Comcast Accused of Blocking VoIP 325
kamikaze-Tech writes "Comcast, the largest USA Broadband provider is being accused of VoIP
blocking, just days before they release their own VoIP offering.
According to a long standing thread on the Vonage Forums, many Comcast ISP users are unable to use Vonage. Tempers are flaring: 'Although you will see all manner of opinions on this thread, there seems to be a sentiment that - politely put - Comcast could really be doing a better job of carrying Vonage bits.' Looks as though this could be the beginning of the broadband quality wars,
with Comcast taking the first step."
Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:4, Interesting)
My experience with Comcast has been extensive and I am nothing but a little dissatisfied with how consistent my connection broadband width was. I'm not complaining that I lost connections (though I know people who have) but I will complain that my upload and download widths were anything but stable.
I eagerly await the broadband over power lines [wired.com] initiative that's inevitably going to be made available to everyone. Imagine paying for broadband but not having to pay also the cost of using an extensive cable network. Brilliant idea! Use rudimentary piggy backing techniques to deliver two signals through one line. It's actually not that difficult, I'm not sure why this took so long to develop and why it's taking even longer to make available to the public. Yes, I've heard of security concerns but there's got to be some encryption you can use.
If I ever live to see the day where cable is obsolete, I'm going to uncap my modem [cable-modems.org] and host something huge to my friends. Anyone care to take a guess on how long I'd be able to keep that up before they shut me down?
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:2, Informative)
ARGH!
There are serious issues with BPL. It generates interference that compromises several amateur radio bands, and is likewise interfered with by the legal operation of numerous low-power transmitters. (This includes CB radio transmitters as well as ham radio transmitters.)
Visit http://www.arrl.org/tis/info/HTML/plc/ for more information.
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:2)
I think that the 5 people who this will negatively impact will be rendered insignificant by the thousands that it would benefit. It's the same argument that people use to negate the complaints of Mac users, except hams are a MUCH MUCH smal
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:2)
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:2)
Are you also anxiously awaiting their terms of service?
Last I checked, they block HTTP service from your account and various other ports on which they have a competing product.
Basically, VoIP through Vonage is a likely candidate for "quality problems" through Verizon as well.
C
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:2)
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:2)
Forget BPL, let's get some of the Municipal Wireless programs implemented first. I think that it's a little more likely to happen once people start to pressure their politicians not to give into the demands of the telecom providers. Personally, I think the telecom arguments can be fought with the argument that the municipal contracts will go to them anyways, so it is a semi-moot point. Of course, IANAL nor a legislator, or anyone with any relevant information on the topic whatsoever. But, I've heard abo
cable tech (Score:2)
Each channel is something like 6 to 8 MHz wide. They can be dedicated, time sliced, or done like Ethernet. Different channels are used for up and down.
The down channel tells your cable modem where and when it may transmit.
If you get a channel to yourself, great! They are allocated based on demand, more of less. An idle computer doesn't need a dedicated channel for hourly DHCP updates.
Latency varies. If you need to wait for a transmit window, well, yo
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:2)
Broadband over power lines uses the power lines - the power grid - which is an extensive network of cables. It has a definate cost. In fact, the costs are higher than that of cable - since the power lines are responsible for the maintenance and upkeep of the power poles themselves, while the cable companies merely rent space on them.
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:2)
After all, maintaining those power poles costs money, and, well... wouldn't it be a shame if Comcast's equipment started falling off power poles. There could even be a tiered pricing scheme
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:3, Informative)
Anywhere from a few minutes to 24 hours. The uncapped modems were usually scanned for at least twice daily. First "offense" and your modem was cycled remotely and the correct cfg file was downloaded again "capping" your modem. Your account was flagged and a ticket was opened for you. If you did it again then you were booted permanently for a TOS violation. Depending on the severity of the uncapping (10+mbit/10+
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, there is an easy test. If their VOIP works fine and other people's don't then they are probably gumming up the lines with QoS. ISPs have been working on different levels of service for differently labeled packet s of data for a while now and I think it should be clear to everyone that QoS really stands for "pick your pocket", not "quality of service". Qu
Broadband over Power Lines in TX 2006 (Score:2)
Re: Comcast has other problems to resolve (Score:2)
I get tons of spam (for reasons I cannot control), and the volume from Comcast and RoadRunner servers is so great that I filter at the server level all email from IP addreses owned by Comcast and RR. In a typical 24-hr period, 20-75 spam messages reach my inbox, and another 50-150 get filtered at the server as sourcing from Comcast/RR.
