[H-GEN] ADSL, Linux and Telstra (was: Re: DHCP and Telstra)

Tony Nugent tony at linuxworks.com.au
Fri Aug 23 04:20:59 EDT 2002


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On Fri Aug 23 2002 at 11:40, Robert Brockway wrote:

> Subject: Re: [H-GEN] DHCP and Telstra

> > Is anyone out there running Bigpond cable?

 [ ... dhcp problems ... ]

> When helping a friend with BigPond Cable & Linux I had to tell the windows
> box that had formerly been on the link to explicely release the IP before
> the Linux box could get one.  They were authenticating/locking on the MAC
> address I believe.  When we told it to release it cleared the MAC address
> lock.  The Linux box has never had to release before we changed the cable
> to another box however.

Awesome :)

While this is not directly relevant to this particular topic, I've
been using telstra ADSL for over 18 months, all that time with
linux.  (Well almost... I had it working 5 minutes after the tech
guy left, he had taken more than two hours to install it onto a
windows box I had prepared for the purposes of "keeping them
happy").

I can't recall any real problems I've had with the linux side of
things... it works very well out-of-the-box with rp-pppoe, thank you
very much :)  Hey, my firewall box (a low-end i586) has been up now
for the past 127 days without a problem (I needed to upgrade the
kernel), it's been up longer than that in the past too.

I have gradually been developing a HUGE beef with telstra... they
REFUSE to give me any real support unless I run a windows-based box
connected to the adsl modem (using their particular adsl software,
which I am not inclined to trust wrt security etc, who knows what
"hooks" they have put into it).

Over this time there have been lots of technical hiccups with
telstra's adsl services, admittedly less common and less severe
recently, but it still happens more often than they would like to
admit. 

The attitude I get thrown back at me from them when I ring their
technical suppor is no longer a joke... it has got to the point
where I ring them, give my user details, tell them what's
technically going wrong with their adsl services (eg, modem
problems, ppp/LCP or authentication problems, broken/misconfigured
adsl concentrators) and immediately they come back at me because
they already know that I'm using linux (apparently clearly marked as
such in their electronic records).

I used to simply accept their refusal to give support -- not unless
you can give them answers to questions like "what is the windows
error message that you see?"  Groan.  I've been able to solve most
problems on my own if it happened to be an issue on my end - but it
rarely is (I can't recall a single occasion)... as most of us know,
once you have things setup and working with linux it is highly
stable and very reliable.

But I'm close to the point where I'm getting sick of this situation.

  For example, recently I've been having weird problems with this
  (crappy, insecure, expensive) Alcatel "speedtouch home" modem they
  gave me... the link seems to freeze at random times and the ONLY
  way to bring it up again is to physically reboot the modem by
  turning it off and on again.  (Doing a "soft reboot" by logging
  into it does not do the trick, which would have been useful to do
  automatically with something like an expect script... too bad if
  it happens and noone is around to do the reboot).

  The problem has nothing at all to do with the operating system
  that I happen to choose to be using, yet because of this choice I
  can get no further support -- not unless I put a windows box onto
  the modem so I can give their support people their much-revered
  error messages.  aargh!

Not happy, telstra.

  But it is all in their one-sided terms and conditions which they
  hide behind.  In the end, I'm paying damn good money for service
  and support that I am simply not getting.

There is NO WAY, no way in the world that I would dare to put any
windows box onto any permanent internet connection... it makes a
crappy firewall (err, not suitable as a firewall at all, and not
without expensive 3rd-party apps), and its "internet connection
sharing" functionality is totally brain-dead and inflexable.  In
short, I simply cannot do what I need to do without a decent
masquerading firewall that can also do things like ipip/gre/sec IP
tunnels and so on.

I'm wondering if others here who are using linux on their adsl
connections are having the same total lack of support because they
are not using an "approved" operating system?

Perhaps I should look for an alternative carrier that is at least
sympathetic to linux users?  Is cable a cheaper, faster, more
reliable alternative?

Should we all come together as a group and lobby telstra to change
their obstinate attitude towards one of the best operating systems
available today?  Just because linux is not "popular with the
masses", this is no excuse to ignore its existance.  Their attitude
needs to change.  Hey, does such a lobby group already exist?

  (I can understand their reluctance to support linux itself, but
  the ppp/pppoe side of things is not at all difficult to set up.
  And its very nature makes it great for diagnosing technical
  problems with what is going on... I don't see why their linux
  support can't be limited to just that).

Does anyone know if it is possible to get internal PCI ADSL modems?
I would love to toss this alcatel modem into the rubbish bin where
it belongs, and use a REAL operating system to directly control
what's happening on the adsl link...  :)

(I recently replaced a cisco router with a $200 isdn card, one less
point of security weaknesses, and it works just great! :)

Cheers
Tony
(with apologies for such a long-winded winge about my displeasure
with tesltra's services).

One last salvo...  IMHO they should sell off the rest of tesltra,
but keep control of all the infrastructure in the public realm so
that telstra has to compete and pay for it like the rest of the
telecommunications industry.  No, I don't own any telstra shares :)

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