Help! - Internet Issues - Packet Loss

VocalBellybutton

VocalBellybutton

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Hey everybody! I'm hoping to get some help with a chronic internet issue, and to see if anyone else has had this problem. Since I moved into my new place about a year ago, about every 2-3 months I have been having HUGE packet loss issues.


First, I'll describe the problem:
In BF4, there is a symbol on the right side of the screen that indicates the problem. It presents itself as latency or lag, but my ping is quite consistent in an acceptable range. The server doesn't register my inputs without a delay, or sometimes at all. In Halo, I was getting killed by people, and I couldn't even see that I was dead for 2-3 seconds after it happened. Playing any multiplayer game is basically impossible. I decided to investigate.

Diagnosing the problem:
I had never heard of "packet loss" prior to having this issue. After talking to my cousin about it (mostly because he heard my complaining over voip) he suggested that it might be packet loss. Sure enough, that symbol was ALWAYS red on the side of my screen in BF4. I went to a testing website to be sure. While my internet is functioning properly and I am not having issues, I consistently get <1% packet loss. This is true for all the people I have asked to run it. When I run it now, it is consistently above 75%, sometimes above 95%.

Solutions we've tried
On my end, I've done everything short of replacing my modem, and I'm pretty certain my modem isn't the problem. The first time, I had a couple long conversations with my ISP, mostly because they couldn't understand that my internet works perfectly find for everything besides MP games. Eventually, they did something on their end that fixed it...for a couple months.
After a couple months, it started again. Another phone conversation later, and it was fixed. I think this happened again a couple months later.

What's happening now
This time, they said they cannot do anything about it remotely, and they are going to send a technician out to investigate. I am getting the feeling they are gonna try to tell me my modem is the problem to get me to rent a modem from them every month. I am fairly certain my modem is fine, and I don't want scammed into renting a modem every month. We know the router is fine because I bypassed it completely at one point and nothing changed.

My plea
If you have some knowledge to share on this "seldom" issue, would you kindly share? I've grown tired of having this issue. I'm stuck playing single player games until this is fixed.


Thanks dearly for reading, and I bid you well wishes,
-vb


P.S. Go to https://packetlosstest.com/ select "1080p game stream (GeForce NOW, Stadia, etc.)" from the drop-down menu and share what your percentage is. I'm curious! What is "normal??"
 
I have had that constantly pop up in BF4 since I started playing again a few years ago. I don't think it is accurate, here are my test results:

1615170056903.png
 
what type of ISP do you have? ie: cable internet. I used to be an installer and trouble shooter for Time warner cable who is now Spectrum. Most common issues with cable is loose connections, like behind modem, on splitters, even in other rooms in the house if they are on the same network tighten every single one even behind the wall plates
1615173467411.png

by doing this, you eliminate external radio signals leaking into your network. if you havent done this to your house ever since you moved in, do it!
if that is all done and you still have the issue then call ISP to look at the "drop" which is the line running from the street hook up from ISP to your house. it might need to be changed out, or it could be a plant issue to where it is effecting your neighborhood around a 3 to 5 block radius depending how long the streets are.

if you dont have cable internet then call ISP to figure it out.
 
Packetloss can be caused by ALLOT of things. It used to be where he first thing you need to do is identify where the packetloss is coming from. To do this you needed a tool that does both a ping and a traceroute at the same time. This will gather a list of hops from you to your destination, then start pinging all of the hops simultaneously. I have a program that I got from a game in 1995 called Subspace, and it's called Pingroute.exe.

However now allot of routers don't respect the ping against hops anymore. Also many providers have direct peering agreements.

Of all the times I used this method though, about half the time the problem is local to me. This can be anything from a faulty coax cable, faulty ethernet cable, ethernet cable laying against power cables, EM interference from other devices (I had this one in my front room TV. In the entertainment center I had too many devices crammed in to one little compartment, some on top of each other. When I pulled it all apart and separated the devices, the problem went away), out of date hardware, malware on your system or other processor/memory hogging programs (packets sent and received, are sent and received from your computer. If your computer has a problem it will slow down network traffic because it becomes unable to process at the application layer of the OSI model).

One of the best things I've found over the years is the isolation method of troubleshooting. Take your pc to a friends house, does it happen there? No only at your house? Or replace an ethernet cable. Replace a coax connector. Grab another computer in your house or laptop and plug it in where your computer is and see if that computer has the same problem. You "could" trying rebuilding your pc with a fresh image (if it comes to that). Anyway you see where I'm going.

There is plenty to google too..

https://www.dnsstuff.com/reduce-packet-loss

https://getvoip.com/blog/2020/02/13/how-to-fix-packet-loss/

I would still follow through though with your ISP first and foremost. They can come to your house and eliminate their equipment and such, testing with their devices. If they fixed it before, that's pretty fishy to me. However, keep in mind that you never know if this is that old problem, or a new one.
 
how old is your router/modem? i had weird packet loss issues in the past with ONLY squad for awhile, and then it spread to other games. ended up my router was dying and after replacing it the problem was fixed.
 
mine does this its not constant --it comes and goes soo
i think its the provider in your area .
sundays are my worst days
i think its the provider of the providers doing maint on the lines at some point its hitting a dish if there are storms in that area
23130608_145001459581947_7308588456362655687_n.jpg
 
Yeah, looks to me like it comes and goes. I haven't changed a thing since Sunday and now I have zero packet loss. I know it's not my router because I went old school and plugged my desktop directly into the modem, bypassing the router, and still had the same issues. I think it's my ISP.

Thanks for the input everybody! I'll let y'all know what the technician says after he troubleshoots. I live in an apartment complex so he can't replace just anything haha
 
It won't hurt to do some periodic ping tests, noting the time and date each time you've had trouble. They may need that, if it comes to that.
 
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