What has happed to my VPN?

Yeap, it has been a crazy week. I've changed my ISP (from Clix to Zon), and the shit as definitely hit the fan!

For a start, I can no longer establish a VPN from my OSX. I have to start XP on Fusion to get VPN connectivity, and still dropping from time to time. The problem can be related to the router - now that I no longer have a DSL line, I've stopped using my Huawei and recovered my old Linksys WRK54G. Yes, K, not T :(

As always I'm having problems with the quality. Clix sold me a 24Mbps service and couldn't get me nothing pass 4Mpbs... Then there were the trafic limits - who needs trafic limits these days?

For my needs Zon is a lot cheaper, but it comes with a price: reliability! I've lost my connection for a couple of times, including the phone - yes, on Zon the phone is brought through cable... Let me get you reading from modem right now:

Downstream Power Level	-15.4 dBmV
Upstream Power Level	56.0 dBmV

Ooops. I phoned Zon and had this interesting conversation about it:

• [operator] I'm reading your modem and the signal are in order;
• [me] ok, so what should be the limits for my parameters?
  
• [operator] I'm reading your modem and the signal are in order;
• [me] you told me so, but what are the thresholds that define being in order?
• [operator] the signal are in order;
• [me] can you tell me what these limits are? Does you company policy allows it?
• [operator] no I can't...

And our conversation ended. The fact is we all know (or think we do). Here are the limits:

Downstream (Rx) Receive Power Level:
- 15 dBmV / +15 dBmV : min / max.
- 12 dBmV / +12 dBmV : recomended min / max.
- 0 (zero) dBmV : optimal

Upstream (Tx) Transmit Power (aka Return Signal) Level:

+8 dBmV / +58 dBmV : min / max QPSK. (DOCSIS 1.x)
+8 dBmV / +55 dBmV : min / max 8 QAM e 16 QAM. (DOCSIS 1.x)
+8 dBmV / +54 dBmV : min / max 32 QAM e 64 QAM. (A-TDMA DOCSIS 2.0)
+8 dBmV / +53 dBmV : min / max S-CDMA (DOCSIS 2.0)

+35 dBmV / +52 dBmV : recomended min / max

So until I have this situation solved, I won't be able to blog much - I usually do it over Writer on my office workstation over VPN...