Slow internet only on one computer of network

[dsperber]

I can say there is a lot of wireless software like hp wireless assistant and other crap like intel proset wireless and wimax connection utility. Crap pops up on first startup saying this is connected and that's connected and I don't know what is what. I've removed a bunch of icons and notifications from the taskbar but the programs are still running of course.

As you realize, simply deleting shortcuts from the taskbar does not actually prevent the software from running if it's been auto-launched at boot time. Only actually uninstalling the program (if you feel confident that it's unnecessary) will actually remove it for good.

Or, if you mean icons running in the system tray notification area (rather than "taskbar" as you've said), generally you can right-click on those items and there will be a CLOSE or EXIT item on the context menu. This allows you to terminate these services of programs even though they were auto-launched. Similar to un-checking them in MSCONFIG -> Startup tab to prevent them from auto-launching at boot time, but after-the-fact even though they're now running.

Or, an alternative is to look at MSCONFIG, startup tab, to see what's getting auto-launched at boot time. You can un-check those boxes as a way to prevent auto-launch of unnecessary unwanted software, while still retaining it as installed, if you want to maybe someday run it again. This is instead of truly uninstalling it permanently.

HP wireless assistant has this combo thingy wireless LAN adapter and wireless WAN adapter both enabled and running and when the computer comes on it says combo is on or connected something along those lines. Maybe there is a way to safetly disable what I don't need and see if it helps? Any suggestions?

That's what I'm suggesting... DISABLE the wireless mode if you can (by a slide switch on the laptop, if present), and plug an ethernet cable into the RJ45 connector on the laptop and run it to the router... to run the computer in wired mode, to see what happens.

If you have no such "wireless radio -> OFF" switch in the hardware, you can still just plug the ethernet cable in to get the wired connection working. That should work regardless.

Then you can DISABLE your wireless connection (if it's also running and ENABLED, i.e. both wired and wireless are active... which we're trying to defeat for this experiment) by going to Search -> Network connections, and then select the active wireless connection (if it's shown as "enabled"), right-click on it, and select the DISABLE item from the context menu. This will force the wireless connection to stop via software, even if you can't disable it via hardware.

Or, if you see the wireless network connectoid icon in the system tray, you can click on it and select DISCONNECT. That's yet another way to terminate the wireless connection even after it's been started.

So one way or another now you should be running purely with the wired network adapter (which would also show as ENABLED in that Network Connections dialog), and none of that wireless-related HP or other software will be functional... even if it's seemingly active via icons in the system tray. If the wireless connection has been DISCONNECTED or DISABLED, that's what we're shooting for. Wired-only.

Now... how do things work??

 

[Summerbear5]

on vacation for a couple days, I'll try it out later and get back to you.

 

[Summerbear5]

dsperber,

I was sitting and having problems yet again. Tried to troubleshoot internet and computer basically came back and said nothing was wrong. Tried to access google, facebook, youtube, yahoo and it kept spinning and spinning...tried to browse on both chrome and ie with no addons kept spinning and said unable to connect to internet...ran the laptop but by the modem turned off wifi and plugged it in and everything is working fine.
So I don't know now what to do obviously there is something wrong with wifi because when plugged in it's completely fine.

 

[dsperber]

Hard to say. Wireless can be pretty iffy at times, subject to other factors such as conflicts or interference with neighbor's wireless networks. Sometimes there can be RF interference that seems to start at 9AM (perhaps from someone nearby having some office equipment or machinery activated at that time) and stay around all day, and then magically clear up at the end of the day.

And of course even within your own home there can be impacts on wireless reliability, speed, and overall performance based on distance from the router or secondary wireless access point (WAP), which is a device that plugs in to your wired network somewhere distant from your router and provides a secondary wireless network from that point as a way to overcome distance issues for wireless coming directly from your router. I have one of these (Netgear WN604) in my kitchen for that reason (primary wireless router is in the back bedroom, and cannot reach the kitchen with wireless). With my cellphone, WiFi in the kitchen is MAXIMUM speed. Bring the phone upstairs (where it can still pick up the kitchen's WiFi network, and still can't get the bedroom's) and speed now drops considerably.

