topic Packet Loss Started a week ago in Broadband & Landline

Packet Loss Started a week ago

murphyslaw — Tue, 03 Feb 2026 20:19:18 GMT

So about a week ago I started suffering from packet loss. I work from home and Sim race in my spare time. Both require good connectivity and is noticable when things are wrong. It started in a championship race a bit of lagging about. Then my voip calls at work started to get the odd glitch, remote connections would lag and drop.

I normally use a Ubiquiti Dream Machine Pro as a router and the base of my network. This has been reporting upto 10% packet loss for the last week. After reaching out to EE today for support I was told they could do nothing and my equipment was at fault. I dug out the POS EE router plugged it in and worked from it and experienced the exact same issue. I also have sim raced in an online championship race tonight and suffered packet loss. The ping is fine, the reported speed is fine. When speaking with an EE "engineer" earlier whilst I was connected to the EE Hub I was told everything was fine and it was my equipment that was at fault. They literally wouldn't do anything else. They couldn't care about packet loss as everything they were seeing was fine, not a hint or troubleshooting.

Any ideas how I can get someone to actually look at the issue as the problem has to be with the ONT or in the EE network themselves??

Re: Packet Loss Started a week ago

Jacob_ — Tue, 03 Feb 2026 20:43:29 GMT

I use the UDM Pro myself, haven't had any issues, but I know it's consistent with telling you when there's issue with the connection (and accurate). Have knocked your ONT or are there any bends in the fiber cable to the ONT? (also, try replacing the ethernet cable from the ethernet to the UDM, as a processionary check..) I connect mine with ethernet to an RJ45 -.> SFP+ transceiver to get the full 1.6Gbps, although as I'm typing this I read you went back to their hub and still had the same issue, seems to me like it might be an issue that needs to be investigated by EE/Openreach to test the cables using an optical power meter to measure the dBm on the line.

Are you connecting via WiFi or via ethernet to your computer? If WiFi, do the following in command prompt (winkey + r then type in cmd.exe)

ping -n 100 192.168.1.1 (if that's your UDM)

If you're connected to ethernet i'd do a ping to cloudflares 1.1.1.1

ping -n 100 1.1.1.1

then you can do a tracert to see if there's any issues regarding a switch/network route along the way.

tracert 1.1.1.1

some might show * * * * request timed out, most likely because they block ICMP ping requests.

e.g
1 1 ms 1 ms 2 ms unifi.localdomain [192.168.6.1]
2 2 ms 2 ms 1 ms 172.16.13.94
3 * * * Request timed out.
4 10 ms 10 ms * 62.172.102.136
5 10 ms 10 ms 10 ms peer3-et7-0-0.slough.ukcore.bt.net [194.72.16.52]
6 17 ms 30 ms 30 ms 195.99.126.99
7 11 ms 10 ms 11 ms 141.101.71.133
8 16 ms 31 ms 38 ms one.one.one.one [1.1.1.1]

Just a quick edit, if you happen to know the services you're connecting to (or the server IP your sim game connects to, do a tracert on that, it could just possibly be an issue between you and the server)

Hope it helps.

Re: Packet Loss Started a week ago

murphyslaw — Tue, 03 Feb 2026 21:02:22 GMT

Thanks I’ve done a fair bit of investigating into to it to try and rule out my kit. I’m hard wired in. Tired new cables etc

I had a constant ping going to the server I’m on for the sim and it showed 6% loss over an hour which doesn’t sound a lot but three or four packets at a time results in service issues.

anytime I’ve done a tracert it shows fines. Tests between devices both wired and wireless within the network all perform flawlessly even when on the ee hub. It’s only when reaching out b

Re: Packet Loss Started a week ago

Jacob_ — Tue, 03 Feb 2026 21:05:46 GMT

Do you mind sharing the hostname/IP address of the server? I can do a traceroute directly from my UDM and see if I'm having any packetloss issues to that server too.

Re: Packet Loss Started a week ago

murphyslaw — Tue, 03 Feb 2026 21:10:27 GMT

Sure vrrc1.emperorservers.com I know there was 32 people connected tonight 6 on EE and I was the only one with issues but a second result from udm would be good thanks.

Re: Packet Loss Started a week ago

Jacob_ — Tue, 03 Feb 2026 21:19:20 GMT

using mtr directly on my UDM, I'm getting packet loss from hop3 and hop 9.

Home (x.x.x.x) -> vrrc1.emperorservers.com 2026-02-03T21:12:31+0000 Keys: Help Display mode Restart statistics Order of fields quit Packets Pings Host Loss% Snt Last Avg Best Wrst StDev 1. 172.16.13.94 0.0% 33 1.3 1.3 0.6 8.1 1.2 2. (waiting for reply) 3. 62.172.102.140 24.2% 33 8.9 8.8 8.1 9.6 0.4 4. 213.121.193.41 0.0% 32 7.7 12.3 7.5 33.3 7.3 5. be105.lon-thw-pb2-nc5.uk.eu 0.0% 32 7.9 9.9 7.9 27.4 4.2 6. (waiting for reply) 7. (waiting for reply) 8. (waiting for reply) 9. be102.lil1-rbx8-sbb2-nc5.fr.eu 9.4% 32 13.1 13.5 12.8 16.2 0.7 10. 37.59.16.16 0.0% 32 15.0 15.6 14.1 17.1 0.7 11. (waiting for reply) 12. (waiting for reply) 13. (waiting for reply) 14. ns3288204.ip-5-135-179.eu 0.0% 32 13.3 13.5 13.0 14.2 0.4

