AIS Fibre - Small Issues

[wxpwzrd]

A little different twist on AIS Fibre. I have 100/10 PowerHome, along with its carrier grade nat. Going on about four or five days now. PCs and phones are connected via WiFi. I am wondering if anyone has been experiencing any little "strange" problems with the service. For example, with my phone. It is a Huawei Mate 9, with Android 7. 

 

I have OneDrive set to synchronize photos immediately. When I snap a photo, it will sit for a period of time before uploading. It appears to eventually synchronize, but not immediate as I am used to. 

 

I have a horoscope app that, when I touch my sign, the horoscope will not return. 

 

Candy Crush games will NOT sync (connect) to Facebook. HayDay won't even finish connecting to play.

 

Now, all of these apps work immediately and as designed when I use my mobile carrier data. They also work properly when I stay on the WiFi, but bypass all of AIS with my VPN (in my case to the US). What little thought I have put into it leads me to the CGN.

Ideas anyone? I am even open to moving to PowerPRO if it is the CGN. I still have my True Online service so one of my next plans is to connect the AIS supplied secondary router to the True service to see if the problems move with it. But I have zero intention of keeping any True services long term after my recent customer service experiences with them. 
 

[mtls2005]

Didn't read your post fully but sounds like an IP address conflict; this can happen with multiple WiFI devices connecting, disconnecting and reconnecting. Have seen this issue with 3BB/Huawaei 8245 (but not with AIS to date).

 

Restart the router, restart the devices. On PCs flushdns.

[wxpwzrd]

To update. I activated my True router again. Each problem I listed above and even a couple others involving Two-Factor Authenticator apps worked properly (as before). OneDrive syncs were fast and immediate. Horoscope app, perfect. Even the Candy games sync right up. 

 

Just saw your reply @mtls2005 - actually I am an old systems and network guy. I do and did, repeatedly. As soon as they hit True, they worked. It has to be something misconfigured with AIS and/or CGN. I didn't connect the AIS supplied router to True yet, but I will try that next, to eliminate wifi connectivity between the computing devices and the AIS box. Problem happened on the AIS supplied ZTE fiber box as well, so it is looking more like AIS directly. Following that will be a call to AIS so I can overload the level one tech's brain in English nonetheless. 

[mtls2005]

It seems like all your problems are related to mobile apps? I guess there could be some issues with the remapping of your 49.n.n.n "public" IP address, and your internal AIS IPV6 IP address, with the way these mobile apps expect to perform?

 

I guess I'd check out some Thai tech forums, try to use the THDDNS service, get a more Pro-like package (with a static IP) or an IPV4 service, or just continue to use mobile data? Chances are AIS has other customers experiencing this same problem, given the popularity of these games here, so they may have work-arounds?

[wxpwzrd]

@mtls2005 That sounds reasonable actually. The reason the games wouldn't have a problem is that they all run in the same browser as Facebook... So that is likely where their "link" is. In the apps, they would have to call Facebook and there are probably some callbacks that aren't getting through. I don't even play very often but if those callbacks aren't occurring, where else will I have problems... As I said, I noticed tonight that a two-factor authentication app (in this case, Microsoft's) didn't come through as I was logging in to one of my MS services. For most of my desktop use, the internet traffic is more stateless HTTP, Mail, etc. Nothing much incoming, except I did notice that my Teamviewer control app will fail to connect on occasion.

 

Funny you should mention THDDNS. I can't get it authorized either. Signed up and submitted email for verification. Never heard back. Resubmitted like 15 times AND directly emailed the support@ address at the bottom of the login. Sent them like 5 emails over the last 2 days. 

 

Like I said, I am betting I will overload a level one tech in the next couple days. I find it difficult that they would not resolves this issue in their home package since, like you said, so many Thais love games and their mobiles here. Oh, and Line gave my wife some problems on her mobile... messages didn't come in until she switched to mobile data. 

[maxpower]

What do you mean by bypass all of AIS using my VPN. Is your VPN using another ISP?

[wxpwzrd]

@maxpower By using a VPN, you can create a secure "tunnel" past them (AIS or any carrier) to the other side of the VPN endpoint (connection), for me the US. Therefore, all of their NAT'g, proxying, etc. is "ignored" in a sense. You still use their actual pipe for transmission, but they cannot get inside the tunnel. They have no control other than "cutting the pipe." This is why some governments (including Thailand) make it a criminal offense in specific circumstances. If you use a VPN or other secure device to bypass their censorship, monitoring or blocking of traffic it is criminal.

 

Edit: In this case, it is for me to see if the Carrier Grade NAT is causing an issue.

