Diagnosing an internet speed problem

[Parliament 14282]

I pay for gigabit intenet (Surly 1%, hollah).  My desktop was a fairly high end model when I bought it 5 years ago.  Whatever the good wifi "spec" was back then, that's what I have.

Right now, with no other devices using internet, I ran a speed test on my desktop (on my provider's speedtest listed on their webpage) and got 160 kbs.  That's the high range of what I usually see.  Usually 110-160kbs.  iPad and iPhone (through the Speedtest free app) showed the same.  

I have no problem streaming, YouTubing and Surly posting. No glitches, even with 2-3 devices running.  Where I DO complain is downloading/uploading bigger files for work.  They can take up to 2 minutes.  NBD there, but if I can get more speed through the desktop, I want it.  Are my desktop and other devices capable of >160 kbs?  Or is that the limitation of the system?

 

[Dr Fear 1268]

10 minutes ago, Parliament said:

I pay for gigabit intenet (Surly 1%, hollah).  My desktop was a fairly high end model when I bought it 5 years ago.  Whatever the good wifi "spec" was back then, that's what I have.

Right now, with no other devices using internet, I ran a speed test on my desktop (on my provider's speedtest listed on their webpage) and got 160 kbs.  That's the high range of what I usually see.  Usually 110-160kbs.  iPad and iPhone (through the Speedtest free app) showed the same.  

I have no problem streaming, YouTubing and Surly posting. No glitches, even with 2-3 devices running.  Where I DO complain is downloading/uploading bigger files for work.  They can take up to 2 minutes.  NBD there, but if I can get more speed through the desktop, I want it.  Are my desktop and other devices capable of >160 kbs?  Or is that the limitation of the system?

 

How is your desktop connected?  Wired or wireless?  The various wireless protocols have speed limits.  No harm in making sure the driver and firmware are fully updated on your wireless adapter on your desktop.

Edited March 23, 2022 by Dr Fear

[TeeDubya 3362]

Make sure you're testing the wired connection.  160 wouldn't be out of line for a wireless connection.

[Parliament 14282]

I'm wifi.  The apartment i live in doesn't have Cat 5 (or whatever) outlets run.  Wifi or string a cable across the living room.

[MonkeyDoughnut 10346]

Also, if applicable, check with the kids:

[LosIllini 91]

My ATT giga internet hits 900+ Mbps via speedtest.net over cat5/ ethernet, using an Asus router.  Newest laptop gets ~500Mbps or so over wifi (5Ghz band) in the same room, and about half that speed on the opposite side of the house.  Old 2012-era macbook is 150 or so in the same room.

My experience is that wifi usb-dongles are slower than dedicated wireless cards w/ antennas, so depending upon how you're set up on your pc, your speeds may be impacted.  Same, if your wireless router is blocked, in an enclosure, etc.

How large of files are you downloading?  What kind of speeds do you get if you try your iphone/ ipad right next to the router?

[beer 3220]

also are you on a vpn for work?  going to need to be direct wired connection for testing purposes to figure out if it is a wifi or bandwidth issue

[CooterBrown 18022]

Turn your phone to airplane mode and check the wifi speed from it. If it’s a reasonable speed then it’s something with the PC not the wifi equipment or fiber.

[TwiceHorn 31519]

Kbps?  or Mbps?

 

[Quagmire 2147]

Gigabit is overkill , unless you are hosting a port server .

[TwiceHorn 31519]

It's fairly normal to get about half or 60% of your rated speed on wifi, depending on your router.

160kbps would be shockingly bad on a 1Gbps line.  160Mbps would still be pretty bad.

Either way, your router sucks and you are overpaying for gigabit.

[Parliament 14282]

2 hours ago, LosIllini said:

How large of files are you downloading?  What kind of speeds do you get if you try your iphone/ ipad right next to the router?

I don't know the size of the files.  300+ iPad and iPhone right next to it.  Office is 20' and 2 walls away.  Had no idea it would matter that much.

2 hours ago, beer said:

also are you on a vpn for work?  going to need to be direct wired connection for testing purposes to figure out if it is a wifi or bandwidth issue

I'm not on a VPN.

