New broadband but sometimes slow connection

[Pozzydrive]

Hi all

Just had Toucan broadband installed (1Mb), when downloading say a file from majorgeeks its fairly fast, but to get to the download bit it seems extremely slow, sometimes hanging, it also does that when I go into my emails, even at times not letting me switch between pages, as I say its just hangs or it takes forever, then I have to go back and keep trying, its as if it cannot find the page, I am using windows XP pro, have a variety of programs running that I downloaded from major geeks:
Crap cleaner
Adaware
Spyware blaster
Spyguard
Norton system works
AVG for free
The package came with Zone Alarm, I've tried disabling them to see if it makes any difference but to no avail, anyone any idea why its doing this.
I was thinking of totally formatting my HD, how do I go about erradicating everything leaving a blank disk, so that I can start again, it may even help.

[brownizs]

Have you tried to do a Tracert to majorgeeks.com to see if there are any lag between you and here?

[Pozzydrive]

Hi Browniz

Please forgive the ignorance, but what is a tracert? I have just done something that seems to be helping it seems to be working faster, what I've done is to download the new google engine, at least I think thats what its called, it certainly seems to have made pages changes much quicker. however if you can explain what it is I have to do for this tracert then I will give it a go, thankyou.

[brownizs]

Tracert is a tool for Trace routing the hops to a site:

5 9 ms 8 ms 9 ms bb2-g7-0-0.spfdil.ameritech.net [151.164.240.151
]
6 14 ms 13 ms 13 ms bb1-p4-1.emhril.ameritech.net [151.164.42.254]
7 13 ms 13 ms 13 ms bb2-p13-1.emhril.ameritech.net [151.164.191.114]

8 14 ms 13 ms 14 ms 151.164.42.141
9 14 ms 13 ms 14 ms ex1-p6-0.eqchil.sbcglobal.net [151.164.40.125]
10 14 ms 15 ms 14 ms ge-3-2-1.edge2.Chicago1.Level3.net [4.68.111.13]

11 14 ms 14 ms 14 ms ae-1-55.bbr1.Chicago1.Level3.net [4.68.101.129]

12 44 ms 43 ms 42 ms ae-0-0.bbr2.Dallas1.Level3.net [64.159.1.110]
13 43 ms 43 ms 43 ms ae-23-54.car3.Dallas1.Level3.net [4.68.122.111]

14 44 ms 44 ms 47 ms 4.78.220.10
15 46 ms 44 ms 45 ms vl31.dsr01.dllstx3.theplanet.com [70.85.127.29]

16 152 ms 207 ms 236 ms vl41.dsr01.dllstx4.theplanet.com [70.85.127.83]

17 45 ms 46 ms 70 ms gi1-0-1.car17.dllstx4.theplanet.com [67.18.116.6
9]
18 * * * Request timed out.
19 * * * Request timed out.
20 * * * Request timed out.
21 *

This is a Tracert. Of course there is a bad hop at 16, which means there is either a router or line problem at that point.

[Pozzydrive]

Hi Browniz

Do I have to download this tool from somewhere?

[Halo]

No just goto the command prompt and type in tracert and the url you want eg. tracert majorgeeks.com

as you have changed to DSL, it maybe worth also flushing the DNScache sometime this can cause slowdowns in connection to www's, again from the command prompt type ipconfig /flushdns

also turn off Norton and do a quick test to see if pages come up quicker?

[Pozzydrive]

Hi Halo, thankyou, now I understand what a tracert is, however I have completly formatted my HD's and started over again and also found google acclererator, what a difference that has made, its like a racing snake, the only problem I have now is, with my start-up, something I've done in formatting has affected the Bios I think, because when I turn on the PC at one point I have to press F1 to get it to continue, however I have already asked for help with this in the software section, so once again I thankyou, OH! and enjoy the up and coming festive season.

[Halo]

Cheers Pozzy and you too :)