Help internet slowed down! Is this because..

*Vikki*

I think this is to do with what I briefly saw in the papers, about bt and others slowing down the connection at peak times. Does anyone have any info as I am sure you could find out if you were effected. Its certainly not my Macbook!

dylanuk

I think it was BT Option 1 customers who were reported to no longer be able to use iPlayer in the evening due to the speed throttling.

A lot of broadband providers do throttle speeds, such as Virgin Media - and I'm sure probably any larger company like TalkTalk, Tiscali, etc...

It's done so they can get more customers on the line at once - and make more money.

If you're struggling, it might be worth checking out a provider with a better speed/usage policy.

Be/O2 don't throttle speeds and have a very leniant fair usage policy. Sky broadband has no fair usage policy at all - though I'm not sure if they throttle speeds or not. Eclipse, Zen and Plusnet are also good - though Plusnet throttle speeds based on application use - so emails and surfing stays quick, but you might notice a slow down if you're downloading peer-to-peer.

Viper_7

Slows down as there is contention.
In the evenings more people, you will be sharing your maximum bandwidth with others...strangely they want to you it at the same time as you. Funny that.
Also just as you start surfing, our friends accross the water are getting out of bed.

Eric_Pisch

Viper_7 wrote: »

Slows down as there is contention.
In the evenings more people, you will be sharing your maximum bandwidth with others...strangely they want to you it at the same time as you. Funny that.
Also just as you start surfing, our friends accross the water are getting out of bed.

Not true, BT and several other ISPs traffic shape at peak time regardless of contention, BT also filter your internet for you.

BE there (and O2) do not, I backup my servers with acronis and copy the files via ftp to a server at home, I avg 600gb a month on BE there and never get throttled or shaped in anyway or have ever had a complaint. Top rate ISP.

There is more than the price per month with ISPs as they are all very not equal.

mrJ_5

Still can depend on contention of the ISP service.... if LLU the contention can vary depending on the ISP, and also the number of users that the ISP has on an exchange too... like I'm sure Tiscali have a worse contention than Be, and thus the speed slows right down at peak times....

.... likewise, more people on the physical Internet, the slower the traffic can be - as servers can only process so many queries at a time, etc etc

*Vikki*

it never used to do it though so its odd.

andyfuk

It might be temporary: I've had a few problems with mine and it was because I was fiddling around with the router (new ISP, new router, no experience= trouble!). Other reasons could be thunderstorms, or generally the weather, bad wiring....the list seems endless. I was down to 1meg from 3meg for about 5 days, went to the self help section on my ISP's website and found a lot of information that I never knew before!

If if the router is connected or disconnected a lot, or there is a lot of noise on the line, BT think the router is dropping the connection due to the line being unstable. To overcome this instability, they'll drop your speed. It should pick up soon enough, as long as it becomes stable, 3-5 days is the norm, but ideally you need to leave the router connected 24/7. Left mine on for 3 days, now I can get 5meg :-)

Some info here that will probably to better at explaining things than I have, and there are some self diagnosis tools too on the link below that:

http://community.plus.net/blog/2007/07/02/broadband-speed-faults-how-to-diagnose/

http://www.kitz.co.uk/adsl/frogstats.php



Andy

joe_pesci

I had this problem with SKY broadbrand few weeks back. All of a sudden the 8mg(suppose to get 16mg:rolleyes:) i was getting went down to 1mg:rolleyes: This over space of 3-4 days slowed down, so much so at 1mg a website would take a minute to load up and watching videos on Youtube was impossible.

Only after a few calls and "tests" did my speed shoot back up. If you are getting slow internet, phone them up, it will be most likely the cheeky gits slowing you down. Just threaten you will leave them if not sorted.;)