[SOLVED] Can a 12 years ethernet cable be the cause of my ping spikes?

[Worius]

As the title says, my ethernet cable is pretty old, to the point where it is build into a new layer of wall.
For an year I have noticed ping spikes here and there but the past couple of months, the ping spikes have drastically increased.
And for someone like me, it is a BIG problem.

I have done multiple traceroutes on multiple sites throughout the months..
I don't get any ping spikes when I ping my router but outside of that, it is unbearable which means that the problem comes from my ethernet cable to ISP.
Obviously, I have called the ISP multiple times but it is always the same unplug plug and whenever they catch "Request timed out" (that's the only thing they see as a problem), they say they'll have a look at.. but that's the end of it. I am not blaming them for not anything but I need help here.

This is a quick test I just did while writing.. This is throughout the entire day, entire night, entire week.

A quick tracert as well. Now I understand that I can't just ping the same IP but it does NOT matter. Everywhere I ping, everywhere I trace, the problem of ping spikes is there.

Point 1. of the tracert is my router while 2. and 3. should be my ISP routers, I guess as these are the same IPS that appear everywhere. In the first tracert, you can see "85" ms which is obviously way higher ms when I'm using an IP that's not located 3-4 cities away in my country.

I can't just ignore and also it is a problem.. I need consistent connection, I understand that at times it might happen because of servers and stuff but should it really be that often and constant? I have tried everything that you can see on the first page of googling like up to date drivers, dns servers and others. I have also ping tested both of my wifi and plugged in, still there. I am at the conclusion of it being my old ethernet cable as my ISP has replaced a lot of stuff but that.

 

[The Paladin]

you know if the cable from post to house is broken , they have to replace it, hint hint.

 

[bill001g]

In general a bad ethernet cable will cause packet loss not drops. Unlike wifi the devices on ethernet connection check the packet for damage and discard. Wifi attempts to retransmit it. Ethernet leaves the data retransmission to the applications. Many times the result is slow data transfers since it is very hard to see how many packets the pc or router ethenet port dropped.

A second reason it is unlikely the ethernet cable is you would see the problem on pings to your router.

With the ISP packet loss is actually easier to fix in their network. It means like ethernet some equipment is detecting damaged packets and discarding them.

Packet delay is caused by some device holding the data in a buffer. In most cases it is because of over utilization of some connection or device in the path. This is why when you do a large download that uses all your bandwidth the ping times increase.

Your problem is tracert does not run enough traffic and ping to end node does not give you a clue a to why....it could be the end server like the ISP will try to blame.

You can try a tool called pathping but it tends to get misleading information sometimes. The ISP will also not understand it in most cases.

Your best bet is to leave constant pings run to all the hops in the trace. Your goal is to find the hop where the problem consistently starts. You actually hope it is hop2 because the ISP can fix that.

The problem you may have is if it is load related they likely will never admit that too many of your neighbors are sharing the same bandwidth and they have oversold the connection.

 

[Worius]

In general a bad ethernet cable will cause packet loss not drops. Unlike wifi the devices on ethernet connection check the packet for damage and discard. Wifi attempts to retransmit it. Ethernet leaves the data retransmission to the applications. Many times the result is slow data transfers since it is very hard to see how many packets the pc or router ethenet port dropped.

A second reason it is unlikely the ethernet cable is you would see the problem on pings to your router.

With the ISP packet loss is actually easier to fix in their network. It means like ethernet some equipment is detecting damaged packets and discarding them.

Packet delay is caused by some device holding the data in a buffer. In most cases it is because of over utilization of some connection or device in the path. This is why when you do a large download that uses all your bandwidth the ping times increase.

Your problem is tracert does not run enough traffic and ping to end node does not give you a clue a to why....it could be the end server like the ISP will try to blame.

You can try a tool called pathping but it tends to get misleading information sometimes. The ISP will also not understand it in most cases.

Your best bet is to leave constant pings run to all the hops in the trace. Your goal is to find the hop where the problem consistently starts. You actually hope it is hop2 because the ISP can fix that.

The problem you may have is if it is load related they likely will never admit that too many of your neighbors are sharing the same bandwidth and they have oversold the connection.

Isn't that packet loss in the ping test? Because it says "Loss = 6%"

From my router to PC, I use a separate ethernet, isn't that the reason I am not getting loss when pinging my router?

This is my traffic statistics for a PC and a couple of phones for around 12+ hours. (I haven't downloaded anything) I can't get the meaning of these numbers so if they say something, please share it with me.

And also, I've heard the sentence "Not a single neighbour shares this problem in your connection of losing packets" They have or at least I hope, that they changed a couple of parts here and there throughout the posts to my house and the problem is not fixed.

I just realized although its a faint memory... That the last time they were here, they did a ping test from my post on the house and then from my ethernet cable, both were showing delayed packets but at that day, I didn't have any packet loss so, it didn't seem as a problem for them.
Perhaps that means its not the ethernet cable but yet again I can barely remember anything and I can't confirm that we actually pinged the post.

 

[bill001g]

Now I am not sure what cables you are talking about. If there is a ethernet cable going from the router to some other device you might see loss on that. Normally it would go to a modem or ONT type device. You should be able to find the other end and plug a pc directly into the equipment elminating that ethernet cable. It would tell you if the cable is causing the problem.