That's why wired setups are ALWAYS preferable, if you can do it and if you absolutely want maximum possible speed from your ISP per your ethernet cabling and computer's network adapter capability. You'd think all the conditions that determine wireless speed and reliability would be static... but that's not always the case. Sometimes it just varies.

You might try experimenting with setting a different "wireless channel" on your router, to see if that helps. Theoretically AUTO should try and find the best channel (typically from 1-11), but my experience suggests that manually running through wireless channels 1-11 and doing a "speed test" on each one should be able to determine which channel works best for THAT particular location in your home.

Or, use wired.

 

[Summerbear5]

Well I don't want to and can't do wired...it's a laptop and I'm in a different room than the modem.

Also I'm in disbelief over the interface issue as for my husband would be having the same problems on his computer and he isn't. Also he is further from the modem and router than I am with no problems.

I'm thinking about checking the modem channel as suggested and seeing if that helps. I seriously think there is just something wrong with this computer I mean who knows maybe the network card on the inside is going out or something. Hopefully not but you never know. I did notice there was a driver update for the network card and I might try rolling back to a previous driver to see if that works.

 

[Someone777]

did you consider changing the wifi chip?

 

[Summerbear5]

The wifi chip in the laptop computer?

No I never thought of it until just recently, but also I've never really did repair work on laptops only desktops. The tight space makes me nervous.

Is it something that is easy to do? How much you'd think it'd cost just for something decent nothing fancy.

 

[Someone777]

Well, I'm not sure about the price, but i don't imagine it's too expensive, but before doing that, I think you need to check the driver of your WIFI, maybe there's a conflict? cause as you said the wired connection works fine, that means the problem is only there when you are connected through wifi, and according to what you said all other wifi devices are working fine, so that eliminates the router, which leaves us with the laptop wifi.

 

[Summerbear5]

Ya, I noticed there was a driver update from windows update...I'm not sure how to tell if it's conflicting but I'm sure it might not be completely compatible as for the same thing happened with my graphics card I downloaded an update that was supposed to be compatible but it wasn't. I was thinking of doing a driver rollback but how do I prevent the newer driver from trying to reinstall again?

Also I checked my wifi channel and it's set to auto. What would be a good channel to try?

 

[Summerbear5]

I don't know what happened but now the problem seems even worse than before. Not exactly the same issue but when I close the lid of my laptop (plugged in) the wifi gets disconnected and when I open the lid it doesn't reconnect automatically when it should. Also upon first attempt to manually reconnect it doesn't go and doesn't go finally I have to keep hitting disconnect and finally it connects. Very strange don't know what to do. I'm sure I possibly got a bad driver so I'm going to attempt to get a new driver from the manufacture website. A little nervous about that though because there is a graphics driver on the manufactures website that even though it was listed under my make and model computer it didn't seem compatible.

 

[matts6887]

One other thing i might try if you have not already done so; is on the pc that is having the issue; go into the device manager in the control panel and completely uninstall the network adapter(s) for that pc. Then reboot; let windows re-detect and reinstall and and all adapters and then update them to the latest drivers if there is any updates. Try this if you have not already done so and see if it does anything for ya.

 

[Summerbear5]

Thats what I just did so going to see if it helps. Already though I was told to check my network connection when downloading something even though I was clearly connected to the internet. I had to restart the download but has been fine so far. Any other diagnostics I can run on the wifi?

 

[Summerbear5]

Alright I finally fixed it.

Wait till you read this crap!

After bickering with comcast (my internet service provider) they turned on bridge mode or something on my combo device. (basically it turned my modem/router combo into a modem with the router capabilities turned off) I hooked up my own damn router and boom...everything is working properly...but besides that the modem router combo was only in g/n mode and I switched it to b/g/n mode. Which I never got to test and see if that helped.

But anyhoo it's finally working wifi is perfect everything is perfect! Thank you so much everyone for dealing with me and trying to help me with this problem. I'm very appreciative and so happy things are finally working!