[drmoneejd]

I recently upgraded my dsl service from 1.5 mbps to 3 mbps. This upgrade is the highest availble in my area and has only been availble for maybe 4-6 months. After about a week of waiting for a change, my internet speeds were still between 1.2-1.6 mbps. I called at&t and they agreed that my speeds were slow and sent someone out to look at their lines outside of my house. I then never heard from them again. My speed is still topping out at 1.6-1.8 mbps. I am confident it is not the phone line/hook ups inside my house because I went outside to our phone box and plugged my modem directly in there and got the same result. I've already spent 2 or 3 hours on the phone with them to get this far and am pretty confident they are going to try to get me to buy a new modem. I have a wirespeed 2100 modem that has ran fine since 2006. Could it really be the problem or is there something else I'm overlooking? I realize I wont always get 3 mbps but even the rep on the phone said my bottom should be 2 mbps. Thanks.

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Hello I am SGC.

First off, internet "speed tests" are not all
that reliable, assuming that is how
your getting these results.

Here's something you can try.
Download TCP Optimizer and save it
to your desktop. Close all browser
windows and any other programs
which are running.

Right click on TCP Optimizer
and choose Run As Administrator.

Near the top of the window, under Connection Speed,
set the slider to 3Mbps.

Now near the bottom of the window it says Choose settings:,
select the Optimal box/bubble.

Next click Apply Changes, then Ok.

If prompted to reboot go ahead and do so.
Check your connection speed and see if this helped.

This program will create a backup of your original
settings in case you want to revert them back.

Also, that modem is pretty old. I've had At&t
in the past, and they never charged me for
a modem. Although I believe they do charge a rental
fee for there gateways/routers.

Hope this helps. Have a nice day.

SGC

[SupeR GeekiN CognitO]

Hello I am SGC.

First off, internet "speed tests" are not all
that reliable, assuming that is how
your getting these results.

Here's something you can try.
Download TCP Optimizer and save it
to your desktop. Close all browser
windows and any other programs
which are running.

Right click on TCP Optimizer
and choose Run As Administrator.

Near the top of the window, under Connection Speed,
set the slider to 3Mbps.

Now near the bottom of the window it says Choose settings:,
select the Optimal box/bubble.

Next click Apply Changes, then Ok.

If prompted to reboot go ahead and do so.
Check your connection speed and see if this helped.

This program will create a backup of your original
settings in case you want to revert them back.

Also, that modem is pretty old. I've had At&t
in the past, and they never charged me for
a modem. Although I believe they do charge a rental
fee for there gateways/routers.

Hope this helps. Have a nice day.

SGC

[GryphonGuy]

Slowing down is not a failure mode I've encountered with a modem before. It's generally all or nothing, except for that odd one that will deliver internet but disregard advanced settings it's given. Don't spring for a new modem, and if you're running Vista or higher, NEVER try to tweak the TCP/IP stack. It's not really that great an idea on XP either. It dates back to older OSes when internet speeds such as we have today were unimaginable, and therefore not taken into account. With the speeds you're expecting, I wouldn't worry about my Windows configuration, just the service provider.

[drmoneejd]

I appreciate your input! And sadly the TCP optimizer didn't have much of an effect that I could see on my machine. And the speed on my individual machine is not the problem, as much as the speed that my modem is getting period. And I do agree that speed tests are not always accurate, however when I did contact at&t I had to do a lot of speed tests, and found that their results were never farther than .15 mbps different than mine, which is why I think it is accurate enough to at least measure for increase. I do hope that they give me another modem for free, however because I did not lease the hardware from the beginning I believe they gave me a quote of around $100 for a new modem. However I will probably search for one on ebay or craigslist. Do you think setting my modem to a bridge mode and letting my router actually handle the traffic would have any effect?

And to gryphonguy, I agree I have never encountered a modem that slowed down, but do simply quit. However I don't know what my options are if it's not my modem. Me vs. at&t doesn't seem like a battle I can win. Thanks for the input

Edited by drmoneejd, 22 September 2012 - 02:14 AM.

[GryphonGuy]

The DSL modem is handling DHCP? Does it have multiple LAN ports? I never knew AT&T to use more than basic DSL modems. Even if so, I doubt very much that any processing burden is slowing things down. Don't worry about that. If your modem does ever fail, you should be able to buy a new one for $25 or less, but again, don't take "slow" to mean that you have a modem problem. It's more likely a line noise issue that it would be up to them to solve. Probably weak infrastructure, and frankly not something that you could get your hopes up about fixing. It would mean replacing all the phone lines in your neighborhood, which they won't do because they'd rather wait until they have time to install something completely new, i.e. Uverse.

[drmoneejd]

No, it is a basic modem, i just wasn't sure if it would make a difference. I agree that it doesn't seem likely I can win this. I guess I'll just switch back to 1.5. And i will hold the hope that one day I will be able to truly upgrade and watch netflix in HD

[SupeR GeekiN CognitO]

Hello again,

and if you're running Vista or higher, NEVER try to tweak the TCP/IP stack.

Well this seems a little dramatic. TCP Optimizer backs up
the current settings. It also has a feature to reset TCP settings
back to Windows defaults. Also, the only setting which is
being manipulated by this program is the MTU, since Win 7
does not have registry entries for TCP/IP settings like
XP has.

The most important setting for speed is RWIN.
In Windows 7 however, RWIN is adjusted dynamically (or automatically),
and cannot be manipulated using TCP Optimizer. There is a way to turn
this RWIN auto adjustment feature off, but I will not go into
that now.

So this tool would probably, and apparently did, have little to no effect.

It's not really that great an idea on XP either.

I would have to disagree with this statement. The default RWIN
setting in XP is 17520, which is sufficient for about 384 kbps.
My advertised connection speed was 12 Mbps and with the
default settings in XP, I would get no more than 2 Mbps.

After setting the RWIN to 513920, I got 12 Mbps on multiple speed tests.

Remember the further you live from your ISP, the slower the speed.
With a max speed of 3 Mbps it sounds like you might be in a rather
unpopulated area, and possibly a long distance from your ISP.

SGC