Internet service provider (ISP) Afrihost - which has been experiencing ADSL network issues for a number of weeks - has announced the issues have finally been resolved.
CEO Gian Visser says the major problem the company was having with its ADSL traffic management devices has been "identified, isolated and fixed, and we have seen a marked overall improvement in client experience on our network".
Visser says teams from Afrihost, MTN and an unnamed overseas company (the device manufacturer) are still monitoring the performance 24 hours a day, but the ISP is confident the biggest problem has been fixed.
"As you can imagine, the network devices are incredibly complex and the R&D [research and development] team from the overseas tech company found an error that they had never seen before.
"I am not very technically proficient, but as I understand it there was a very subtle problem with the memory that meant any updates and changes that were being made were not truly taking effect in the background - even though the device was reporting they had been installed successfully and were running properly."
Visser explains this meant the ADSL traffic - especially torrenting and peer-to-peer downloading - was not being classified properly. "This in turn meant we couldn't effectively control these traffic protocols in peak times, which led to congestion and a slowdown of the network at times."
The company, he says, also found "some other peculiarities" relating to the performance of its capped ADSL clients that have now been fixed. "We have also seen a marked reduction in support tickets opened and phone calls received relating to this problem over the last few days.
"Further good news is that we are in the process of increasing the capacity of both our South and East IP Connects as well, which will lead to even better performance - we'll send more details as soon as this is complete."
Visser encourages clients who experienced problems to restart their routers and test their overall speeds and general performance now.
"If a client is still experiencing a problem, I would encourage them to get hold of us so we can help them get to the bottom of it. Any problem now is most likely to be a localised problem such as an ADSL line issue, a router problem or a congested exchange issue, which we will do our best to assist with," he says.
The latest statement from Afrihost may come as a surprise to the ISP's customers, after Visser last week revealed the company was struggling to identify the network glitch, saying "the honest truth is, I am not sure" when the problems will be sorted out.
Earlier this month, MTN received the go-ahead from the Competition Tribunal to acquire a 50% and one share stake in Afrihost, for an undisclosed amount. The mobile operator announced in June it was buying the majority stake to add scale to its local online ICT service offering, which is focused on the consumer and small and medium enterprise market.
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