Edited January 7, 2017 by wxpwzrd
Additional information

[maxpower]

3 minutes ago, wxpwzrd said:

@maxpower By using a VPN, you can create a secure "tunnel" past them (AIS or any carrier) to the other side of the VPN endpoint (connection), for me the US. Therefore, all of their NAT'g, proxying, etc. is "ignored" in a sense. You still use their actual pipe for transmission, but they cannot get inside the tunnel. They have no control other than "cutting the pipe." This is why some governments (including Thailand) make it a criminal offense in specific circumstances. If you use a VPN or other secure device to bypass their censorship, monitoring or blocking of traffic it is criminal.

 

Edit: In this case, it is for me to see if the Carrier Grade NAT is causing an issue.

Thanks for providing detail of what you are doing. I am quite interested in your AIS situation because I am trying to solve a similar problem for a friend. The fact that using VPN cures the problem is a good clue but does not prove the CGN is the cause.  I have requested some network info from a contact at AIS but he runs around like a headless chicken and takes days to reply.

[wxpwzrd]

@maxpower Well and I kind of went a little past just experimenting with VPN. I still have my True Online service on a separate router. None of the problems I am experiencing on AIS are present on True - which is supplying a public facing IPv4 address.

 

Yeah, I still haven't made the "leap of faith" to call AIS, yet. My experience with support staff over the years isn't what I would call productive.

[wxpwzrd]

Just to update this. Opened a ticket on AIS website in the Fibre area, report a problem -  earlier today. Received an email a little over an hour back that they would call within three hours. It was more like 30 minutes. Very courteous and professional. 

 

Found out that prior to the call, they had shut off IPv6 routing (which I don't use right now anyway). Asked me to power cycle the router and my devices and attempt the issues again. And they would call me back in 10 minutes. And they did. Everything is as it should be. Since I don't use IPv6 at the moment (and no plans) it was no big deal. Said if I needed it, I can call them back to reconfigure it. 

 

MUCH better service than calling True for anything. 

[elfpattaya]

8 hours ago, wxpwzrd said:

Just to update this. Opened a ticket on AIS website in the Fibre area, report a problem -  earlier today. Received an email a little over an hour back that they would call within three hours. It was more like 30 minutes. Very courteous and professional. 

 

Found out that prior to the call, they had shut off IPv6 routing (which I don't use right now anyway). Asked me to power cycle the router and my devices and attempt the issues again. And they would call me back in 10 minutes. And they did. Everything is as it should be. Since I don't use IPv6 at the moment (and no plans) it was no big deal. Said if I needed it, I can call them back to reconfigure it. 

 

MUCH better service than calling True for anything. 

You must be very lucky, as I have also opened tickets on their fibre problem page, which has promised a reply in 24 hours, and never had a reply.

I have also been in daily contact with their 1185 number trying to sort out various problems, saying they will get someone to call me back in 3 hours (it used to be 1 hour), I'm lucky if I get a call back in 3 days. I also have never spoken to anyone from the fibre team when calling them, I always get someone from their mobile team. I have heard they only have 2 fibre people taking the English speaking calls.

 

Can you write and speak Thai, as that may make a difference. But I agree when I do talk to them they are always courteous. They never fix the problems, but they are always courteous.

I upgraded from 50/10 to 100/10 on January 1st and although I have excellent speed to Bangkok, my International speeds are the same or worse, especially to Europe.

I am very jealous of Pib and his super speeds, considering we are allegedly on the same service.

 

Anyway an appointment has been made with an engineer (who can speak English, I've talked to him) for Monday morning at my home and hopefully he'll sort everything out.

Hope he can find me in the wilds of Pattaya.

Edited January 7, 2017 by elfpattaya

[SooKee]

On 06/01/2017 at 7:30 PM, wxpwzrd said:

 

 

Funny you should mention THDDNS. I can't get it authorized either. Signed up and submitted email for verification. Never heard back. Resubmitted like 15 times AND directly emailed the support@ address at the bottom of the login. Sent them like 5 emails over the last 2 days. 

 

 

Same problem here with AIS THDDNS.  Got through the initial registration page OK and got to the 'wait for email verification' stage.  Received the email, clicked on the 'verify' link and got a 'bad request' result.  Also got the THDDNS log in page.  Typed my user name and password  and got 'invalid user name or password'.   Even tried the 'forgot password' link and had a reset password mail sent.  Tried resetting the password twice and logging in again.  Same.  Invalid.  Mailed them twice at the support@dns address.  No reply has yet, not even an acknowledgement.  So, not working for me at all and not particularly inspiring so far.

Edited January 17, 2017 by SooKee

[SooKee]

Seems to be working OK now with THDDNS.  Just need to fathom how the heck to get it to work with Plex for remote access.  I have feeling it won't.