Help slow speeds

[Andy1234]

We have 4 people sharing our internet connection. 2 on cable and 2 wireless. It is so slow it is unbelievable.

Port Status TxPkts RxPkts Collisions Tx B/s Rx B/s Up Time
WAN PPPoA 14536875 15944465 0 113903 0 25:20:42
LAN 1524507 769993 0 14212 901 25:21:46
WLAN 14419446 13809066 0 0 115566 25:21:18
ADSL Link Downstream Upstream
Connection Speed 15293 kbps 764 kbps
Line Attenuation 16.0 db 6.8 db
Noise Margin 14.9 db 17.0 db

It looks like we are getting 15mb if im not mistaken. An example is if i want to get to the google homepage it will take maybe 20-30 seconds to even load that up. Getting onto emails takes a few minutes. I did a speed test and it shows only 1.7mb.

How can it be so slow? With 1 person conected it is a good service, but with 4 it grinds to a hault.
Im not sure how much is downloaded with utorrent etc, is this the cause of the problem? Is one of our housemates using up all 15mb?

Thanks

[Smithy99]

If one person is downloading at full whack then the rest will grind to a halt. The Netgear router does not have QOS were you can limit the amount each person is able to use.

I guess you have a heavy downloader in the house.

[Saturday]

Also, I think you'll find that those users who are connected wired will get more of the bandwidth available than those who are wireless.

To be able to control how much bandwidth each user (or each type of use) gets, you need a more sophisticated router.

[Andy1234]

Well ive found out that none of us are downloading anything for the last few days and the internet is worse than dialup. What can we do as the internet is critical for our work!

Would buying a better router be a good idea, or is it just sky giving us a **** service and pocketing our money? Does the router status i posted above look ok? Is there anyway we can get off the contract and move to another ISP?

Many thanks Andy

[Smithy99]

Well first, Sky do not supply business broadband, if it is really improtant to have a reliable service for business then you need to look elsewhere.

You reported that you were able to download a full speed when only one PC was connected, this points to the fact that there is nothing wrong with your connection only that it is not being shared around equally.

Have you scanned all the PC's for viruses and malware, this could eat up your bandwidth without you realising. It may also be worth installing a net monitor programme on the PC's so you can check if they are downloading more than they should.

Anyone using torrents is able to flood the connection, so check that they are not running in the background on any PC and it may also be worth limiting any connections by MAC to stop anyone else accesing your connection.

[Andy1234]

We are all students, should have been more precise. So if we turn off all our pc's and try each one by itself connected to the internet, then this should show us which pc is at fault and then we can run the required programs to cure it? Sorry were not IT students so might be a dumb question! I cant help but think, can malware eat maybe 10mb of bandwidth?
Thanks

[Saturday]

Originally Posted by Andy1234

can malware eat maybe 10mb of bandwidth?

Depends what you consider malware. I'd say the Sky Player would fall into that category for instance.

Don't forget that maxing out the upstream will choke the downstream speed.

[Smithy99]

A virus/malware could flood the connection completely.

First thing to try, turn off all PC's except one, then log in to the router and see what devices are attached, you should only have one (the PC you are using)

Try downloading, see how it is, then turn off that PC and try the next one, keep doing that until you have tested all four.

Then start with PC1 again and then leaving that on try PC2 and so on.

If you get a good speed with only one PC turned on then the problem is that one or more of the PC's are able to use all the capacity. You could invest in a router that offers QOS, that way you can limit each one.

[NewsreadeR]

To add to the above. If one machine is using torrents / downloading them, and the upload is set to 100% - that would cause issues that you are experiencing.

Using Utorrent allows you to set the max upload speed to leave some bandwidth available, I am sure other torrent programs would as well.

[noikz]

Sounds like this could be related to the speed problems I and a few other users have been experiencing. This has been idtentified by Sky as a problem at (so far) 4 exchanges.