Plz Help if u know networking!

[Anonymous]

Last year my cable internet was very reliable and fast, but as the months went by... the performance became progressively worse. My bandwidth changes dynamically, and while I'm certain towards the evening my internet sux due to congestion, it shouldn't be that way in the morning or late night.... unless people really do a lot of dl'ing around here....

I did a bandwidth test this morning, which is usually the time I have the best performance:

Description  Your Results  
Bandwidth Down 1644 Kbits/sec
Bandwidth Up 143 Kbits/sec
Average Ping 253 ms
Ping Loss 0%
TCP Receive Window (default)
External IP Address 24.205.155.8
Internal IP Address 192.168.1.104
Browser MSIE 6.0; SV1; .NET CLR 1.1.4322
IE current cache 94 MB
IE max cache 261 MB

By the afternoon and evening, it gets worse.....

Latency in Mxo can get upto 1500ms regional and local sometimes.
Is it me? can I change mxo settings to adjust to my latency? Is there anything I can do or am I pretty much screwed?

Network setup:
I am in a house with a Linksys WRT54GS wireless router to link 4 computers in the house, but I do run on a LAN line, which is connected to the router by a HUB.
Internet: charter communications
Cable modem: D-link DCM-202

[Lits]

Sounds like someone is piggybacking from your wireless. That would explain the dynamic changes in bandwith and the slow downhill progression... more and more people catch on. What kind of protection are you running on it?

[Avzeke (Khr0n1k)]

also do you ever just power cycle everything? I do that when my net seems to be slowing fixes everytime.

Just turn everything off, comps routers modem, then turn modem on first let it boot up then router/switches whatever and then comps.

[Tbone]

Is your lan line slow as well? You need to determine if it is your wireless network or your lan line. Mine had similar problems and I bugged the technicians until they simply started tweaking my connection on their end until something worked. HUGE difference once they figured it out, though I'm not sure what the problem ended up being. I know that when our connection went out for a day, when it came back my connection sucked again and I had to get them to do it all over again.

[Heironymus]

Make sure you wireless setup has a *password* set up... I know the police force around my town will patrol neighborhoods and when it is slow late nights and early mornings they will pull out there personal laptops and use other peoples wireless networks to surf the net or download things... trust me.. they know exactly where to go to get good connections.. and they will pass it on to other officers... so.. MAKE sure you setup is protected from freeloaders..

Another example: at my college apartment complex I ran a program to find all the wireless connections that my wireless could reach... it found three and one was password protected... so I fed off the other two :-D

[Anonymous]

Shou and I run a 128-bit encrypted Wirelass LAN with a 14 character alpha-numeric password, so we're good to go for security XD

As for your connection being slow, a cable modem's overall performance is usually dictated by how many cable modems are active on the main switch box. So, you either have a lot of downloaders in your area, someone is piggy-backing, or you need to power cycle. I would advise power-cycling first.

[Anonymous]

Is your lan line slow as well? You need to determine if it is your wireless network or your lan line.

The LAN speed from my computer to the router is fine.

What kind of protection are you running on it?

For the wireless there is no WEP encryption or anything. Router firewall is on, and windows xp firewall is on.

also do you ever just power cycle everything?

Yea tried that, it helps sometimes. it seems to strengthen my signal to the client, but not my speed... if that makes sense...

Make sure you wireless setup has a *password* set up

Looks like this is the next step.. I'll try that.

Thanx for the help guys!

[Ketamininja]

Yep, that is probably the issue.
People all around you will take advantage of open wireless.

If it isn't that, you could see if there is an obvious kink in the chain:
Start > Run
Type cmd
Type tracert www.google.com (or your favourite slow site)

Each hop is a connection to a computer/server, to pass on the request until the correct site is found. If some are really slow or not responding, that could indicate your issue. I would have expected tech support to test this from their end, if you made a ticket.

The first few (could be up to seven, or more) hops are usually your provider, and you would hope for trouble there, for the ISP to easily fix.

[Anonymous]

"Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.

C:\Documents and Settings\Jessica>tracert www.google.com

Tracing route to www.l.google.com [66.102.7.147]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

  1     1 ms    <1 ms    <1 ms  66.102.7.147
  2     8 ms    49 ms    38 ms  10.224.144.1
  3     8 ms    24 ms    21 ms  66-215-0-193.static.lsan.ca.charter.com [66.215.
0.193]
  4    18 ms    12 ms    15 ms  cr01.mtpk.ca.charter.com [24.205.1.193]
  5    53 ms   144 ms   275 ms  66-215-0-13.static.lsan.ca.charter.com [66.215.0
.13]
  6    16 ms    33 ms    13 ms  66-215-0-22.static.lsan.ca.charter.com [66.215.0
.22]
  7    15 ms    13 ms    15 ms  bur-edge-04.inet.qwest.net [65.119.29.133]
  8    14 ms    12 ms    14 ms  bur-core-02.inet.qwest.net [205.171.13.57]
  9    29 ms    33 ms    30 ms  svl-core-01.inet.qwest.net [67.14.12.6]
 10    74 ms    38 ms    22 ms  pax-edge-01.inet.qwest.net [205.171.214.30]
 11    53 ms    34 ms    23 ms  72.165.46.26
 12    22 ms    41 ms    24 ms  66.249.94.12
 13    25 ms    26 ms    23 ms  72.14.233.129
 14    33 ms    27 ms    36 ms  72.14.233.123
 15    25 ms    22 ms    31 ms  66.102.7.147

Trace complete."

What would one make of these results? It looks like its the ISP giving me problems.... right?

Btw, for now, since I don't have access to all the comps in the house yet, I've limited DHCP users to 3. I know I can't stop the piggybacking till I can get PW's on them, but it's atleast something temporary.

[Anonymous]

Ok, I'm sorry. This thread wouldn't be a "Troubleshooting" thread without the n00bie suggestion of:

You should format and reinstall.

((Disclaimer: By Zeus' Beard, please do not do this. I am merely joking about how every person who thinks they are tech-savvy, will immediately suggest this as a universal cure-all. I am merely making fun of the graduates from Fresno Institute of Technology.))

Carry on with ye olde Tech Support.

[Ketamininja]

5 53 ms 144 ms 275 ms 66-215-0-13.static.lsan.ca.charter.com [66.215.0
.13]

This doesn't look great, and seems to be your ISP... doesn't always mean anything.
Try the same command a few times, see if its the same higher numbers.
The lower double digits are ok.

You did password up your system right?