downstream dropping off
 

Hi,
Been a lurker here for a while and had most of my probs cured by reading other peoples problems but I'm now stumped. Over the past couple of days whenever I'm downloading anything you can watch the speed drop down to nothing and then the whole system locks up. This is happening with bit torrent and emule and normal "save as..." downloads. I initially thought I had made a mess of my windows install so I wiped the whole thing at the atrt of the week but the problem persists. I am using the following

Windows XP Pro SP1 and all current updates
ZoneAlarm (Free version)
AVG Antivirus (Free Version)
NTL 600 k/b on a Motorola Surfboard 4100

This is the system I've been running for about 6 months now with no problems and suddenly it's all messed up. I used netstat to check this and it registered down to about 500bytes each way before the system locked.

I realise there may be a software problem but as this is happening before and after a fresh install I thought the broadband forums would be a good starting place. Any ideas are most welcome.

Re: downstream dropping off
 

are you using the usb or ethernet connection?

have you tried with zone alaram disabled? do you get the same problem?

Re: downstream dropping off
 

Same here mate,
I know that I have downgraded from 1mb to 600kb but I find that many downloads, from big name sites such as MS, or crap. Currently downloading a Nero update at 26mb which is coming in at 14.1kb a sec and has taken 14.9 mins so far with 58% of the download complete. This is getting to be very normal for me now in the Coventry Warwick area.

Re: downstream dropping off
 

Discovered a similar thread to this in the internet section and most people seemed to think it was firewall related so I pulled zonealarm and installed sygate personal firewall instead and so far so good I'm running all 3 types of d/l concurrently and while it isn't on fire speed wise it's at least working.

Re: downstream dropping off
 

good stuff :tu:

have a rep for having the nonce to do a search of the forums... you would be suprised how few people do ;)

MB :monkey:

Re: downstream dropping off
 

Erm m8, I'd edit the nonce bit. ;)

Re: downstream dropping off
 

:LOL:

Re: downstream dropping off
 

just out of curiosity, are you using a nforce2 chipset and installed the latest drivers from nvidia? those 4.16 ethernet drivers can mess up the connection.
i had to drop back to older ethernet drivers, and it seems to of stopped the problems.

Re: downstream dropping off
 

Have you tried using something like "Download Accelerator Plus"? It can be very useful for large downloads because it creates multiple links to the site (or mirrors) and gets the file in "chunks' meaning that even if one link is slow the others will take up the slack.

PS I think Monkey Breath meant "Nous" (ie intelligence), although when I first read I thought he was trying to say "for the nonce" (for the present time) but mis-typed, rather than using the word in its more modern use of a "nonsense crime". This has been a free English language lecture...! :)

Re: downstream dropping off
 

If the upstream is saturated, downstream ack packets cant get through in time - which means a chop in download speed. It could be just the sources your downloading from thats causing this.

Re: downstream dropping off
 

well its not the drivers as ive tested them, me think its just ntl network, those upgrades theyve been messing with and still are.
when my connnection drops i have to disable then re-enable the network connection.
ntl support suggested it was the drivers or network adapter.
as the cable modem tested fine. oh well, shall soon see when they stop messing about.

Re: downstream dropping off
 

having similar problems here (manchester) speed while surfing is dreadful. Downloading stuff doesn't seem to be affected?

I was worried because I built a new P.C yesterday and thought maybe that would be the cause. Strangely enough it uses the nforce2 chipset and I'd updated the drivers as part of a microsoft upgrade. I've reinstalled the drivers that came with the Mobo but still no joy. Terrible surfing speeds. yet doing a speed test shows everything as being pretty good.

why would that be?

Re: downstream dropping off
 

try specifying a proxy server.

IE- tools -> internet options -> connections -> lan settings
firefox- tools -> options -> connection settings

there is a link to all the proxy servers somewhere on here... i will find it in a second.

MB

Re: downstream dropping off
 

There is something else I need to clarify. It's ok for me to just plug my cable modem into the ethernet socket and surf away? I already had a connection set up on another P.C so I don't need to install any software?
Thanks

Re: downstream dropping off
 

yep... absolutely fine... just make sure that you turn the modem off for about a minute before switching pcs. You will only be able to connect one pc at a time to the modem unless you have a router or are subscribed to the xbox or ps2 service.

hth
MB