Continuing yesterday’ post, Pinging Smart, communication between the Broadband Internet user and the Service Provider involves transmission of these packets from one end to another. Tracert (also known as traceroute) is a Windows based tool that allows such test. It is a computer network tool for measuring the route path and transit times of packets across an Internet Protocol (IP) network.
Microsoft offers a lengthly exposition of Tracert:
In Windows XP, issuing a command console with tracert smart.com.ph shows the following results, such as:
The above tests were performed without any active browser window, i.e., SmartBro Plug-It was connected to the Internet but idle (no download or upload). Tried to get more data streams using Tracert every hour for three hours, and the above two snapshots were selected as representative of the other three snapshots per test.
The Request Timed Out error message, according to BrainBell.com, is:
The traceroute tool is a valuable aid to network troubleshooting. It also is the most commonly misinterpreted diagnostic tool, according to Robin D.H. Walker, capable of raising false alarms when nothing is wrong, and equally capable of showing no problems when quite a lot is wrong.
The above snapshots, each contained about 21 lines, show in Line 19 that the trace finally connected to smart.com.ph. The IP 184.108.40.206 is traced SmartBro, shown in Line 9. At each instance, both tracer routes connect to 220.127.116.11 [static.pldt.net] located in Sampaloc, Rizal, MM, in Line 11 then to
18.104.22.168 [www.smart.com.ph], based Smart Tower, 6799 Ayala Ave., Makati City, beginning Line 19, respectively.
Using the results of the Ping tests, particularly the Time-to-Live [TTL] value of 106 ms, anyway both tests gave the same value, and replacing all those Request Timed Out errors into 106 ms each, particularly from Line 1 to Line 19 when the connection to 22.214.171.124 [www.smart.com.ph] was initially established, the calculation resolves into:
For the 04:00H test: Total duration for the tracert = 1172 ms + (106 ms x 10) = 2232 ms.
For the 12:00H test: Total duration for the tracert = 1639 ms + (106 ms x 9) = 2204 ms.
Thus, it makes sense to connect to the Internet using SmartBro during day-time instead of the Off-Peak time, i.e., after midnight. Maybe there is really truth to the sad fact that SmartBro servers are shut-off after midnight to cool off!
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