Broadband problem with speeds?

Question

Hello

Recently I have been having a problem with my broadband connection, it started when a couple of weeks back the connection speed was going from good to to bad (high speed to low speed).Currently the connection speed is low around 288/256 (kbps) my line attenuation is 63/31 db.

The speed does not go to the high speeds it once did, averaging 288/256 and only rarely going beyond it,

I have called my Internet service provider and they tell me that the package that I'm currently on is too high for the line that I have, I don't want to downgrade my package since it has never got a better speed than 1mb (the package I was sold is 3mb).None of the Technician's I have spoken to have told me why all of a sudden the connection can not get the speeds it once did.

I don't understand why all of a sudden the line I have can no long take the package it once did It worked fine for 2 years and now I have this problem.

I have checked the splitter and it works fine, I have also checked the dsl cable.

Could the problem be with the router, it seems to work fine on the internet and low speeds its been getting.


I was wondering if this problem had anything to do with more people being connected to broadband in my area as my area(I don't know if more people have connected to the broadband in my area) area is pretty far from the city.
I thought it might have been due to the - tempetures we have had recently but I doubt this is the problem.


Could some one please say if they have ever encountered a problem like this before,

Answer 1

It is not clear what type of connection you actually HAVE. Cable or DSL? First about DSL. DSL is like a direct line to a port on the router at your ISP. It uses the telephone hard wire coming into your house. You do not compete with any of your neighbors for bandwidth. You have a dedicated line direct to your ISP. The phone company determines the speed the line can handle at each end of the line with their equipment and the DSL appliance in your house. In my area, my speed is 256K up and down. The phone company says they will upgrade my phone line "real soon now" which is what they have been saying for a couple of years now... Anyway, the other type of connection is cable. This is the same cable TV system that uses some kind of decoder to tune the channels for your widescreen TV. Cable has a BIG problem that DSL does NOT have.. Cable is in effect a BIG partyline. Your connection is to the same wire, the coaxial cable, as all of your neighbors, so in this case you DO compete with all of your neighbors. On a partyline, only ONE talks while ALL OTHERS LISTEN and wait their turn to break into the traffic pattern. If there is only YOU, you get full bandwidth. If two people the best you can get is half, minus some for overhead. 100 people and you are now down to less than 1% minus some for overhead. Overhead is the result of collisions, where two (or more) try to talk at the same time, losing BOTH packets and causing a resend of both packets! Just think about it, how many other people, houses, are on YOUR leg of the wire? Wireless suffers from the same partyline effect to slow throughput. Only in the case of wireless, only one transmits while all others receive. Again, collisions cause loss of packets and resends exactly like cable. The wireless connection point is the bottleneck as it merges all wireless links into a single lane of traffic into one port on your router. The more people on the partyline, the slower ALL go. On DSL, throughput always remains a constant since you only compete with others connected directly to your ISP, AT the router at your ISP. In a sense as you plug your computers into your router, your connection is plugged directly into a port on the router at your ISP. Remember also, that inside your house, if you have more than 1 computer, you are in competition with your other machines. Think several parallel roads that merge into a single lane, which is what your wired connection is as it leaves your house. My son has several roommates, all of whom are into real-time gaming. One day, he moaned and groaned to me (System Analyst/Senior Programmer) that his gaming was SO slow. Of course it was slow! They were all trying to share a single 256K DSL line! Gaming is intense use of bandwidth. He ended up taking my advice and having his housemates all get their own line installed. Problem solved. So, you actually can be causing the slowdown yourself as well as it being slow from other causes.



Bottom line: If you have DSL, then the speed is determined by your phone company and ISP working together as a pair. Your throughput is directly dependent on the HARDWARE installed between you and your ISP. On cable, you are on a big partyline and here, your throughput depends on how many people are on your segment of the wire that you have to compete with to get your turn to talk. My neighbor is on cable and he moans and groans about how slow things get during peak usage times such as after school and early evening hours after dinner. But, at 0400, he gets great speed... if he chooses to stay up that late...

Answer 2

It seems that you have checked most of the main indoor things, and I assume that by 'splitter' you mean the plug-in filters at the phone sockets. The reason that you are on a fairly slow service (3Mb/sec) is simply because you are a fair way off from the serving telephone exchange. While it is possible that speeds will reduce if more people are connected to the service provider's system, something which is called contention, but large and sudden drops and increases in speed are more likely to be down to an insulation failure either between the line wires or to earth or between yours and another line. You do not mention whether you have asked the line provider to run a line test, but it would seem to me to be a front runner especially as it has only been happening over the last couple of weeks, since the snow and ice have been around. I assume that all sockets have the filters fitted (phones/sky box/alarms) Before you call, and to avoid call out charges, disconnect any indoor cabling from the master socket (Where the line comes in) and make sure that the fault is still happening. If it has mysteriously righted itself the fault lies in the wiring within your home, and can be fixed by you.