(On a side note, since I have no communications with anyone outside the U.S., all email from foreign IP addresses gets blackholed immediately.)
Re:OT: Foreign IP addresses (Score:2)
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:2)
And from what I understand, the Comcast phone box is basically like another cable modem, so they can ensure that data boxes get this QoS and their phone boxes get better QoS. Such a set up makes it quite difficult to prove that comcast is killing
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:2)
- My understanding is that vonage use SIP. SIP works over port 5060 usually. As long as traffic is seen on these ports it can be blocked no matter if encrypted or not.
- Encrypting the traffic would have 2 consequences:
-- adding a few milliseconds delay because of the encryption loop.
-- adding load on the servers, both your client (which in this case would be negligeable), but especially on the vonage servers. It would p
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:2)
Not being a VoIP expert, maybe each vendor has im
Re:Perhaps Comcast is just inadequate? (Score:3, Insightful)
VOIP users = very small minority of the population. Smart people = also a very small minority of the population. The intersection of these groups is another order of magnitude smaller than the population of either group alone. Small enough, to where that group doesn't present any kind of real threat to Comcast.
To who, exactly? If you think Comcast is bad, try dealing with Verizon or SBC. At leas
Actually... (Score:2, Informative)
Outgoing calls are extremely choppy and cutout in the middle of words, but I can hear the other person without a problem.
Re:Actually... (Score:2)
To add to this, I've noticed Comcast is offering phone service of its own on their website. Perhaps this is what they are up to, scrrewing with Vonage and trying to tell us it doesn't work, but then saying: "Why don't you try our service instead?"
The thing that sucks is I just signed up for Vonage and a have a couple months to go to get my rebate check. I also redid all the drops in the ho
Comcast blocking doesn't surprise me... (Score:2, Interesting)
It is does not surprise me they would block access to their competitors. Soon I expect them to begin survelliance of their customers and reporting their "un-American" activities to the alphabet a
time warner-owns comcast? (Score:2)
Re:Comcast blocking doesn't surprise me... (Score:2)
Road Runner and Comcast are not sibling companies, they have deals in some areas for the purposes of branding. Comcast, to the best of my knowledge, has never blocked out specific web sites from its subscribers. Time Warner contributed large amounts of money to Democrats this past year (IIRC, more than 2/3 of its campaign contributions, the only major media company to donate more to GOP and its candidates was Disne
Re:Comcast blocking doesn't surprise me... (Score:2)
Do you have one bit of proof that RR blocked your web sites? Are you certain they were not simply down when you tried to access them? Is it also possible that there were backbone routing issues that would have prevented less contentious web sites from being accessed as well?
Just because Google and Cisco are making strategic business decisions with respect to China does not mean Comcast will do the same thing here, especially when evidence that they have a contrary approach exists.
What you saw was a con
Re:Comcast blocking doesn't surprise me... (Score:2)
For now, I will assume you mean Repbublican, not neo-con. Many high profile Liberals attend events with Republicans -- where they put their money would seem to trump their social calendar when figuring out which side of the political spectrum they fall on.
WRT Jack Welch and NBC, that is insane. Kerry conceded the election, then recante
allow me to join in the post-bashing (Score:2)
*takes the pedant-points and runs*
Re:Comcast blocking doesn't surprise me... (Score:2)
1. There was something wrong with it that prevented you from reaching those sites.
or
2. You are such an important person in the free speech movement that comcast is spying on you. They were there to install stealth bugging equipment to keep comcast informed of your radical activities because without you, the radicals will fail.
Myself and all of those not wearing tin foil hats are betting it is number one.
Re:Comcast blocking doesn't surprise me... (Score:2)
I've never had a Comcast employee at my apartment - it was always an independant company that was working for Comcast at the time, and I wouldn't be surprised if that company also had a contract with Adelphia to service their customers...
This is why I have ADSL... (Score:2)
Now the rumor is that they're trying to bring fiber into homes and deliver television signals over the phone system.
