Connecting From China?

[chandm]

Hi Guys,

 

I have been a member of TCH for about a year now, but this is the first time I am posting in the forums. I am a bit lost...

 

Basically I am connecting from Mainland China and trying to setup a website via TCH. When I try to upload the files to the webhost using FTP the thing keeps failing. Also, I get occasionally very slow response times. At times, in bursts, its very quick, but then again at times it timesout repeadidly and crawls.

 

Anyone else from Mainland experiencing these problems? Is this a known issue? Any way around it. Looking for advice, thanks.

 

Mitan

[TCH-Bruce]

Welcome to the forums Mitan

 

Do you have your FTP program set to passive mode?

 

Have you tried uploading with cPanel's File Manager?

[TCH-Thomas]

Welcome to the forum, Mitan.

[TweezerMan]

Welcome to the forums, Mitan!

[Madmanmcp]

Hi Mitan,

 

Also, I get occasionally very slow response times. At times, in bursts, its very quick, but then again at times it timesout repeadidly and crawls.

 

This will probably be because of your location. There are a number of factors which determine and control your response time and most of them are not controlled by TCH.

 

Your ISP is one, the routers and switches between you and the data center where your web site is located. You have a very long distance to travel between here (USA) and China and I would expect some delays would be "normal". Also I would suspect the internet took a big hit here in the USA because of all the damage done by Katrina, it probably wiped out a lot of backbone in the south and everything is being rerouted around the truble areas.

[TCH-Don]

Welcome to the forums Mitan

 

As Bruce mentioned

did you try using cpanels file-manager to upload files to compare?

and have you tried more than one ftp program?

 

Sometimes a different ftp program can make a difference.

Also if you are on a dial-up

the quality of the phone connection makes a big difference

such as how noisy is the connection or is there a hum on the line.

[stevevan]

I'd look at ping times between you and the server. (Take several to get a good "average" reading.) As madmanmcp said, routing issues in the states (esp. here in the south) may be a bit compressed. If I remember correctly, I think one of the major backbones went through New Orleans.

 

If the ping times (averaged out) look pretty much the same, then look at another FTP program.

 

Oh...and welcome to the forums!

[chandm]

I will check out the ping times later today. It could be the problems in the south come to think of it now.

 

As far as uploading via C-panel, did that as well and had the same issues. (Would basically time out after 30 seconds or so.)

 

I'll check it out and let you guys know.

[TCH-Rob]

Keep us posted and welcome to the forums.

[chandm]

Strange,

 

I have another site hosted with TCH, it is on server 46. I was uploading to that just fine today (slow, but the connection stuck via ftp thru a 6 MB file) but when I was uploading to my new domain on server 80, I would get good speeds (16-17k / sec) but after about 1 - 2 minutes I get connection timed out from server.

 

Can anyone decipher what is going on? I choose TCH mainly because I didn't have problems connecting from China in the past?

 

Appriciate any advice, thanks.

[Madmanmcp]

Why not run a traceroute to each server and see if you can see where the slowdown is happening. If its happening over here at the TCH datacenters you can then have TCH look into it.

[chandm]

I tried the tracert, but I keep getting destination net unreachable. The funny thing is I can connect via http and ftp just fine, but it does't seem to like a continuous stream of data.

 

Is there any way I can have shell access turned on for my account? This was I can shell into the server and wget the files I need? This would help a lot since I basically am now downloading things from US sites and uploading them back to my website; with shell access I can do it from the shell account thus saving time and I don't have to worry about connection problems since I its US-US servers.

 

I appriciate any help, I kind of have deadline of getting my site set up and now would be a perfect time, but these connection problems are killing me.

[Madmanmcp]

Sorry but TCH does not allow shell access on their servers. If you can't run a tracert then there are problems and it should tell you at what point it fails. Can you post your results here and someone maybe able to tell you where to start looking for help.

[chandm]

Thats unfortunate. Is there a way to FTP or run wget commands via cpanel for the time being?

 

Regarding your question about the trace, I ran tracert on both of my domains hosted by TCH. The first one is the domain where I am not having too many problems (Server 46 I beieve):

 

Tracing route to www.chandyland.org [63.247.85.218]

over a maximum of 30 hops:

 

1 <1 ms 1 ms <1 ms 192.168.100.1

2 714 ms 618 ms 663 ms 219.136.116.1

3 772 ms 583 ms 384 ms 218.19.128.89

4 596 ms 622 ms 552 ms 61.144.15.49

5 659 ms 672 ms 674 ms 61.144.0.169

6 573 ms 673 ms 403 ms 61.140.17.10

7 1083 ms 674 ms 458 ms 202.97.26.233

8 829 ms 726 ms 470 ms 202.97.33.158

9 582 ms 564 ms 440 ms 202.97.51.230

10 623 ms 631 ms 630 ms 63.218.7.17

11 1486 ms 1391 ms * 63.216.31.38

12 * 994 ms 1086 ms 63.216.31.158

13 1020 ms 1030 ms 1229 ms 209.51.149.109

14 614 ms 922 ms 903 ms 209.51.137.34

15 591 ms * 969 ms 63.247.85.218

 

Trace complete.

 

The second one below, this is the one where I am having troubles:

 

Tracing route to 66.36.231.135 over a maximum of 30 hops

 

1 1 ms 1 ms <1 ms 192.168.100.1

2 681 ms 934 ms 725 ms 219.136.116.1

3 897 ms 925 ms 855 ms 218.19.128.113

4 810 ms 783 ms 556 ms 61.144.15.49

5 1213 ms 1422 ms 1323 ms 61.144.0.169

6 507 ms 353 ms 680 ms 61.140.17.6

7 755 ms 816 ms 802 ms 202.97.26.233

8 629 ms 762 ms 793 ms 202.97.33.118

9 1470 ms 1186 ms 784 ms 202.97.51.162

10 * * * Request timed out.

11 * * * Request timed out.

12 * * * Request timed out.

13 * * * Request timed out.

14 * * * Request timed out.

15 * 1016 ms 1205 ms 66.36.224.177

16 1320 ms 1366 ms 1265 ms 66.36.224.33

17 * 957 ms * 66.36.224.228

18 893 ms 870 ms 804 ms 66.36.231.135

 

Trace complete.

 

Seems like something funny is going on with all those time outs, but I can't really decipher this. If you have any insight to the problem (and a possible solution) please let me know :-) Thanks!

 

 

Mitan

[TCH-Rob]

202.97.51.162 belongs to CHINANET backbone network. That seems to be where the failure is starting from.

[chandm]

Ohh, I am 100% sure the problem is from China NET itself, but to my one domain it routes just fine, but the other is causing problems. Any way around this by doing something on TCH's side? (Change servers, etc?) I have no option here with my ISP to complain, and the great firewall of China doesn't have any configuration options for me play with. :-(

 

Mitan

[TCH-Don]

You could open a help desk ticket to the techs

and explain the problem

and ask if the problem site could be moved to the same server as your good site.

its worth a try.

[Madmanmcp]

Wow, those times look like you are running thru molasses.

 

Another option would be checking the times of TCH servers over in England and if those times are any better for you having the techs move your account to that server.

[chandm]

Actually I would like my site to be quick for people in the USA, I am trying to setup a shopping cart system. I am not quite ready to leave China, but would like to get the site prepared before I come back to the states and open up shop.

 

Anyways, I guess I'll open a ticket. Thanks for the help!