register at DSLReports and run their Line Quality Tests. It's best to run this test with a direct wired connection to eliminate any wireless issues from the results. It's useful many times to run this test several times, and we'd like to see each of the results. Post the results link from the top of the test display page for each test run here.

The link to post is near the top of the page and looks like:

If you wish to post this result to a forum, please copy/paste this URL
*http://www.dslreports.com/linequality/nil/2357195* <- _sample only, yours will obviously be different!_
and your IP will be disguised.

Copy/paste that link here.

*Note:* _You will have to enable PING (ICMP) request response either in your router (if you have one), or in your computer's firewall for direct modem connections. This is very important to get the most important part of the test to run._


DSLReports 

Here's also the Line Quality Tests FAQ to help you understand the results. This will answer some questions about the line quality display.


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