open ports

benn having some problems with my isp receiving poor download speeds in the afternoon.been talking to tech support and they advise that i may have a virus on my system.they sent me a qcr test and when i sent it back they advised that it looks like a virus.because of some open ports.the one problem is that my speed decreases in the aftrnoon but in the morning time i get great speeds.i pay for a 3 meg service.is there some type of program that can check my ports.i've scanned my computer with avg,trend-micro,and f-secure virus clean.any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

http://www.majorgeeks.com/download682.html

 

Try this guy too...pretty good..

http://www.grc.com/lt/leaktest.htm

 

If its only slowing down in the afternoon then it could just be that the Router for your surrounding area is getting overloaded because its peak time (i.e everybodys just got home from school), and can only allow a lesser amount of bandwidth to each person.

Used to work in NTL tech support so know this happens a lot!!

If you ring them when yr bandwidth is lesser they should be able to check which router you are on, do a diag test on the router, and see what percentage it is functioning at. Anything over 75% is bad!!!

They should then be able to assign you to a different router or if necessary get the technicians to do something about the service in your area.

Also, if u search on google for the company you have yr broadband service with then u may be able to download a list of all theyre proxy servers. It could be that the one you are running off is getting slowed down at that time of the day for the same reasons as above. You can then try and specify a proxy server manually by going:

Internet Explorer>Tools>Options>Connections>Lan Settings>Tick the box that says "Use Proxy Server" and specify yr own proxy.

It is better to use one that is in yr area, but trying one outside yr town could also benefit.

Hope this helps.