How Fast is your Internet?

[pompeyfaith]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?



This I have not the best I am hearing too

[pompeyfaith]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

Router is one of those new sky sagam ones with no antenna visible it does not support wireless N at the moment mainly due to sky's slow roll out of wireless N technology.

There is much talk about Wireless N on skys help forum many unhappy customers

It will support Wireless N however sky would have to do a firmware update.

I think cabling is the best way to go as I can run them all via loft upstairs.

[stevieb]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

yes thick walls do affect the signal ....

but my house has 3ft thick walls (old miners place built 130 years ago) and I only lose about 25% of my wireless signal.

My router is downstairs @ the front of the house, My main machines are upstairs at the back of the house.

If you are running "old" sky kit, it will be something like the netgear834g/t router .. which has the omnidirectional aerial that you can re-point. it also only runs 'b/g' wireless signal ..
UPGRADE

if you are running the new sky / bt routers then it will be pushing b/g/n wireless signals. those three little letters make a vast difference for the speed that it works at, which in turns gives it greater distance through walls etc.
obviously if your router is pushing out "n" signal then your wireless cards - dongles also need to be able to receive "n" signals. this _should_ increase the speed over double through walls etc.

also other obvious things, if your machine is in a 'cupboard' and the wireless card/dongle is hanging out the back ... then that will affect speeds etc.

You can get USB extension leads, but anything over a couple of metre's will need to be boosted, which you can pick up for around a fiver.

failing that run cat 5/6 cabling

[philnicandamy]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

Due to our ex council house having solid walls having the router downstairs would give even worse connection. I did try it but it was crap.

Is there anyway I could put the router downstairs and use something to boost the signal in the bedrooms?

Regards

wireless extender? although if the walls are thick may make a slight differece

http://www.broadbandbuyer.co.uk/Shop...CategoryID=259

otherwise I use homeplugs in the bedroom (we're in a bungalow bedroom at the far rear wifi signal terrible connected a couple of homeplugs & fine now

http://www.homeplugs.co.uk/acatalog/faqs.html

[Riz]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

so will test a direct plug into the main socket this weekend and post back with *hopefully* revised figures

Yep. That's the only real way to see if the prob is your side.

I wouldn't touch NTL (now Virgin) now either. Shitebag of a company.

[Never-In-Doubt]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

That is dreadful if you are as close to the exchange as you say. Or is that a BT box rather than the exchange?

Anyways, I remember ages ago having NTL bring out a 1-1.5 Mb service that I was chuffed with at the time, so I suppose all things are relative?

I'm in a wee village and at the top of my street is the main BT Hub (sub-station) for the surrounding villages so I am closer than most - however spoke to steve last night and he thinks it could be when the housebuilder went thru the cables and rewired it (ie incorrectly) so will test a direct plug into the main socket this weekend and post back with *hopefully* revised figures

* yea I remember when NTL brought out cable, yonks ago - I loved it - now i'd never go near it!

[Riz]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

Want me to remind you how slow mine is again....?

That is dreadful if you are as close to the exchange as you say. Or is that a BT box rather than the exchange?

Anyways, I remember ages ago having NTL bring out a 1-1.5 Mb service that I was chuffed with at the time, so I suppose all things are relative?

[Never-In-Doubt]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

I'm not that unhappy with my speed. Just a bit naffed off that it's gradually dropped a couple of MB over the last 4/5 years.

Want me to remind you how slow mine is again....?

[Riz]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

Factors you can control.
Run your router/modem straight into the master socket _avoid_ extensions where possible.
have _all_ sockets, extension run through ADSL filters. you would be surprised at how many people _don't_ do this.
If you have extension sockets, COPPER wires are the best.
I have known phones to knock down speeds on ADSL, even completely knocking the lines out.

also as a side note running things wirelessly will affect your speedtest results! ..

lol. Been there, done that, eliminated those factors, and tested several times.

Recently and years ago.

No significant or measurable difference.

I'm not that unhappy with my speed. Just a bit naffed off that it's gradually dropped a couple of MB over the last 4/5 years.

[diddlydee]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

Is the "exchange" the big box that the engineers work on? If so I am about 30 yards away from it! However, I think most of the cabling in my area was laid down before women had the right to vote, so I feel lucky to have broadband at all!

I do have an ADSL filter and I am plugged directly into the main socket, however, I also have a voip phone on the line (work phone) so I know this will be slowing me down, especially when on a call ...... I'm gonna disconnect it now and retry


Update: marginally better with no voip phone:



I wish my connection was better though, as I have lost voip calls before (due to the line dropping?)

[pompeyfaith]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

Stevieb,

Thanks for the excellent tips, now I must admit my sky router is in my bedroom I put it there due to the fact all the computers are upstairs bar one, this is run of an extension from the main BT socket in frontroom.

Due to our ex council house having solid walls having the router downstairs would give even worse connection. I did try it but it was crap.

Is there anyway I could put the router downstairs and use something to boost the signal in the bedrooms?

Regards

[stevieb]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

jeez ..

basics .. when your pc 'grabs' an IP address from the router it has a "lease" time on it ... if you have had a machine on for _less_ than the "lease" time then it doesn't bother renewing the IP address.
if another machine has been on for _longer_ than the "lease" time then it will grab a new address .. then its all down to the time it takes to link to the router .

Personally I use 'fixed' IP addresses for all the internal machines, with access control lists, and the usual wep* keys etc.

That way you know _exactly_ what machines will have what IP address, and no danger of anyone else "hopping" onto your connection.

With regards to speed on the connection.

Factors.
*line distance* ... from exchange to Master socket in the house. This is the largest factor.
*line quality* ... how many 'joints', how many 'connections', how much twisting, how much degradation etc etc.
fixed rate, adaptive rate, cable etc etc .. nothing you can do about these, but they are the _first_ thing that defines your speed.

These are factors beyond your control, if these are _bad_ you will have crap speeds.

Factors you can control.
Run your router/modem straight into the master socket _avoid_ extensions where possible.
have _all_ sockets, extension run through ADSL filters. you would be surprised at how many people _don't_ do this.
If you have extension sockets, COPPER wires are the best.
I have known phones to knock down speeds on ADSL, even completely knocking the lines out.

also as a side note running things wirelessly will affect your speedtest results! ..

[BBoo]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

Ermm no mate I don't think it's "that" good

Gets round most "issues" though! Not many sites are like this one!

[Never-In-Doubt]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

Even easier, buy HideMyAss and you can change your IP address to anywhere in the world at a click of a button. Fools the IP checkers online, but not sure it really changes the IP address.

Ermm no mate I don't think it's "that" good

[oscar]

Re: How Fast is your Internet?

depends which site I use as well. I also get:

Download 6.071, upload 0.418 and ping 76