traceroute directly from the UDM to the server is

traceroute vrrc1.emperorservers.com traceroute to vrrc1.emperorservers.com (5.135.179.188), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets 1 172.16.13.94 (172.16.13.94) 0.799 ms * * 2 * * * 3 62.172.102.140 (62.172.102.140) 8.174 ms 8.221 ms * 4 peer7-et1-1-3.telehouse.ukcore.bt.net (62.6.201.41) 7.626 ms peer8-et-3-0-3.telehouse.ukcore.bt.net (62.6.201.214) 8.485 ms peer1-et-3-3-0.faraday.ukcore.bt.net (62.6.201.165) 7.490 ms 5 be105.lon-thw-pb2-nc5.uk.eu (54.36.50.114) 7.781 ms be107.lon-thw-pb1-nc5.uk.eu (54.36.50.112) 8.173 ms be105.lon-thw-pb2-nc5.uk.eu (54.36.50.114) 8.308 ms 6 * * * 7 * * * 8 * * * 9 be102.lil1-rbx8-sbb2-nc5.fr.eu (54.36.50.231) 14.435 ms be102.lil1-rbx1-sbb1-nc5.fr.eu (94.23.122.144) 14.209 ms be102.lil1-rbx8-sbb1-nc5.fr.eu (54.36.50.241) 13.956 ms 10 37.59.16.24 (37.59.16.24) 16.548 ms 16.450 ms 16.322 ms 11 * * * 12 * * * 13 * * * 14 ns3288204.ip-5-135-179.eu (5.135.179.188) 14.408 ms 13.596 ms 13.547 ms root@Home:~# traceroute vrrc1.emperorservers.com traceroute to vrrc1.emperorservers.com (5.135.179.188), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets 1 172.16.13.94 (172.16.13.94) 1.052 ms * * 2 * * * 3 * 62.172.102.142 (62.172.102.142) 7.789 ms * 4 peer8-et-4-0-3.telehouse.ukcore.bt.net (194.72.16.158) 7.918 ms peer7-et1-1-3.telehouse.ukcore.bt.net (62.6.201.41) 7.638 ms peer8-et1-1-3.telehouse.ukcore.bt.net (62.6.201.43) 7.527 ms 5 be107.lon-thw-pb1-nc5.uk.eu (54.36.50.112) 7.808 ms 7.954 ms 8.275 ms 6 * * * 7 * * * 8 * * * 9 be102.lil1-rbx8-sbb2-nc5.fr.eu (54.36.50.231) 13.210 ms 12.920 ms be102.lil1-rbx1-sbb2-nc5.fr.eu (213.251.130.102) 13.851 ms 10 37.59.16.16 (37.59.16.16) 15.861 ms 37.59.16.12 (37.59.16.12) 16.441 ms 37.59.16.24 (37.59.16.24) 17.238 ms 11 * * * 12 * * * 13 * * * 14 ns3288204.ip-5-135-179.eu (5.135.179.188) 13.155 ms 13.456 ms 13.345 ms

I notice the server is based in france at OVH datacenter, have you tried testing a different server (maybe based in London/Manchester/Coventry) to see if you have any similar performance issues?

Re: Packet Loss Started a week ago

murphyslaw — Tue, 03 Feb 2026 21:24:45 GMT

when I’m at work tomorrow I’ve got access to several countries so will try there.

if the problems just one service I would say look there but as I am the only one having issues and I am also experiencing issues with discord voip, teams voip and vpn connections I am very confident the issue is in my local area.

Re: Packet Loss Started a week ago

Jacob_ — Tue, 03 Feb 2026 21:46:16 GMT

Ah, if you're having issues with frequent disconnects of your VPN and issues with VoIP then I'd suggest getting EE to check the logs on your ONT, for loss of signal, re-registrations etc and optical power levels.

It happened the same when you were using their router, but do you use IDS/IPS on the dream machine? It's known to cause some network issues, degradation in speed and packet loss. If you have packetloss at certain times of the day, you can either ssh in to your local UDM ssh -l root 192.168.1.1 if you have it enabled in the settings/console plane. Then do apt-get update and apt-get install mtr

After it's installed, you can run

mtr -c 200 bbc.co.uk or the IP of whatever you're having issues with, or download WinMTR on windows, the responses may be able to help the techs at EE give you some support.

Re: Packet Loss Started a week ago

murphyslaw — Tue, 03 Feb 2026 21:44:59 GMT

That’s the problem trying to get EE to look more in depth!!

Genuinely shock at the support I received today. Will try again tomorrow whilst using their box and see if I am more successful

Re: Packet Loss Started a week ago

Jacob_ — Tue, 03 Feb 2026 21:46:32 GMT

Fingers crossed for you!

Re: Packet Loss Started a week ago

murphyslaw — Thu, 05 Feb 2026 10:26:21 GMT

So after speaking with a great support agent called Courtney she enabled a “channel scan” on my line. Not really heard of other before but the packet loss is definitely improved. From 5-10% to around 1%. Will see how it goes over the next week.

Re: Packet Loss Started a week ago

Leanne_T — Thu, 05 Feb 2026 12:27:18 GMT

Thanks for coming back to us with an update @murphyslaw

Let us know how it goes after monitoring for the week.

Leanne.

Re: Packet Loss Started a week ago

Jacob_ — Thu, 05 Feb 2026 19:48:24 GMT

Have they made you revert back to their Smart hub to do the "channel scan", or are you still using the UDM Pro?

I'd monitor it using a BQM (you'll have to enable ICMP to your WAN though)
I recommend https://www.thinkbroadband.com/broadband/monitoring/quality

If you're using the latest 10.x version of Unifi Network, go to :
https://192.168.1.1/network/default/settings/policy-table

and do the following:

Create new policy (firewall) name BQM ping Source Zone External Any Port Any Action Allow Destination Zone Gateway Any Port Any IP Version IPv4 Protocol Custom ICMP Echo Request Connection state All Schedule Always