[BUG] XG v16/17 PPPOE doesn't endlessly tries to reconnect

Hello All,

If you are experiencing issues related to this, please raise a support case mentioning the tracking ID NC-62029 and also PM me with your support case number for further investigation and follow up.

As a temporary workaround you can perform the following:

• Set a specific time when the PPPoE link reconnects (May work for certain situations)
• Manually save the PPPoE configuration or connect manually from the UI

Regards,

Hi there

I have logged 2 cases today for this issue. Although I have 3 units that have experienced the problem, one of the units is not under maintenance.

One unit is an XG230 Running 17.5.MR9. This unit presently has an uptime of 159 Days. It was a hardware upgrade from an XG125 in March 2020 and was running fine until 2 weeks ago and has experienced the problem 4 times in 2 weeks.

The other unit is an XG210. Running 17.5.MR8. This unit has an uptime presently of 211 Days, has not been upgraded initially due to scheduling issues with the customer, but recently due to known issues with firmware which will impact their operations. Today is the first occurrence of the issue there. This site is a dedicated fiber link, no other issues, just the PPPOE dropping at 4:50am and no attempts for a reconnect.

Given the details on these 2 units, this has to be an induced bug from either the SQL Injection fix or the HTTP/S Bookmarks retirement. I also continually see Alert messages about these fixes being applied, this is now several months after the fix was released. The alerts have been viewed, but are still listed as under 5 minutes ago. 

With ISP's moving to using PPPOE on dedicated links like Fixed Wifi and Fiber rather then fixed IP, this issue needs serious investigation now

Hello Gavin,

Thank you for contacting the Sophos Community.

I have followed up with both engineers and replied to your PM.

Regards,

hi emmosophos 

We haven't hear nobody's back on the pppoe issue !!!

Another 2 clients impacted last sunday, i will consider to send the bill to sophos to cover the extra hours overpaid of my technicians, only because sophos is not able to maintain or reconnect a pppoe link, which a simple 20€ modem can !!!!

this is not acceptable (again), and the time needed to troubleshoot this major issue is not more acceptable.

Hi,

have you started a support case for each of your affected customers?
ian

hi rfcat_vk 

no, i can't spend my time to open ticket for a system issue, for dozens of XG, that does not seems to be seriously handled by sophos, 

i opened one ticket, with an ideal case because the pppoe link could stay disconnected for investigations. and i have no news since days.

Yes a 20 € modem should do better than my XG to maintain the connection.

I personally plugged back my provider's box (you know we need to work sometimes).

I really think my last option is the change for another brand.

Hey,

I received an email from Support just before the migration to the new Support Portal. They looked at the unit which has had only the single failure and deemed it no problem. Then requested information on how to consistently generate the fault.

They don't appear to have looked at the logs for the XG230 unit which has exhibited the issue 4 times.

Support have also failed to understand that with Victoria in Stage 4 Lockdowns due to Covid-19, the reliance on VPN facilities here is high, and having a unit fail and require manual connection restart is an issue. Especially since at times there is no staff allowed in the offices of the customers.

While I read and appreciate you have been experiencing the issues for some time, The 2 units under maintenance and 3 units with no maintenance that my customers are seeing the problems with, have only started in the last 2 months. Given the older firmware, uptimes in excess of 100 days (AN XG210 with an uptime over 200 days), and no previous issues to report, should assist in pinpointing the problem for everybody.

While it may not be a hotfix that is the cause of the issue, they have certainly made the issue more prevalent.

I have just recovered my service spare from being onsite at another customers. I am going to set it up with 17.5.9 and write my config for it and run it in the office and see if I can generate the fault, then they can debug with it.

Hello Guillaume,

Thank you for the follow-up.

I just see that the L2 engineer is asking you to provide a new Support Access ID, it looks like there is a patch available for this now. Basically he would need to escalate it to get the patch apply it.

Regards,

Hi,

after you have tested the old v17 version try the new v18.0.2 MR-2 is supposedly has undocumented fixes for similar issues.

Ian

Hello

18.0.2 is only available for manual download.

And without a set of release notes to advise what is contained, it has to be classified as an internal test release only.

Sorry, but you don't install undocumented updates in the enterprise.

i wasn’t saying production, but on your test machine.

ian

i wasn’t saying production, but on your test machine.

ian

Hello Ian,

Unfortunately my test network does not use PPPOE connections, hence the reason why I can't just downgrade my office unit and continually break links until it fails. If I could I would.

Given the current state of Covid-19, I don't really appreciate the 3am phone call from a health provider that they have no internet and no phones.

But if there were release notes, there are certain customers where I could weigh up the advantages / disadvantages and install the MR2 release on my service spare and put at their office for testing.

But again, Documentation is required. Its not a Linux community here, Our customers pay for support and maintenance.