Poor Speed - 24/7 It seems

[Pez]

I'm sorry to start a new thread about this issue again but I too am have speed issues. I think it's been going on longer than the World Cup has been on, so not sure if that's the problem or not and it appears to be around the clock, not just afternoon/evening.

Download speedachieved during the test was - 1486 Kbps
For your connection, the acceptable range of speeds is 1200-7150 Kbps.
Additional Information:
Your DSL Connection Rate :7616 Kbps(DOWN-STREAM), 832 Kbps(UP-STREAM)
IP Profile for your line is - 6500 Kbps

Tracing route to bbc.co.uk [212.58.224.138]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

 1     6 ms     6 ms     5 ms  cust119-dsl91-135-12.idnet.net [91.135.12.119]
 2    30 ms    21 ms    21 ms  telehouse-gw2-lo1.idnet.net [212.69.63.51]
 3   336 ms   403 ms    32 ms  telehouse-gw3-g0-1-400.idnet.net [212.69.63.243]

 4    23 ms    22 ms    23 ms  rt-lonap-a.thdo.bbc.co.uk [193.203.5.90]
 5    21 ms    23 ms    22 ms  212.58.238.129
 6    22 ms    24 ms    24 ms  virtual-vip.thdo.bbc.co.uk [212.58.224.138]

Trace complete.

Is there any other tests I can do to get more information?

[Steve]

Sync and pings are fine but poor throughput if this is a wired Ethernet connection I would check with support to see if your local exchange is congested

[tashtego]

Code Select Expand

Tracing route to bbc.co.uk [212.58.224.138]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

  1     2 ms     1 ms     1 ms  192.168.1.254
  2   245 ms   255 ms   258 ms  telehouse-gw2-lo1.idnet.net [212.69.63.51]
  3   277 ms   540 ms   294 ms  telehouse-gw3-g0-1-400.idnet.net [212.69.63.243]

  4   312 ms   314 ms   159 ms  rt-lonap-a.thdo.bbc.co.uk [193.203.5.90]
  5   186 ms   186 ms   199 ms  212.58.238.129
  6   291 ms   309 ms   310 ms  virtual-vip.thdo.bbc.co.uk [212.58.224.138]

Trace complete.

DownStream Connection Speed 6976 kbps
UpStream Connection Speed 1063 kbps


Your pings are way better than mine

I'm beginning to thing the BT infrastructure just can't cope. My downloads are abysmal. I used to be able to max out my bandwidth when downloading from 2 key sites I use. Now it averages the performance of a 1MB line. Uploads seem ok, I can get a sustained upload speed of 115Kb/sec - which is useful as I'm backing up my system right now.

But downloads manage a paltry 20kB/sec and then may peak every 5 minutes to 500kB/sec but not for long. Youtube videos are just a waste of time. It wont hold bandwidth long enough to watch even the shortest of clips.

I began to think that maybe my kids were downloading stuff and crippling my speeds - this hasn't happened previously, but worth checking. So I setup SNMP on my router and collected stats from that. It shows me the peaks are when I cause them and the figures match my own local bandwidth monitor.

Right now I'm seeing a process downloading two files at 8kB/sec that used to max my connection out,

[Rik]

Are you uploading at the same time as the downloads?

[tashtego]

Yes... shouldn't I be?

[Rik]

That will hit your download as it blocks the ACK/NACK packets.

[tashtego]

But when I'm not uploading it doesn't improve. I just stopped the backup and the files are still trickling down.

I guess I could throttle the upload to see if that improves downloads.

With NOTHING else going on

[Rik]

Set your uploads going and then run some pings, stop the upload and repeat the pings.

[tashtego]

With Uploads

No Uploads


Edit: Apologies to the OP for hijacking your thread.

[Rik]

It rather demonstrates what I'm saying. With the uploads, the pings "can't get out" so go high. Without, they drop right back. If you want to do another test, boot into safe mode with network support and try again. That stops most background processes which could be getting in the way.

[Technical Ben]

Thanks Rik. I've also noticed my downloads and uploads can have strange effects while active.
So while downloading a game patch, it might only be running at 4mb, leaving me with over 2 free on my 6.5mb line. However, websites load slow.
If I upload a file to my webspace, or a large picture or video, it kills my web browsing or downloads.
You got 2.5mb there Pez? What speed do you normally get? Your profile is 6500kbps. Perhaps Rik can help as to what would cause it to perform lower than that.
Can you find a definite server to test from? Even if your line can do 6.5mb the servers may be busy or slow this week. 

[tashtego]

I have a long history with the few sites I trade with. It's a regular thing for me to shove data up and down to a few key systems with significantly more available bandwidth than I have ever been able to tax. This isn't something that kicks in at "real peak hours" say 6pm, but is anytime of the day 8am to midnight - my usual hours. Prior to returning to BT by joining IDNet I have never seen downloads perform so dire from these "definite" systems. It has been unusual not to hit 400kB/sec from them and this has been whilst uploading.

I can remote control other systems on another network and download from the same "definite" systems at speeds that are far in excess of my home system. So my host has the capacity - it just appears that I don't. Now I'm not a greedy user, but I will be guaranteed 2-3GB's of downloads each week. To accomplish that I even thought paying for the best package would be easily in excess of my needs. But this is proving almost impossible to achieve since the download performance averages that of a 1MB connection.

I also run a Linux server that doesn't have anything in the way of background processes that idle away, so testing doesn't require safe mode. My backup should complete today/tomorrow so then I should start to get a more realistic view of performance.

[tashtego]

How very strange.

Yesterday I noticed a very real improvement in the service. I have changed nothing. At 5:30pm onwards I was happily downloading (and seemingly sustaining it) in excess of 500kb/sec whilst uploading at 120kb/sec. This is the performance I am used to seeing. Given that it was a big world cup day I was a little surprised. 

I checked the router stats and it showed my WAN had been up for only 9 hours, so I'm suspecting a resync as the rest of the interfaces have been up considerably longer.

[Rik]

It certainly looks like it. As a result, you may have moved to some less congested frequencies.

It's worth a look at this article:


http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/4282-can-the-uk-broadband-network-cope.html