Continue to have problems with 2811 1

[blubomber]

I have posted a couple of times here about my cisco 2811 router. I have two Point to Point T1 lines coming into the router. Both T1s are provided by the same local company. The T1 connected to serial0/1/0 has not had any issues. It has been solid for a couple of months now. The T1 going into serial0/0/0 has been unstable since day one. There is another 2811 router on the other end. Poblems started with the other router, but i got the conrrect cable installed and now it is good to go. Now, the router at our main office is having problems. It will stay up with no problems for about 3-4 hours and then go down for 2. When it is down and i do s show interfaces command, this is what i get;

Serial0/0/0 is down, line protocol is down
Hardware is GT96K with integrated T1 CSU/DSU
Description:
Internet address is 172.16.10.1/30
MTU 1500 bytes, BW 1536 Kbit, DLY 20000 usec,
reliability 255/255, txload 1/255, rxload 1/255
Encapsulation HDLC, loopback not set
Keepalive set (10 sec)
Last input 00:35:06, output 00:34:59, output hang never
Last clearing of "show interface" counters 4d22h
Input queue: 0/75/0/0 (size/max/drops/flushes); Total output drops: 68203
Queueing strategy: weighted fair
Output queue: 0/1000/64/67078 (size/max total/threshold/drops)
Conversations 0/16/256 (active/max active/max total)
Reserved Conversations 0/0 (allocated/max allocated)
Available Bandwidth 1152 kilobits/sec
5 minute input rate 0 bits/sec, 0 packets/sec
5 minute output rate 0 bits/sec, 0 packets/sec
22027 packets input, 557088 bytes, 0 no buffer
Received 21316 broadcasts, 0 runts, 0 giants, 0 throttles
45 input errors, 45 CRC, 0 frame, 0 overrun, 0 ignored, 0 abort
5258468 packets output, 556134544 bytes, 0 underruns
0 output errors, 0 collisions, 7132 interface resets
0 output buffer failures, 0 output buffers swapped out
52 carrier transitions
DCD=down DSR=up DTR=up RTS=up CTS=down

The cable is physicaly plugged into the router. I have talked to the company that provides the T1 and they say all of their equipment is fine.

Is this a problem with my router? Could the WIC card be bad? If the WIC card is bad, wouldnt it not work at all? I am not sure where to go with this. any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

[JOAMON]

If you want to test the interface then physically swap the T1 cards in the router. Then if the other circuit starts to have issues then you will know that it is indeed the T1 card. Although T1 providers never seem to think the problem is theirs. Once forced to come onsite and go intrusive on the circuit they seem to magically find and fix the problem. Just costs them dough to get qwest or other verdor if no problem found. You are using the wic-1dsu-t1-v2 and not the wic-idsu-t1 in that router?

 

[blubomber]

Thanks again for your reply JOAMON. Yes it is the wic-1dsu-t1-v2 card. those are the cards in all my routers. I will plan on doing your suggestion of switching the wic cards. It is going to be tough though because the one good line is used 24/7 with constant critical data flowing across it.

Thanks again.

 

[JOAMON]

That would be one way to do that....you got smartnet on that router? Could just do a RMA with cisco and get it replaced.....those wics have known hardware problems. I went through 6 to get 3 good ones. Try to get a time were you could have your provider do intensive testing on the circuit. They can take the circuit down and put loads of data across it and monitor it for reliabilty. At this point is either the circuit or the WIC. If other circuit is mission critical then dont mess with it. Had a T1 circuit one time that worked fine without a load but our provider did intensive testing and found that after a certain amount of time at 3/4 load one of their pieces of equipment would overheat and drop. This after lots of finger pointing on their part that it was my equipment.

 

[blubomber]

JOAMON,

I was just thinking of maybe just doing a config change instead of physically switching the cards. Then i would just move the T1 cables from one card to the other. This way i can minimize down time. All of my network traffic is going through the 2811. So, i figure i can just copy the current running-config using hyperterminal onto my local computer, make the changes, then copy it back to the router.

Does this sound like a possible solution? If it is a bad wic card, then the problems will stay on that card. If it is our service providers equipemnt, then the problems should switch to the currently good card.

Thanks for your help.

 

[JOAMON]

I also have this same router and without seeing your config and knowing how mine is setup...access lists, ip routes, etc...I think you would have less downtime just turning off the router and physically swapping the interfaces. Should be able to do this in under two minutes if all goes well. You have to kill the interfaces anyway when you try to make the config changes to swap the interfaces and then swap the cables which may actually take longer to do.
Have you also considered that it may not be a problem at the main office and is actually a problem at the other end. You mentioned earlier about a bad cable. Maybe the incorrect cable caused some hardware problems with the wic on that end.
Also as this is a point to point do you have one side set to do internal clocking for this circuit.?

 

[blubomber]

Yeah, i think that you are right that physicaly switching the wics is the fastest way to go.

i am pretty sure it is the main office, right now at least. When the line goes down, the router tells me that either the cable is not plugged, or the wrong cable. On the remote office, i was only getting that the line protocol is down but the router detected that the cable was connected. So, i will see what happens when i switch the cards.

Thanks again.

 

[robertjo24]

Two things.

Cisco put out a note about a series of WIC-1DSU-T1-V2 cards with a certain series of serial numbers that are causing issues with the 2811.
We had one of these cards and it gave us fits. Check their website for this notice.

TELCO providers test the T1 circuits remotely by looping thier SmartJack internally and running a basic test pattern. There is some minimal circuitry past the internal loop point to the physical interface that is never tested unless a tech comes on site to perform head to head testing. If the T1 card swap yeilds no reults, I would request two things from the TELCO:
1) Perform a lond duration stress test on the circuit with a more aggresive test pattern. Some test patterns will give better indications of harder to define issues.
2) Request a tech come on site and perform head to head testing. They may say this could result in extra charges if the issues is determined to be in the CPE. I would agree to this, especially if you have proven all of your equipment. Even if they do identify the issue as being in your equipment, it is still cheaper than messing around with a chronic issue for days, or even weeks.

 

[JOAMON]

FYI....

The problem I had with my Wic's was that 3 cards would only operate in slot 0....when put in any other slot router would not recognize it. Cisco originally siade to just leave it in slot 1 but I took issue with the fact that if it had that problem then what else could be wrong with it. Besides....I needed 3 T1 cards. They did an RMA and the new card works great. When you switch the cards watch the indicator lights on the back and see if they even light up when powered back on.

 

[blubomber]

Thank you for the replies. when i switch the cards i will jot down the serial numbers really quick and check cisco's website for possible issues with the card and the 2811.

If the swap indicates that it is not my router or the wic cards, i will have the TELCO company come in and do a thorough test on the line.

Thanks again for your help.

 

[JOAMON]

If you wanted to check the serial numbers first just do a show diag and it will list the serial numbers for the wics.

 

[blubomber]

Update,

I switched the cards yesterday and did not have any problems all day. today, i moved all property to property communications between our main location and the remote location over the T1 that i was having issues with. so far so good. There is email and terminal server sessions currently going accross the T1 and some user files every now and then.

It will be weird if the T1 is stable from now on. I have not called my TELCO company so i am sure they have not made any changes.

Thanks again fro all the help with this issue.

 

[robertjo24]

You may be experiencing the same issue as JOAMON listed above on the 6 May 05 10:39 posting.

Keep us updated, and give em' 'ell!