Re:This is why I have ADSL... (Score:2)
They claimed that it was so expensive to build the infrastructure, that there was no way they could do it while being burdened with their
Libertarians and tollroads (Score:2, Interesting)
However, such a situation generally assumes that road operators would be willing to build roads out to remote areas where only a handful of customers would ever drive. It also assumes that these so-called "liberated" road owners would be unprejudiced indiv
Re:Libertarians and tollroads (Score:2)
Unless their contract with their users, into which their users enter voluntarily, says differently. Or are you only in favor of people's rights when they're rights you wish to exercise?
Re:Libertarians and tollroads (Score:2)
Re:Libertarians and tollroads (Score:2)
Re:Libertarians and tollroads (Score:2)
Wouldn't be surprised if this was the case.
Re:Libertarians and tollroads (Score:2)
An individual or business that advertises to the public that it is available for hire to transport people or property in exchange for a fee.
A common carrier is legally bound to carry all passengers or freight as long as there is enough space, the fee is paid, and no reasonable grounds to refuse to do so exist. A common carrier that unjustifiably refuses to carry a particular person or cargo may be sued for damages.
Re:Libertarians and tollroads (Score:2)
Re:Libertarians and tollroads (Score:2)
Re:Libertarians and tollroads (Score:2)
It isn't like there isn't fiber around the country that the telcos could use.
They just don't want to have to pay for additional equipment, even though they have had hundreds of thousands of people start using (and paying) for their service in the last year. This isn't a matter of technical problems, it (just like the tiered internet / extortition idea) has everything to do with a bean counter's slanted view of reality.
Vonage will sue? (Score:2)
Or is it that Comcast has full control of what gets sent through the bandwidth they provide?
Inquiring minds want to know.
Re:Vonage will sue? (Score:2)
Wait until the real lawsuits... (Score:2)
Well, given all the hubbub [slashdot.org] about Vonage and 911, wait until someone tries to call for help but finds out that Comcast has throttled their connection... I'm thinking intentional throttling (if that is the case) of a person's phone line could make Comcast liable.
Not enough upload (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Not enough upload (Score:2)
Re:Not enough upload (Score:2)
Re:Not enough upload (Score:2)
Re:Not enough upload (Score:2)
Didn't an ISP already get busted for this? (Score:2)
Business move? (Score:2, Interesting)
They could justify the block with this part of their TOS.
http://www.comcast.net/terms/use.jsp [comcast.net]
"You shall ensure that your use of the Service does not restrict, inhibit, interfere with, or degrade any other user's use of the Service, nor represent (in the sole judgment of Comcast) an overly large burden on the network. In addition, you shall ensure that your use of the Service does not restrict, inhibit, interfere with, disrupt, degrade, or impede C
Re:Business move? (Score:2)
I suspect you may be right.
As far legality goes, they've got the money to hire the lawyers to make whatever they want legal as far as the courts see. They just claim Vonage takes up too much bandwidth and therefore violates the Terms of Service agreement that says they alone determine who or what is using up too much bandwidth and causing problems on their network.
Time to dump Comcast
Re:Business move? (Score:2)
GSM compressed VoIP takes up at most 13Kbps. I can't see that they can get away with blocking such a low bandwidth application on the grounds that it uses up too much bandwidth.
Re:Business move? (Score:2)
Re:Business move? (Score:3, Interesting)
But i belive in this case this was just a shot to sell their own service, the main question is since its their network are they really ALLOWED to do this?
Sure, just as soon as they give up all their lines using publicly owned right of ways and are willing to no longer be protected from legal action for all the copyrighted material and kiddie porn they republish from router to router. That is to say, when they are no a government mandated local monopoly with special protections and privileges they can sto
Comcast Generally Sucks (Score:2, Interesting)
Common carrier status? (Score:2)
Re:Common carrier status? (Score:2)
From wikipedia: [wikipedia.org]"Internet Service Providers generally wish to avoid being classified as a "common carrier" and, so far, have managed to do so. Before 1996, such classification could be helpful in defending a monopolistic position, but the main focus of policy has been on competition, so "common carrier" status has little value for ISPs, while carrying obligations they would rather avoid. The key FCC Order on this point is: IN RE FEDERAL-STATE JOINT BOARD ON U
Re:Common carrier status? (Score:2)
In any case, the business operations of Comcast and other cable companies depend on monopoly franchises granted by local governments. That means they have a responsibility beyond maximizing their
Consequences of (lack of) common-carrier status (Score:2)
This has got to be the most ass-backward wrong thing I've heard on Slashdot in some time... Do you really want your ISP breathing down your neck about what you do with the bandwidth you paid for b/c they're afraid that they'll be sued for what you do? What you suggest will have the exact opposite effect from what you seem to think.