 

I'm gonna call my provider.  They need to fix something.

[rage-a-holic 4441]

This is ridiculous. Run a cat 5 or 6 cable from your gateway/router to your desktop. Make sure your desktop NIC is set to Gig. If you are still getting super slow speeds, call your provider, but this is 99.9% user error.

[Handcruser 2805]

T-Mobile home internet user here. I’m getting anywhere from 250-400 down. Sometimes 500 but rarely.

Wire in and retest.

[TwiceHorn 31519]

1 minute ago, Handcruser said:

T-Mobile home internet user here. I’m getting anywhere from 250-400 down. Sometimes 500 but rarely.

Wire in and retest.

How is it?  Does it use a cell network?

[Hate 20130]

23 hours ago, rage-a-holic said:

This is ridiculous. Run a cat 5 or 6 cable from your gateway/router to your desktop. Make sure your desktop NIC is set to Gig. If you are still getting super slow speeds, call your provider, but this is 99.9% user error.

I believe the proper term in an Id10T error.

[Handcruser 2805]

How is it?  Does it use a cell network?

Yep. Works great. I’ve had 3 phones going while streaming YouTube tv and someone else streaming shut upstairs and it works great.

Every few months I have to update it (turn it off, wait 60 seconds, turn it back on) but that’s it.

[gsoda3 3280]

In your op did you mean kbps or Mbps?

[pearlandhorn 3274]

Depends on what kind of modem you're using.  Some modems do not support gig service (mine doesn't).  If you want to actually be running gig speeds, you need to make sure your modem and router are gig compatible.

[Parliament 14282]

On 3/23/2022 at 3:06 PM, Parliament said:

I pay for gigabit intenet (Surly 1%, hollah).  My desktop was a fairly high end model when I bought it 5 years ago.  Whatever the good wifi "spec" was back then, that's what I have.

Right now, with no other devices using internet, I ran a speed test on my desktop (on my provider's speedtest listed on their webpage) and got 160 kbs.  That's the high range of what I usually see.  Usually 110-160 mbps.  iPad and iPhone (through the Speedtest free app) showed the same.  

I have no problem streaming, YouTubing and Surly posting. No glitches, even with 2-3 devices running.  Where I DO complain is downloading/uploading bigger files for work.  They can take up to 2 minutes.  NBD there, but if I can get more speed through the desktop, I want it.  Are my desktop and other devices capable of >160 kbs?  Or is that the limitation of the system?

 

Megabytes

[Deej 76882]

On 3/23/2022 at 3:06 PM, Parliament said:

(Surly 1%, hollah)

 

On 3/23/2022 at 3:38 PM, Parliament said:

The apartment i live in

[BevoSwag 272]

Here is my question.  I have T-Mobile unlimited.  Customer Service said they limit when we exceed certain guidelines.  Another Customer Service Rep said you have unlimited.

On my Mac speed isn't really a problem I get great speed and it is cut in half when the AVG VPN is on but still well above 130.

The problem is my HP Windows 11.  I get great speeds without AVG VPN but the VPN cuts the speeds to useless and so far AVG has no reply.

The HP and Mac sit side by side and I eliminated McAfee on HP thinking maybe another protector was slowing things down.  No change.  Here is a picture of the fast HP (No VPN) and slower speeds with VPN activated.

 

 

Edited March 28, 2022 by BevoSwag

[TwiceHorn 31519]

For most stuff, where you need bandwidth is not where you need security, i.e. streaming video.

Seems like 20Mbps would be ok for doing sinister shit through the VPN.

[Parliament 14282]

What about watching South Austin's mom's webcam? 

[BevoSwag 272]

I thought the VPN was to prohibit Google from looking and other snoops trying to sell stuff.

[Handcruser 2805]

Here is my question.  I have T-Mobile unlimited.  Customer Service said they limit when we exceed certain guidelines.  Another Customer Service Rep said you have unlimited.
On my Mac speed isn't really a problem I get great speed and it is cut in half when the AVG VPN is on but still well above 130.
The problem is my HP Windows 11.  I get great speeds without AVG VPN but the VPN cuts the speeds to useless and so far AVG has no reply.
The HP and Mac sit side by side and I eliminated McAfee on HP thinking maybe another protector was slowing things down.  No change.  Here is a picture of the fast HP (No VPN) and slower speeds with VPN activated.
 
