True Adsl - Slow - Cable Broken In Taiwan...

[laurent]

Hi,

I was really fed up with my internet connection today (True ADSL 1000) and decided to call their tech support, and I was told that they had some problem with one of their submarine cables (Taiwan) and that they were getting lots of complaints.

They said it should be solved within next week.

This let me wonder if it is another BS answer or whether they really have some issues on one of their cables...

.....

Edited January 26, 2008 by laurent

[AlexLah]

Yes true,

I blow up one of ther stations as they were sending out a lot of encrytpted data.

More then usual.

Very suspicious.

That's why.

Sorry for you.

[Florin]

They must definitely be having issues with one of their links, quite likely the Taiwan one, from my experience today:

Sites in Europe, SE Asia (such as this one) - no problems, including maxing out my download speed.

Sites in the US - varying levels of problems, sometimes slowing to a crawl or not working at all.

Since Taiwan would seem to be the link between us and the US, seems like what happened...

[TexasRanger]

I had a lot of problems a couple of days ago with some UK sites and couldn't get gMail / google. I know it was a True problem because I jumped on a wireless network to check and that one was OK. They said it would be clear that day and I haven't had any more trouble since.

[paperwerks]

I can't even get my mail at Yahoo.

It is always something with true. Totally pathectic service. Most of the failed states/hellhole countries in Africa even have better internet service than Thailand. many have Wimax already.

You just have to laugh at the pathetic government propaganda crap they put out like how they will make Thailand the "Information Technology hub of Asia"

[SWINDON MASSIF]

It's true, there is a problem (See what I did there?)

I have been having problems with slowness for that last few days now and now the majority of UK sites have completely stopped for me. I can still get football highlights from the beeb, although not until my third attempt.

I have called True and after my insistence that there is not an issue with my PC, Viurse's or spyware they fobbed me off with some "We cannot guarantee a connection to all countries" excuse. Which clearly defeats the whole purpose of the WORLD WIDE web.

Considering that the conversation went through my Thai wife, I shall be calling True again as soon as there is an English speaking supervisor on hand to find out why my subscription limits me to Thai servers (Depsite the fact that I am paying for the best possible package), and what they intend to do about it.

In saying that though, this to mean is a blip in an otherwise rather good and reliable service from True.

[youngkiwi]

International bandwidth on True is definately shot. No problem accessing Thai sites but international access has slowed to a halt. Fortunately, my KSC connection is still running fine.

[vam-pire]

We must all remember this is Thailand, The B/S hub of Asia

what a sad state of affairs ....

VP

[nikster]

Get CAT Telecom DSL. Only service that is good right now. My TOT is mostly crap as well, and the phone support today tried to convince me that the number that I have used for the last 3 years doesn't exist, and never has. TIT

[griser]

Any update from anyone about this Taiwan issue? My nighttime speeds from true are down to below dialup speeds. only happens at night.

Oddly enough its only the downloads, upload speeds are fine

Greg

Edited January 29, 2008 by griser

[HDRIDER]

Hi

There is broken submarine cables in Taiwan, have friends working up there, but you have to load cables first and then find the fault and then get it up from seabed and splice a new piece in, can take from 3-7 days, or more if its very deep water say + 2000-7000 meters

[CosmicSurfer]

International connections are ridiculous..

... and I can't get my the New York Times fix

CS

[cclub75]

I think the problem could be worse...

As you said : some websites are OK. Other seem to be unreachable.

For instance : bloomberg.com

Since a few days, it's hel_l.

If you type the IP address of bloomberg.com (204.179.240.224) directly in the browser, it's getting better.

Therefore : over the bandwith issue, we could have also a DNS issue...

[Plus]

You just have to laugh at the pathetic government propaganda crap they put out like how they will make Thailand the "Information Technology hub of Asia"

Wait until that IT minister for the past six years becomes Finance Minister next week. When not in politics, he is an alernative medicine and spa treatment professional.

[freitag1]

Plus this is perfectly fine in a country like this... oh Thailand....

[MartinBKK]

My TOT has been awful in the last few days - had previously been ok in the last 3 months.

[marquess]

You just have to laugh at the pathetic government propaganda crap they put out like how they will make Thailand the "Information Technology hub of Asia"

Wait until that IT minister for the past six years becomes Finance Minister next week. When not in politics, he is an alernative medicine and spa treatment professional.

What do you expect in a country where a pair of breasts are a threat to national security!

[beekaykay]

I upgraded to the SME package (2400bt per mth) after 5 years or so on the standard package (1200bt per mth), they let me try the SME first with a test password and it was great, speed was significantly faster in all aspects, now its slowed to a crawl (last 2 weeks) heard somewhere that True had upgraded their systems and this may be true (excuse the pun) as this coincided with my slowdown (and everybody else's as well) I called true today and they did the usual re-set, my international speed b4 re-set today at approx 1.30pm was 112kbps d/l and 99 u/l after re-set was 161 and 92 respectively, so now i have the usual "an engineer will call you with 24hrs" and it will cost you 350bt if its your end that the problem is!!! (the cheek of it)...

