Slow DSL

What did I tell you? Here I am again. The router is back up and running and we once again have our wireless laptop connection. However, my pc is back to the dreadfully slow connection that I've had for months and was continually blaming it on SBC. Now I'm not sure what it is. Web pages are taking forever to load and the mouse slowly "jumps" all over the screen when I try to use it. I just can't seem to win with this thing!!! Any ideas?

 

how much memory do you have in it? how old is it? what is the speed your network is running at?

eric

 

Ok, don't laugh. It's on OLD (4+years) system. Win98, 128SDRAM. Did a speed test at dslreports and it came back 1055 down, 173 up. I wish I had done one before the router was working again so I could compare it because it was much faster without the router. But that hasn't always been the case. It's been fine (speed wise) with the router until about two months ago, so I really don't know what has happened to slow it down so much.

 

those speeds are more that acceptable. in fact, they are very good. it must be something with your computer, and not with the speed coming in. the upload is a little slow, but it shouldent be showing a visible difference.

 

Download DrTCP: DSLreports DrTCP021.exe

Run the program, it will show the current settings of TCP/IP parameters. Write them down.

You can change any variable that you want, click Apply, and reboot the computer, if no good; you can always change to your original values.

Start with:

MTU - DSL =1492 Cable = 1500 ISDN = 1322 DialUp = 576

Tcp Receive - 256960 (This is the varaible to play with!)

Window Scaling - Yes

Time Stamping - No

Selective Acks - Yes

Path MTU Discovery - Yes.

Black Hole - NO

Max Duplicate - 2

TTL - 64

Notice it said above Start with

These settings are not written in "stone" there is variability depending on the computer other setting. So try few setting and measure your Download for each setting.

In addition, in case a person has a Router the Router's MTU if set differently can affect the general MTU.

Link: Measuring the "Speed" of Internet Connection.

 

Well, turns out the problem is my Norton software. I was getting a runtime error message on startup (but not all the time), so for the heck of it I disabled my Norton Personal Firewall and now I have a normal, fast DSL connection again. Should I uninstall and reinstall Norton or tweak it so it doesn't bog everything down so much? I'm feeling pretty vulnerable right now with nothing protecting me!