Phone extension sockets, Digital Voice and broadband speed

[Jo743]

Before I was recently migrated from BT to EE I had my BT Hub plugged in to a phone extension socket rather than the master socket (despite the advice not to do this, I was getting average speeds of 44mbps). Once I switched to EE I plugged the new EE router into the master socket. Speed dropped to 36mbps and continued to drop. An engineer came out and upgraded the master socket, as I had an old one. Speeds returned to around 34 to 36mbps over the next few days, but I don’t understand why the speed has dropped so much. I tried plugging in my old BT hub to the master socket, it worked and speed was also 36mbps; I then tried connecting it to the extension socket I used to use, but it didn’t work. Before I spend a frustrating time (due to cable management lol) moving my EErouter to try the extension socket, I want to know whether it will still work, or whether having digital voice and the new master socket has somehow disabled the extension (the engineer did attach the extension wiring to the new master socket). I’m wondering whether some electrical interference or something is affecting the speed. Or does Digital Voice affect broadband speed? It’s very odd.

[JimM11]

@Jo743 So number 1. your master socket, is that where the line comes into for sure and you do know that as a fact, i have NO idea how your home is wired for the incoming telephone supply. You had higher before, the engineer confirmed that for you and you are left high and dry. You need EE to get it higher then you need to call them and ask for it so.

[Jo743]

Yes, the master socket is definitely where the line comes in.

I will phone EE again, but thought I'd try here first in case there was a simple solution that I could do myself, or someone could tell me what the problem is likely to be so I could then tell EE.

[XRaySpeX]

Thanks. Yes, you are getting a sync speed of only 39 Meg, near the bottom of a range where you might expect up to in the 50s.

I can't see you would ever get faster from an extension socket than you would get from the master socket.

Locate the hidden test socket that is revealed when you remove the bottom half of the split faceplate (2 screws or press tabs) of your master socket. Only do this if you have a split faceplate. 

Reboot the router & plug it into the test socket using a DSL dangly micro-filter. Post the full router stats & System Uptime when plugged into test socket.

Is the speed any better?

[Jo743]

Doesn’t look like it’s the split faceplate version, though there are press tabs on the side

[XRaySpeX]

It's a NTE5 master socket modified by a Mk4 faceplate which replaced the split. Just press the tabs at the side to remove the Mk4 & you should see the test socket.

[Jo743]

Thanks: I've done this and it didn't make any difference to the speed. Here are the stats: