Crawling Internet Speed

I’ve had an uninterrupted and reliable broadband connection for the last five years. In comparison to some of the upper speeds available, my connection wasn’t the fastest but I was able to do what I needed so it’s not been an issue.

That has now changed. Two weeks ago I noticed a engineer working onthe junction box in my road and logging on half an hour later, my internet speed was literally crawling with the lowest recorded speed coming back at 0.02 mbps.My SP has been making adjustments including re-setting things there end; I’ve reset the router half a dozen times, the SNR ratio has been changed. Finally a BT engineer came out. He said at the junction they were getting a speed of 3.3 mb at the junction box. This reduced to 1.1 mb by the time it got to my home. He made some adjustments including bringing the NSR ratio down to 9 from 12. I ran a speed test whilst the engineer was at my premises. It came back at 1.11 mb but when I logged on later that day, it had reduced to 0.19 mbps and it’s stayed that way ever since.

My computer is connected permanently with an ethernet cable. I have made no changes tocables, I’ve not moved anything, downloaded any new software. The day before the engineer was working on the junction box, everything was fine.


I've run MalwareBytes half a dozen times or more, no issues. I've run anti-virus. No issues.

Before I contact the SP again to say there’s been no improvement, I want to rule out if there is anything on my computer that may be causing it. I’m pretty sure there isn’t but I’d like to rule it out.

Is there anything I can check out?

LevelBest

What type of connection have you got ADSL, ADSL 2± or dial up? What can effect it is if you have ring wire on the connection, use a cheap wire from socket to router a insulation cable can add a lot of speed as the normal cable picks up noise

samuria said:

What type of connection have you got ADSL, ADSL 2± or dial up? What can effect it is if you have ring wire on the connection, use a cheap wire from socket to router a insulation cable can add a lot of speed as the normal cable picks up noise

Thanks for your reply. How would I establish if I have ADSL or ADSL 2 or dial up? I have not changed any of the cables. I purchased a good quality ethernet cable. But everything has been running smoothly for five years, all with the same cables.

LevelBest

Model of router will give us a good idea those speeds are stupidity slow are you out in the country you would get ten times the speed using mobile phone for a connection and it's cheap now I get 8. Gig for £12

You'll know if you have dialup if an analog phone line is required for the connection, and if you hear it dialing out whenever you want to connect to the internet.

Dialup is dreadfully slow compared to all other types of internet connection.

The router is a Thompson 8.

I don't have dial up. I have a phone line which I need for the broadband. But there's no dial up tone. when I'm connecting to the internet.

LevelBest

The router is really old it's for ADSL it's WiFi speed is 50 meg modern ones are 3 gig the problem is it's like a old PC so may not be up to the job new ones have better CPU etc and may well increase speed and over all performance routers are now very cheap so well worth getting a modern one

samuria said:

The router is really old it's for ADSL it's WiFi speed is 50 meg modern ones are 3 gig the problem is it's like a old PC so may not be up to the job new ones have better CPU etc and may well increase speed and over all performance routers are now very cheap so well worth getting a modern one

In conversation today with my SP, they pointed out my router is six years old. I don't think it's a contributing factor to the slow speed problem however, it may be worth getting a new one anyway as it may provide a small increase in speed when the problem is finally resolved.

So, bearing in mind that I use an Ethernet cable and prefer not to use Wi-Fi, are there a couple of routers that you would recommend?

LevelBest

Does you ISP recommend any routers a lot test routers so they are compatible with their system a lot even supply their own that's best for their system. Do you have any extension if that has the bell wire it will give major problems

A second engineer came out. He transferred the master socket that was in the loft to the room where my laptop is set up.

He said he was getting about 6 mbps on his test equipment at the new master socket. It still did not make any difference to the speed, so he said the culprit was a failing router.

SP have provided me with a new router and I've just set it up. I am definitely getting onto the net quicker but it's still only returning 1.39 mbps download (mind you that is infinitely faster than the .38 mbps I was getting).

I was just wondering does a new router need time to settle in / adjust?

LevelBest