Anyhow I also think that although Thailand need to get their act together with bandwidth, it also has a lot to do with the tourist season, once the tourists go home speed will pick up I hope:-)

[Firestorm123]

Hi

There is broken submarine cables in Taiwan, have friends working up there, but you have to load cables first and then find the fault and then get it up from seabed and splice a new piece in, can take from 3-7 days, or more if its very deep water say + 2000-7000 meters

Hi,

is TOT affected also with this broken cable? My international speed dropped yesterday next to nothing. No problems before. I hope they really get this fixed in 3-7 days. In december 2006 there was a quake in Taiwan wich broke submarine cables and connection was very bad several weeks.

[zzSleepyJohn]

Hi

There is broken submarine cables in Taiwan, have friends working up there, but you have to load cables first and then find the fault and then get it up from seabed and splice a new piece in, can take from 3-7 days, or more if its very deep water say + 2000-7000 meters

Not only in the Taiwan area. There are also two major cable breaks in the middle east (Alexandria)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7218008.stm

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=206...mp;refer=europe

So with 3 cables broken, it's hardly surprising that our internet services are struggling. There's a parallel moan thread under Maxnet going on about all this, too.

The ISPs are supposed to have backup alternative routes they can patch into service when this sort of thing happens. Sometimes via a different cable (perhaps not so good in this case with 3 cables down), or by satellite. But they tend to be a bit slow off the mark implementing these reroutes, maybe because there's a bill to pay. It means that if anyone calling their ISP to complain about the degraded service gets fobbed with a "it may take a few weeks to repair the cable" story, they should counter by asking what they're doing about implementing temporary satellite restoration.

Contingency plans do exist for these events, so if we're left suffering for long periods, it's an organisational failure as well, not just an unfortunate act of god!

+ SJ

[Dissolution]

I upgraded to the SME package (2400bt per mth) after 5 years or so on the standard package (1200bt per mth), they let me try the SME first with a test password and it was great, speed was significantly faster in all aspects

Could you share how it is I can go about upgrading to this SME package, and how I can get a test password?

Thanks lots! If paying 2400bt a month will let me finally play WoW with an acceptable ping, every baht would be worth it.

[HDRIDER]

Hi

There is more than 5 cables, just from here and up to Shanghai there is about 5 broken cables.

Shanghai

Singapore

2 X Taiwan

Korea, and a shunt fault near Manila.

This is just for 1 cable ship to repair

[laurent]

And one more in Dubai.

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/01...f=edition_world

[Dissolution]

Current results for LA, on a 3mbps True line: (Same results at 2pm, 4pm and now 9pm.)

And:

And:

Odd how Singapore is lagging horribly as well. And how San Jose has less than half the ping of the nearby LA.

Edited January 31, 2008 by Dissolution

[sniffdog]

Yes, indeed ... amazing difference between San Jose and Los Angeles .... now let's get on with our lives ....

[freitag1]

today is the first day since two weeks that everything seems to be alright again 5mb, true, nonthaburi

[MaxLee]

today is the first day since two weeks that everything seems to be alright again 5mb, true, nonthaburi

Well, I live in Nonthaburi as well, Maneeya Village is the place. The people are all going out tonight for some party, meaning more bandwidth for today respectively...

[freitag1]

Its been good the whole day though and especially I didn't have any random disconnects or website timeouts. Downloads were smooth as well.

[zzSleepyJohn]

Hi

There is more than 5 cables, just from here and up to Shanghai there is about 5 broken cables.

Shanghai

Singapore

2 X Taiwan

Korea, and a shunt fault near Manila.

This is just for 1 cable ship to repair

Two major cable breaks in the Middle East causing disruption has been well documented, but I haven't been able to find any reports about the 5 breaks you're mentioning here. Can anyone point me in the direction of any info about these, please?

Certainly the disruptions we've been seeing around here recently do seem consistent with something more than just the those two breaks in the Middle East.

+ SJ

[HDRIDER]

Hi

I got it from my friends in the industry, but you can find it on the net as well, if you know what to look for, you will not know when a cable break, they will redirect to other systems, been working with cables for years.

http://www.subcablenews.com/

THIS IS FROM ALCATEL!!!!

How are submarine cables broken? Cable breaks occur when fishing gear is towed across or anchored close to or across submarine cables. They can also be broken when a ship's anchor is dropped directly onto them or drags across.

Fishing-related damage may also be caused by trawl otter-boards, beam trawls, scallop dredges, clam dredges or net anchors. These are used directly on the seabed and in the cases of dredges and net anchors, actually penetrate the seabed. When such gear is towed across a cable, problems will occur.

Tension breaks can also occur when cables are fouled by fishing gear. This type of damage may not involve the cable being dragged to the surface. If the cable is fouled and broken by towed gear, one end of it can remain entangled and be dragged on board the fishing vessel.

Even if a vessel is equipped with strong lifting equipment, cables must NOT be brought to the surface intact and attempts must NOT be made to cut the cable and free the fishing gear.

Cable can also be damaged when shoes on beam trawls, scallop dredges, the leading edge of otter boards, or the knife on a clam dredge cut through armour wires and cable insulation. Where the cable armour has been previously damaged, the potential for a snag with resulting extensive damage to cable and gear is increased.

This is from Alcatel...