I’m hoping to understand plausible causes of my dsl going down, and was curious whether actions by neighboring apartment units could be the cause.
Long story short, my dsl ceased working three days ago, and the modem sits forlornly with the Internet light blinking red/green. It had been running fine (despite some hits to wireless speeds due to interference from other wireless signals) for a month.
Troubleshooting attempts, including different jacks in the apartment, different computers and a second modem, have yielded no real additional clues. The tech support for the isp says they “discovered that your signal strength is extremely low or your DSL modem has no physical connection to your DSL equipment at all.” They suggested the issue was “physical interference.”
This leads to my question: since i have neither cable nor phone service in the apartment, and the phone jacks are unused except for the dsl modem, is it possible there is interference from other apartments? I have no idea what happens to the line once it leaves my apartment unit. Could someone (perhaps a maintenance person for the apartment complex) have made changes that introduced interference into the system? Again, I have no clue where the wires go, but each floor of the apartment complex has a (locked) “data closet” and we are have both cable and dsl options for Internet.
Thanks for any thoughts or insight!
My assumption would be that the phone service comes into a distribution panel somewhere in your building, so it could be possible there is an issue at that point.
Here in So Cal, the phone company will only accept responsibility for the lines up to the outside of the building - in other words, if your problem is somewhere inside the building, they won’t help.
I suggest that you call the apartment manager and tell him that the phone company told you there is a problem with the lines inside the building and you need the manager to get it fixed.
Well DSL services run over phone lines so you do have one. I have twice been disconnected and lost my ADSL2 service due to new tenants moving in to my building and the phone company choosing the wrong line in the switchroom. They have had to come out to fix it both times.
ETA I also don’t use the phone that could be used on that line
Indeed, my running assumption has been that someone altered the state of the system when another tenant changed/added services. What I wasn’t sure of was whether that act of adding services, even if done correctly, could have an effect on mine; or if somewhere there is a correctable (once identified) mistake. I am hoping it is the latter, though getting someone who has the tools to identify and correct it could be it’s own challenge. The isp technician comes on monday…
The idea that someone adding service could interfere with your service is plausible due to a mistake or otherwise.
I once lived in an apartment with a central utility closet for cable hookups throughout the building. Two or three days after my cable internet was installed, it stopped working altogether. One of my friends in the building reported that his cable went out at the same time and that he saw a cable sales representative (not a cable technician) in the utility closet. He was apparently going down a printed list of cable subscribers and disconnecting anyone not on his list. I was probably disconnected because my service was too new to be on his list. My friend was disconnected for the another reason – the cables in the service closet were mislabeled in many cases. Since the building was new and less than half full when we moved in, the odds were pretty good that if you had a mislabeled cable connection, your connection was labeled as an empty apartment that wasn’t a cable subscriber. Throughout the building, cable subscriber after cable subscriber was disconnected due to the ignorance of the sales person. The cable company insisted that I had to schedule a new service appointment to get reconnected. It had take three attempts to get a cable technician to show up and install service the first time so rather than go through that hassle again, I just cancelled service and reversed the credit card charges for installation.
More than once, I’ve seen lines swiped in apartment buildings. Not maliciously - just by not knowing a line was in use, or because wires were mis- or non-labeled.
It sounds like the OP has DSL on a “dry” pair without dialtone service, so it’s very likely someone grabbed the wires, thinking it was an unused pair. Getting it sorted out becomes the headache.
The ISP technician came by and we went to the apartment complex’s data closet. As folks here had guessed, the wire from the outside box to my apartment subline (maybe not the right word for it) had been removed and someone else’s line was put in its place. If I understand, that meant my apartment was connected to the ISP, but the credentials were all wrong. I suppose this means that someone else was also having (or will soon be having) difficultly with their services.
Fault appears to be some combination of poor line labeling on the apartment’s part and poor wiring decisions on some prior technician’s part.