Forum Discussion

SilverApple42's avatar
SilverApple42
New Contributor
6 years ago

STILL Packet Loss For Over a year in games (Fortnite, Overwatch, Rocket League, etc)

My original thread about this was locked with no reason, and after multiple Cox technicians and calls I am still receiving extremely bad packet loss on the upload side only. Mainly to games that use Amazon AWS servers. Anybody from Cox or community members able to help me?

Original thread - 

Hello, I have been a Cox Customer for 17 years and a few years ago I started having very bad packet loss issues. I have spent hundreds of hours trying to fix this issue but it still happens even years later. I am only receiving packet loss (upload), 0% download packet loss. I am receiving low ping (for the most part) (30-40ms) and high packet loss (10-120%) in games such as Fortnite, Overwatch, Rocket league and more. It is happening on my PC & PS4. I have tried pretty much every solution you can think of.

(I am hardwired directly to the modem with Ethernet as well) 

This is a Cox issue as I used a TMobile hotspot and received 0% packet loss so it can't be anything on my end. At least I don't think so.

49 Replies

  • jasl's avatar
    jasl
    New Contributor II

    Hey, I have this same issue. Have had 2 techs out and they have been unable to resolve the issue. I am on the westside of Arizona

    • SilverApple42's avatar
      SilverApple42
      New Contributor

      I am on the East, but yeah multiple people are having this issue unfortunately.

  • Rob_H_'s avatar
    Rob_H_
    Contributor II

    Perhaps you could try running a traceroute to the IP of the server.  Then, with that information returned from the trace route, start pinging the closest hop with about 100 pings using 512-byte packets and then continue to the next hop, etc until you start to see packet loss.  Maybe, this could help to identify where the bottleneck is.  Good luck.

    • BooPacketLoss's avatar
      BooPacketLoss
      New Contributor III

      Amazon Web Services servers don't return ping requests due to them blocking ICMP packets to prevent DDoS attacks, so that testing is unreliable. COX denies that this is their problem because there is no packet loss up to the point of the Phoenix server, 68.1.1.14. The packet loss occurs somewhere after that point. But this happens to so many COX customers in the Southwest, and has been happening to me for nearly a year. From my limited knowledge, I have to say that the "routing tables," or whatever controls the path our connections take to these AWS servers, is completely messed up.

      • Rob_H_'s avatar
        Rob_H_
        Contributor II

        Yes, I wouldn't be at all surprised that ICMP requests are blocked from the AWS Servers for the very reason you mentioned.  However, that doesn't negate the validity of isolating the point of network congestion which likely occurs en route to the servers (i.e. Level 3 backbone).  Hence, my suggestion for performing a traceroute, then perform pings to the visible hops seems feasible in trying to get a handle on where the packet loss seems to be occurring.   Would you not agree?

  • Rob_H_'s avatar
    Rob_H_
    Contributor II

    silverapple42 , boopacketloss  and jasluna, in a nutshell, AWS is entrusted to host those gaming applications for businesses.  Those, high profile customers, probably have very good access to AWS technical support.   The gaming company CEOs should be very concerned about the apparent widespread impact this is having on their customers who use Cox Internet Services to directly access their applications hosted by AWS. Having said that, I would think that the management of those companies would appreciate having some data presented to them that could definitively help isolate the problem that's having a widespread effect on their customer base.  Based on our testing and other info gathered, I think the information should be presented to the corporate management of those respective gaming companies.  All the best.

    • BooPacketLoss's avatar
      BooPacketLoss
      New Contributor III

      The CEOs should be concerned? https://www.reddit.com/r/FortNiteBR/comments/931lrl/attempt_2_at_getting_visibility_most_cox_isp/ The company knows about it, they don't care. As you can see, a member of the company commented on this thread and the developer eventually concluded that the problem is on COX's end. The first place I went to try and address this problem was to the game's forums and through their support system. I didn't receive a single response in 8 months. It's a free game with over 125 million players, they aren't going to address the problems of one ISP.

      • Rob_H_'s avatar
        Rob_H_
        Contributor II

        Are the CEOs and/or upper management present in the discussion you provided the link to?  Has anyone offered more definitive data than ours? The testing you and I performed strongly suggest the problem lies within the 54.239 network at AWS.  Someone is paying AWS to host those games for "over 125 million players".   I seriously doubt the for-profit AWS is providing those system and network resources simply because they feel like being charitable.  The fact that Cox directly peers with the AWS network gives insight into the amount of traffic originating from the Cox network.   We're not talking "small potatoes" here.

        I don't play those games, yet I took the time to assist fellow Cox customers in helping to isolate the problem.  It is disappointing that, apparently, you guys are giving up without even attempting to present our demonstrable findings to upper management.  If upper management won't listen, take your case to an arbitrator (i.e. BBB).  For someone who began working in IT WANs when the size of a 19.2 Kbps (not 19.2 Mbps) long-haul modem was the size of a microwave oven, this is disappointing.

  • flitzanu's avatar
    flitzanu
    New Contributor II

    i can say that i'm NOT in Arizona, and my upload stability and packet loss is also terrible.  also, the replies from others here are great with all the suggestions, but i'd love to know why the burden of figuring out the problem should be on the user instead of the company to which we are paying money for service to figure out.  i'm not being paid to be a network technician, i'm paying Cox to do that job and provide a service.  internet connectivity through cox has greatly gone downhill over the last several years, and it seems that it is time to recognize a problem exists that we want fixed.

  • Hi everyone, we believe the issue impacting Fortnite/AWS should now be resolved. Please let us know if you continue to have issues.


    Brian
    Cox Support Forum Moderator

    • Internetman60's avatar
      Internetman60
      New Contributor II

      I am still having issues with up stream packet loss in games.  Hard wired, and have verified the problem is not between my computer and router.  However, I suspect the problem might be with a neighbor/node and not with routing, but you can check my previous post for more info.

      • Skdsneaky's avatar
        Skdsneaky
        New Contributor

        I had the same thing [If variable rate is on turn that off] that was my proplem no packet loss on fortnite

    • dylan123noe's avatar
      dylan123noe
      New Contributor III

      nope still getting packet loss even tried turning off variable refresh rate. 

  • Kitkat362's avatar
    Kitkat362
    New Contributor

    Major Packet Loss in Pensacola Florida too. Can't stream or play Fortnite 

    • dylan123noe's avatar
      dylan123noe
      New Contributor III

      i know the server i was connecting to and getting packet loss on when i did the ping plotter test was located in boca raton FL strange you have it being in same state