 

Sell the HP.
Buy another Mac.
Profit?

[Parliament 14282]

UPDATE

I ran a cable across the kitchen and hardwired right into the router.  750+ Mbps.  Time for a new router.

[rage-a-holic 4441]

12 hours ago, Parliament said:

UPDATE

I ran a cable across the kitchen and hardwired right into the router.  750+ Mbps.  Time for a new router.

 

[Parliament 14282]

Or reset.  Or booster.  Or call to my provider.

[UT_OB1 2224]

Going to hijack a little. At work we went from iPhone 10 to 13 as the 10s have needed to be replaced. I was the 2nd or 3rd to get one. All 3 of us have almost no speed when off WiFi. Something like 0.1 down 0.1 up. 5g or lte. Doesn’t matter what part of houston. We have ATT. All the iPhone 10s still work fine. IT guy hasn’t figured it out. Any recommendations?  

[Parliament 14282]

Is it a work-issued phone?  Does it have a VPN or other work software?  

Doesn't take real long to do a factory reset.  Do that and check speed before you put any work stuff on it.

[hornbri 1401]

Make sure your company updated with AT&T your new phones info. I have seen cases where people just transfer a SIM to a new phone assuming it will work, and it mostly does. But weird things like this happen. 

[elfenix 34331]

On 3/25/2022 at 8:57 PM, Parliament said:

Megabytes

megabits

 

 

if you have an N router you're 2+ generations behind on wifi.  if you have an AC router you're a generation+ behind.  the new stuff is AX/wifi 6E, which can give speeds around a gigabit with the right equipment. 

Edited April 3, 2022 by elfenix

[Parliament 14282]

How do I know what i have?  And how about the wifi reciever on my desktop?  It's a 2018 model.

[LosIllini 91]

Are you using the wifi from the ATT router, or do you have it in passthru mode with another router? (ATT doesn't allow a true 'bridge' mode, but, you can work around it)

I've always used an Asus router- running Merlin firmware, and have gotten speeds mentioned above.  Sometimes I've seen channel interference from neighbors, but, the Asus seems to handle switching/ overlap pretty well.

[TwiceHorn 31519]

1 hour ago, Parliament said:

How do I know what i have?  And how about the wifi reciever on my desktop?  It's a 2018 model.

The wifi standards are, in descending order of speed and modernity:

802.11ax, 802.11ac, 802.11b/g/n, 802.11a

I'm a little rusty on Windows, but if you go to "Network & Internet" or "Device Manager" and find your wifi adapter, the properties should tell you which standards it supports.

From 2018, unless it's a pretty cheap computer, it should be 802.11ac or better.

[elfenix 34331]

4 hours ago, Parliament said:

How do I know what i have?  And how about the wifi reciever on my desktop?  It's a 2018 model.

look on the router for its model.  as for the computer, built-into-motherboard wifi usually sucks.  so do usb sticks (though the big antenna externals can be pretty decent, particularly if you can remote mount them).  for example, the 802.11ac built into my board only supports 1x1 with a peak rate of 433 Mbps.  an add in AC card with proper mimo support can get up to 1733 Mbps.  802.11ax/wifi-6 can be even faster (and shares bandwidth with multiple devices better - your router's bandwidth will be split between whatever is using it and AX does the split better).   note that to take advantage of the speed you need both the router and the computer on the better standards and with MIMO support. 

Edited April 4, 2022 by elfenix

[Homercles 10206]

How far away are you from the router?  Once I became permanent WFH I had to buy a mesh system to reach across my house to get decent speeds in the office.  

[Parliament 14282]

Final update:

Landlord says no drilling in the ways to put in a Cat 6 outlet, which I understand.  So I got a wif booster and got up to 180 M/sec.  Better.  I noticed the booster has a Cat 6 port on the side, so I ran a wire from there to my computer.  Computer wifi turned off.  Bam.  300m/sec.  So no I have wifi from my router to the booster, then a wire from the booster to the desktop.  That'll do.