Answer 3

In the UK, as an ADSL customer, you have a dedicated broadband card (circuit board) at the telephone exchange. It monitors things like how often it gets error messages and has to resend data packets. If it gets too many errors, it slows your line down until the error rate falls to an acceptable level. Once it has slowed down, it can wait up to a couple of days before checking whether it can speed up again. If it still gets errors, it will slow down again.



My ISP didn't tell me this but just kept fobbing me off saying it wasn't their fault and saying it would cost me £140 if BT checked the line beyond my house and found no fault. I found the information after some lengthy internet searching.



In my case, the internal telephone wiring was picking up electrical interference from fluorescent lights and some unusually long cable runs were picking up other electrical noise. All this interfered with my broadband signal, causing errors to be recorded at the exchange so my data rate was slowed to below dial-up speeds.



I solved my problem by completely separating broadband and telephone from the moment it enters my house. I replaced the front of my BT master socket with a splitter faceplate (it is legal to do this) which has separate outlets for the phone and broadband. My router plugs directly into the broadband socket and the telephone wiring connects to the push-fit terminals just as it did on the old face plate. My broadband now never uses my internal phone wiring.



My data rate had never been better than 1.5 mbs but had dropped to about 33 kbs before the fix. After my modifcations, the data rate increased almost immediately to around 3 mbs and has since crept up to around 5 mbs.



Obviously, that may not be your problem but it is worth doing anyway. There is now a cheaper, easier way of eliminating all electrical interference: You buy a thing called an i-plate that fits between the front of your master socket and the box on the wall. It is very easy to fit and needs no special tools or knowledge. You can buy it from Maplin or for about half as much from various on-line dealers. Using an i-plate, you can continue to use your internal phone wires for broadband.



None of that will help if there is a line fault between your home and the exchange. Then there is the problem of the 50:1 contention rate. Basically, the 3 mbs they sold to you, they also sold to up to 49 other people which is fine unless a load of you want to use broadband at the same time. Low temperatures should not affect your broadband but water penetration in dodgy connectors will affect it. Our main underground cable once got waterlogged and it killed broadband for hundreds of us around here. It is almost impossible for us end-users to check the splitters that plug into phone sockets. Substitution with a new one is about the only way to rule out splitter faults. If you have a phone plugged in anywhere in your house without a splitter, that will cause problems.



Twice in the last year, broadband has slowed down for no obvious reason. Both times, rebooting my router solved the problem.



Sorry, lots of words but not much help. Try the i-plate thing anyway. Everyone should do it as it can only do good by removing a possible source of trouble. Good luck.

Answer 4

Sorry but jus had to LMFAO at rowlfe's answer! What an utter pile of mish mashed tosh! His descriptions of the different types of available connections are ill-informed, inconsistent contradictory in their terms and give no help whatsoever to the asker. I could spend a page informing him about what he is attempting to discuss in their proper terms but this would obviously serve no purpose and would also be irrelevant to the asker. The other informed answers by people with direct experience are much more relevant and closer to the answer needed. It amazes me how many "Analysts" and "Programmers" think that qualifies them as all round experts when in reality this couldnt be further from the truth. Any real analyst or programmer I know worth their salt would actually call upon a qualified network specialist with the relevant experience to help with network issues as they know its well outside their own areas of expertise.

Apologies to the asker but it really gets on my goat when people who claim to be experts in all fields by stating they are a "programmer" or "analyst", and also giving a full page of obviously cut+pasted mismatched tosh to make it look like an informed response defeats the purpose as whats actually being acheived is the exact opposite!

Answer 5

1. change filter

2. plug in direct to master line

3. new cables if they're bent or split

4. keep cables away from or high energy electronic objects like tv's



5. look into fibre optic broadband. ive switched all my services, tv, phone and broadband to one company for a faster broadband and im paying less per month. there is no line attentuation or anything so the speed your paying for is the speed your getting.

Answer 6

Invariably, ISP's will try and fill you with bull$^*!



CHANGE your ADSL filter, plug your router DIRECTLY into the master socket (with filter) and click this address, then submit your postcode

http://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange_search



It will show you weather your ISP will provide MAXIMUM speed in your area.

If it does show that it has full LLU support by your ISP, threaten your ISP with the Ombudsman until they sort it out (in writing) -it usually works ;-)



-Ofcom being the Ombudsman



ALSO.. Check the 'Noise level' on your routers status page. You may have a line fault that your ISP SHOULD investigate (by BT Openreach)

Answer 7

I had the same problem, and it was found that the PCU unit was caked up with dust and the fan as well. Cleaned them up, and no problem since. It seems the clogged dust was preventing the broadband getting through fast enough.