No, it will have exactly the effect I think -- ISPs will either quit messing with packets to and from their customers, or customers will become so harassed by ISP
FTC needs to be all over this one (Score:2)
Any Comcast employee asked
Qualtiy of Service (Score:2)
That's what quality of service is all about and why putting intelligence in the network is stupid and wrong. No matter how fast your equipment gets, decisions take time that could better be spent just moving the data. No matter how good you make yourself look, you are never your best. Common carriers should never engage in net shaping other than routing around damage or pulling the plug on spambots and infected machines.
Re:FTC needs to be all over this one (Score:2)
Doing a better job carrying Vonage bits? (Score:3, Funny)
Thank you Comcast (Score:2)
Re:Thank you Comcast (Score:2)
I had Comcast for years and their customer service was lousy, usually ineffectual, and their service over-priced. Not to mention the constant outages that used to seem to take place when I was in the middle of something for work. Nothing quite like picking up the pieces when the Internet connection drops out! Mind you, I'm with Cablevision now, and the service has not improved, though I have no trouble with the Internet connection. I can't get them to change the phone number on my account with any success (
What Comcast actually blocks is (Score:2)
Re:What Comcast actually blocks is (Score:2)
It's been similar for Charter... (Score:2)
Many of my neighbors used VoIP, and were unable for hours at a time to use their phones. It's the major reason I never went to VoIP.
Just about a month ago, Verizon threw down fiber optics, and within a few weeks, offered their FiOS service. For basically the same price as Charter's
To their credit, it probably isn't intentional.... (Score:2)
That said, they have been jacking their rates while at the same time killing off features - newsgroups, static ip addresses, and of course, the ever decreasing transfer limit (I don't believe there is a place in the USA where you are allowed to transfer more than 80 gigs combined up / down month
Re:To their credit, it probably isn't intentional. (Score:2)
Even a dialup modem can handle 8kbps reliably.
Tom
Re:To their credit, it probably isn't intentional. (Score:2)
I don't want to sound like I'm advertising skype, but I've been on 3 way conference calls with people on dialup lines in Germany and haven't had any issues with sound quality and I've used skype quite a bit when my vonage servic
Re:To their credit, it probably isn't intentional. (Score:2)
I use Vonnage as my home phone and it's 95% of the time just fine. I do get the occasional "unrecoverable 1.5 second lag" bullshit. But I'd say the vast majority of calls are crystal clear.
Coupled with the fact it forwards to my cell phones and I can call anywhere in North America for unlimited time
Skype is ok too. I don't have anything against it. And I don't represent Vonnage.
I just like the service is all.
Re:To their credit, it probably isn't intentional. (Score:2)
I'm just saying that as ISPs try to mooch as much as they can from their customers (lowering speeds, packet shaping and the such), eventually there will become a point where you're going to have to spring for a "premium" package in order to get some things working.
To me, especially since I know that X,Y and Z worked once upon a time, and the only thing that has changed is the
Re:To their credit, it probably isn't intentional. (Score:2)
g.711 encoding (ie. no compression) is 64kbit PAYLOAD. You'll end up with 77kbit on the WAN link, due to RTP and IP overhead.
g.729 encoding (ie. good compression) is 8kbit PAYLOAD. You'll end up with 21kbit on the WAN.
Assuming 30ms packetization time and voice activity detection(VAD) turned of.
These number are for routers not supporting header compression. Header compression saves you around 10kbit on both g.711 and g.729.
The GSM codec as implemente
common carrier (Score:2)
Being immune from prosecution is a privilege extended because you're enabling the citizens to live peacefully and freely.
Otherwise the MPAA and RIAA may want to have a chat with you.
That and if Comcast is really doing this then fuck them. Make it expensive for them to suck. E.g. share connections with your neighbours, call te
ISPs are not "common carriers" exactly (Score:2)
Re:ISPs are not "common carriers" exactly (Score:2)
My point though is that if they want to claim they let all non-abuse traffic through and are not responsible (for say piracy or kiddie porn) then they ought not to modify legitimate packets and data.
Of course I live in a country where GSM comes from
You can get net access from
etc...
