VOICE CHAT

charter support told me that it is the problem with the application, the way it connects and transmits.

at the begining, I had trouble getting him into the issue. he kept on repeating that my connection is working. I know my internet service is working!.

later, he puts me on hold and comes back saying that many users reported similar issue. contact yahoo!:mad:

sucks. I have not been able to talk to friends for 3 weeks now. duh.

i just want to say i’ve been having the exact same problem for about 3 weeks now and i’m NOT on charter cable, i’m on wave broadband in WA state. i’m glad to know that its not something I did to my puter, but sad to know I wont be getting voice back anytime soon. I live 3000 miles away from family and friends and this was one of the ways I would communicate with them. sigh…….. oh well life goes on as they say. I wonder if i’m the only one in this area. what do you think I should do? obviously contact yahoo, but should I contact my cable company as well? i’d really like to hve voice back 🙁

lol I call daily, they say ”we are not required to provide you with voice in chat” So its actually absolutely pointless to even bother..

I called charter and gave them this forum… the guy on the phone read all of this and then said he would forward it to the technical people and his supervisor… at least he seemed eager to get it fixed

hi geeks,
this is my trace. communication with yahoo server on port 5001 is seen.
i am no expert in these things and but is tired of this issue and started getting into the details. if charter is blocking 5000 to 5010, then how come I see these packets arriving between my comp and yahoo server.

UDP 345 10.129.224.1 255.255.255.255 67 68 [2004.07.07 – 23:32:34.437]
TCP 40 66.191.166.214 216.109.118.149 1486 5001 [2004.07.07 – 23:32:34.453]
UDP 345 10.129.224.1 255.255.255.255 67 68 [2004.07.07 – 23:32:44.312]
TCP 40 66.191.166.214 66.191.166.49 1025 2019 [2004.07.07 – 23:32:50.296]
TCP 48 66.191.166.49 66.191.166.214 2019 1025 [2004.07.07 – 23:32:50.312]
TCP 40 66.191.166.214 66.191.166.49 80 2035 [2004.07.07 – 23:32:50.312]
TCP 48 66.191.166.49 66.191.166.214 2035 80 [2004.07.07 – 23:32:50.421]
TCP 40 66.191.166.214 66.191.166.49 80 2035 [2004.07.07 – 23:32:50.421]
TCP 48 66.191.166.49 66.191.166.214 2035 80 [2004.07.07 – 23:32:50.437]
TCP 40 66.191.166.214 66.191.166.49 1025 2019 [2004.07.07 – 23:32:50.437]
TCP 48 66.191.166.49 66.191.166.214 2019 1025 [2004.07.07 – 23:32:55.296]
UDP 345 10.129.224.1 255.255.255.255 67 68 [2004.07.07 – 23:32:58.390]
UDP 363 10.118.224.181 255.255.255.255 67 68 [2004.07.07 – 23:33:12.296]
UDP 363 10.129.224.1 255.255.255.255 67 68 [2004.07.07 – 23:33:12.312]
TCP 100 66.191.166.214 66.191.166.49 1025 1419 [2004.07.07 – 23:33:13.546]
TCP 40 66.191.166.214 216.155.193.155 1433 5050 [2004.07.07 – 23:33:13.625]
TCP 40 66.191.166.214 216.109.118.149 1486 5001 [2004.07.07 – 23:33:13.625]

i see almost same pattern of packets coming in and going out after voice is enabled.

does this mean that port blocking is not occuring. I update windows frequently. is there an issue with windows!

The packet activity certainly seems to be in line with what occurs during a voice session. Here’s the general flow of things:

Stage 1:

Connect to the RTCP (Real time control protocol – over TCP) server
->Send authentication
<-Recieve OK
->Send chat room information
<-Receive information about the server to log into for that chat room
Disconnect

Stage 2:
Connect to the RTCP server for the chat room
->Send authentication
<-Receive OK
<-Receive initial user list and other information

Stage 3:
Create a UDP socket for RTP (real time protocol)
->Send the initial ‘alert’ packet
<-Receive an OK packet
Send and receive compressed audio data

Yahoo uses what is known as the RTP protocol which is documented in RFC-1889 (circa 1996). Although it’s been some time since I’ve dug into the protocol specs the port numbers used should be arbitrary and are probably specific to the application using the protocol.

The UDP packets you listed above are known as broadcast packets which are sent to every computer connected to your LAN or local IP block. Generally speaking they have nothing to do with messenger as if they did the port would be in the range of 5000 to 5010 although 5000 is usually the only one used.

Considering that your tracelog stops at a packet sent to the voice server on port 5001 and given the size of the packet it’s being sent to establish the connection. If you don’t get any packets back on that port the connection attempt is either being ignored or blocked.

One of several things are happening here:

1. You have your firewall configured to block that port regardless of what application is running.

2. Yahoo! has either blocked your IP address or has banned the entire block of IP addresses allocated to Charter.

3. Charter is blocking it for whatever insane reason they can come up with.

The only reasons I can think of that would cause Charter to block those ports is if they were used by one of the popular P2P application (likely) or if Charter is totally inept (also likely)

The people using Charter want to prove the issue is with Charter they need to find someone who is with another ISP such as Cox, AOL, etc. and have that person start up some kind of internet application which accepts connections and configure it for port 5001. Then just try connecting to it.

If the connection is successful chances are Yahoo! is ignoring the connection request (IP ban) -OR- Charter has decided to actually block access to the yahoo voice service.

If the connection is not successful (and the user on the other ISP configured everything properly) Charter is definitely blocking it for whatever reason. If this is the case call them up and refuse to get off the phone until you talk to someone in their network security dept.

Ok here goes….

I havent had Yahoo Voice Chat since Friday June 25th.
I have been watching this forum as well as placing calls to Charter. I have also been e-mailing Yahoo however they have stopped responding to my e-mails. Go Figure.

I too just used AOL to dial up and guess what? I had Yahoo Voice chat just like another user on this forum. I am currently on hold with Charter.

However in the last two weeks the excuses from Charter have been
#1 We are blocking some porst that are used by IRC Chat programs due to blah blah virus.
#2 they have told me that they are in NO WAY blocking port 5001 that they are blocking some lower ports in the teens as well as some in the 6000 range
#3 another agent told me they were blocking 5001 and no ETA on unblocking
#4 same night as #3 another Tech Support agent told me Charter was NOT blocking 5001 to contact Yahoo.

It has been back and forth like this for 14 days now, and Im about Fed up.

Ok the Tech Guy is giving me a trouble ticket number.
Im posting that here so that possibly everyone can call and fuss at charter.

HOWEVER he is promising that his “Lead Tech” will look into this matter and it should be corrected within 48 hours.

Ticket Number –
1423497

He says all information that is found regarding this issue should be listed under this ticket mumber as they investigate the matter.

Hope this helps in some way
Again that ticket number is
Ticket Number –
1423497