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NOTE: If you continuously experience a bad OTS connection using ADSL we can provide you with a reliable unshaped ADSL test account.
The way the Internet has been designed allows it to "break" in certain areas but continue running in others. Thus many users immediately assume that if they can still browse http://www.google.com (or just one site on the Internet) their Internet connection is still working. This is, however, not necessarily the case and it is therefore possible for some OTS users to run whilst others are not. There are thus some basic troubleshooting issues to consider to have the best possible connection.Type of connection
* With ADSL there are different options such as shaped/unshaped bandwidth. We have not physically tested this, but have found that some users used a shaped service and continuously lost there connectivity. They have since moved to an unshaped service and resolved all their connectivity problems. This may, however, be specific to particular ISP’s.
* Dial-up is not very reliable and should be expected to disconnect depending on a user’s location. Avoid using dial-up to only those times where ADSL is not available.
* ISDN is very stable and reliable.
* 3G/GPRS quality is very dependent on the area. 3G seems to work well in general but is not available everywhere and will be automatically replaced by GPRS where 3G is not available.
General Internet
* Problems can occur on the user’s ISP network – The company that gives the user access to the Internet (No OTS activity for users using that specific ISP – all other OTS users will be fine). Resolution – Ensure ISP’s have a good quality infrastructure and can provide good service.
* We use MTN and Teraco (TCO) as our backbone operators and therefore all traffic has to go onto their network at some stage. When MTN/TCO experience problems internally all OTS users will be affected no matter what network path they take. Resolution – None
* A peering link (network link) between 2 bigger backbone operators can be down – These are for example companies such as Telkom, UUNET and Internet Solutions. If a peering network goes down an entire chunk of the Internet can disappear (The OTS will not work for users who’s traffic has to cross the peering networks – all other users will be fine). Resolution – Try to minimize peering links by having an ISP that uses UUNET’s / MTN’s backbone. If you connect to a 196.50.x.x address you are on TCO and if you connect to 41.208.x.x you are on MTN.
* The peering networks can also experience high latency – Web sites can be accessed but take very long to open (The OTS will run extremely slow for users who’s traffic has to cross the peering networks – all other users will be fine). Resolution – Try to minimize peering links an by having an ISP that uses UUNET’s / MTN’s backbone
* Internet servers can experience DDos attacks which place heavy strain on networks and slow down Internet traffic. (All OTS users will run slow ). Resolution – None
Simple Test
If you want to check your connection speed to the OTS Server via the Internet you can do the following test. This test is useful when the OTS runs slowly too see where on the route the problem lies.
Open a DOS prompt (Start, Programs, Accessories, Command Prompt).
Now type tracert 41.208.46.100 or (tracert xxx.xxx.xxx.xxxx where xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx represents the address of the server you are connecting to) and press enter.This will return a list of IP addresses (the route traffic follows to reach our server). Some servers might not return any responses and a Request timed out message is returned. Wait for the tracert to complete or reach about 30 hops.
Now start a continual Ping to the first IP address returned on the tracert and work your way down the tracert list until a slow response/timeout is returned by the ping. This indicates the link between the last fast ping responses and the first slow ping responses is where the problem lies. Contact you ISP / OTS Support and provide them with these IP’s for help. To run ping open a DOS prompt and type ping xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx -t (where xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx represents a IP address returned by the ping command).
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