You think your monopolies suck in the USA. Here in Canada we put the "pwned" in Monopwned
I can tell you my experience with Comcast & Vo (Score:2)
I called Comcast to complain. After 3 service calls in 2 months, I finally was tired of the problems and went with Verizon DSL for 2/3rds the cost of Comcast broadband.
Vonage works perfectly again.
Comcast and VoIP (Score:2)
This agrees with my own experiences with Comcast. I was testing VoIP through my own local company and for the first couple of weeks it worked great. However, in the past month or two things changed dramatically. Now VoIP calls are 100% guaranteed to disconnect during a conversation and are very choppy even when they work.
Running mtr shows lots a significant amount of packet loss though and lots of jitter; it may not be enough to affect e-mail or web browsing, but it's plenty enough to disrupt VoIP.
ComCuss and RoadRunarounder (Score:2)
I'm not surprised that VoIP doesn't play well over ComCuss or RoadRunarounder. I was with Roadrunarounder for 3 years. The first year and a half was flawless. Then came the packet loss. They claimed it was "signal strength". They replaced our cable drop with RJ6 but the problem came back. Then they replaced the hybrid splitter transformer but the packet loss reared it's head after a few months. Then the packet loss went away for 4 or 5 months and it was smooth sailing. It reared it's head again and RoadRuna
I have a theory on Comcast and others (Score:2)
The reason I say this is a few months ago, my TV picture on comcast got really fuzzy and poor. I called them, and the first thing they did was put a signal booster on the line coming in. That more or less fixed it. And in his truck the guy had dozens of these.
So th
Nah, Comcast was always a problem with Vonage (Score:2)
However, my observation is that FIOS offered significantly higher bandwidth back (it's 5/2 as compared with 4/512k) which seems important for VoIP. Plus, I found Verizon's bandwidth to be more consistent. FIOS offers 5/2 and it *always* works that way. Comcast seemed more inconsistent.
In any event, Vonage never worked consistently well under
Comcast 'invited' me a couple days ago (Score:2)
Comcast history (Score:2, Interesting)
Twelve months later, I called back. "Not available in your area." When? "Twelve to twenty-four months." But that's what you said last time. "Sorry, my hands are superglued to the laminated 'lame answer' card."
Another twelve months, another call, same
Vonage needs a test site (Score:2)
"Internet Minus" (Score:2)
Trouble using Vonage. (Score:2)
Solution (Score:2)
Loss of Common Carrier Status? (Score:2)
not that I care a great deal about US BB (Score:2)
1. Poor upstream B/W
Could be a number of factors - bittorrent, trojans ending email etc
Results in the other party not being able to hear you (properly/at all)
2. Poor downstream B/W
Could be torrents, downloads, windows updates, some arse pingflooding you
Results in you not being able to hear the other party
3. Poor Provider B/W
Caused by overselling bandwidth, overloaded routers, cr*p hardware
I think this is m
Not Surprising (Score:2, Informative)
http://rebrandsoftware.com/portblocking.asp [rebrandsoftware.com]
Check out the visitor-submitted "Complaint List by ISP" at the bottom of the page, Comcast has the longest list of all.
Tortous Interference . . . (Score:2)
I recently ditched comcast for lower speed dsl (Score:2)
Sympatico rewrites SIP headers (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm sure this is the start of some traffic shaping experiments for VOIP on that network. Whether they have started degrading service yet I couldn't say, though.
Very worrying...
Argh (Score:3, Interesting)
B. Your signal levels coming into your house are probably bad, or you have a bad split in the house somewhere. Keep in mind, every time you split that coax that your signal gets cut in half depending on what type of splitter you put on the line
C. From what I understand, their VOIP service isn't like vonage, and it runs over their private network
D. If you have an issue, don't complain about it here. Call them and tell them exactly what's happening. I let my lower channels stay fuzzy for three years without calling, blaming it on them. They came out an reran the line to my house and I haven't had any issues with cable or net since.
packet filtering can be good (Score:2)
Of course it would be nice if they'd let me adjust the settings via my account web page. That's a bit much to ask for from a company that has to deal with so many idiots and their spyware-
Re:A good way to fix this... (Score:2)
Pretty much the same thing as you're proposing, in fact.
we had a house burn down here over VoIP E911 (Score:2)
I will never give up my wired landline with CO power.
magic linkfest
Re:we had a house burn down here over VoIP E911 (Score:2)