Slow broadband speeds

debjk

Hi

I recently upgraded to a 20mb connection with virgin and since upgrading on my main pc I am doing speed tests and getting speeds sometimes of 3Mbps up to 15Mbps. I called up Virgin who said I needed a new modem, new modem came and I am still getting slow speeds so I run spybot ect and generally clean up pc still slow so I phone virgin again they run through several checks on the phone unpluging modem bypassing router but still no improvement so today an engineer came out he checked all connections replaced box on the wall where cable enters the house tested this computer but still getting slow speeds he tested another pc in the house an old office pc (v slow and old) and managed to get 18Mbps he said it was possibly bitorrent on my pc slowing up (even though it wasnt running) anyhow I dont use bitorrent so uninstalled it yet I still have slow speeds on this pc is there anything I can do that I havnt already tried. He also said could be a problem in the area and give it a week and see if it improves so meanwhile I pay for 20mb and sometimes only get 3!

I am running Windows vista home basic the pc itself is running fast enough just the net not going to pay for a 20mg service if I am not getting anywhere near what I am paying for so before I cancel want to make sure I have tried everything

Strider590

That 20mb connection speed is only your potential speed, you actually speed depends on what server(s) your connecting to.

http://www.bandwidthtest.co.uk/

Try that when it's at 20mb and again when it's at 3.

AceRider

It could be your area - We are paying for 10Mb Virgin Broadband (had it sence pre-free upgrade) however our area is only capable of 6Mb so there's effectivly 4Mb we're not getting.

You may want to try and find a site than will tell you the maximum in your area, preferably a site this isnt ran by virgin

debjk

Strider590 wrote: »

That 20mb connection speed is only your potential speed, you actually speed depends on what server(s) your connecting to.

http://www.bandwidthtest.co.uk/

Try that when it's at 20mb and again when it's at 3.

I dont quite understand I have never had 20mb so I cant test when its at 20mb and while I know 20mb is just potential speed getting between 3 and 7 the majority of the time and only occasionally getting over 10 surely means something is not right I tried the site you suggested and got less than 5 every time and tonight obviously while traffic is high I got 2.4 this is with just one pc connected to the net

GunJack

could well be virgin throttling the connection, posibly due to them having limited overall capacity issues in your area...

Money_Grabber13579

Have you tried testing the speed in your test socket? It could be the wiring in your house that could be contributing to getting lower speeds, as well as other electrical interference.

AceRider

To be honest I think your best bet is going be to continue buggin the h*ll out of Virgin, make them send engineer after engineer after engineer eventually you will cost them so much in engineer time & money that they really will pull there finger out and find out what your problem is.

You could also start complaining that you've had this persistant problem for x time, none of there engineers are helping and you are considering either downgrading your connection to 10mb (as that is alot closer to your current speed & cheaper) or leaving virgin all together. Not only will this inspire them to try and sort your connection out so that they can get the cost of the higher broadband from you but they may also give you 'incentives' to stay with them such as money off future bills, free months broadband, free router etc etc.