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Hunting Bandwidth-Eating Gremlin
For a month or so now, the internet connection at the house has been a bit sluggish. The past few days I've been measuring the speed via CNET and bandwithplace.com with consistent results of 338kbps. I'm signed up for the 1.5Mbps package, so I decided to spend this morning getting the bandwidth I should.
I disconnected EVERYTHING plugged into the phone jacks (all computers, both DVRs, phones, and even cut off the power to the Wii since it has wireless). I did a test and got the same 338kbps. I call up the ISP and they get 330kbps to my LAN connection. I then grab my garden extension cord, walk to the network connection on the side of my house, and hook up the modem directly to the NID. The ISP guy is getting 1.4Mbps to the modem. There is something between the NID and inside affecting this. FUCK!
For sake of comparison, I then grab my laptop and plug it into the modem. I do some base bandwidth tests and see about 1.1Mbps. I then go into the pantry where there is a phone jack on the opposite side of the wall as the NID. I get 1.1 there. I go to the phone jack in the kitchen near the b'fast nook - 1.1. I go to the jack in the living room - 1.1. I go to the outlet to which the modem is usually connected and work my way out (into wall, from phone line out of wall, from the Back-UPS, from the phone line out of the backups) and continue to see 1.1.
I then go around the house, plug one thing back into the wall, test (see 1.1 again), plug in another thing, test, etc. Even with everything plugged back into the wall and modem/router, I am getting 1.1 where I was getting 338k just an hour or two before. The only thing that affected the test result was when I turned on the Wii - it dropped from 1.1 to 900k.
My best guess right now is that something was corroded in the NID, the connection needed to be wiggled, or something that was solved by my poking around. *shrugs* While the internet is much better (it's nice not having to pause a video on YouTube to allow enough of the file to download so I can watch a video w/o stalls), it feels like an empty productivity with the two or so hours I spent on this issue today.
I disconnected EVERYTHING plugged into the phone jacks (all computers, both DVRs, phones, and even cut off the power to the Wii since it has wireless). I did a test and got the same 338kbps. I call up the ISP and they get 330kbps to my LAN connection. I then grab my garden extension cord, walk to the network connection on the side of my house, and hook up the modem directly to the NID. The ISP guy is getting 1.4Mbps to the modem. There is something between the NID and inside affecting this. FUCK!
For sake of comparison, I then grab my laptop and plug it into the modem. I do some base bandwidth tests and see about 1.1Mbps. I then go into the pantry where there is a phone jack on the opposite side of the wall as the NID. I get 1.1 there. I go to the phone jack in the kitchen near the b'fast nook - 1.1. I go to the jack in the living room - 1.1. I go to the outlet to which the modem is usually connected and work my way out (into wall, from phone line out of wall, from the Back-UPS, from the phone line out of the backups) and continue to see 1.1.
I then go around the house, plug one thing back into the wall, test (see 1.1 again), plug in another thing, test, etc. Even with everything plugged back into the wall and modem/router, I am getting 1.1 where I was getting 338k just an hour or two before. The only thing that affected the test result was when I turned on the Wii - it dropped from 1.1 to 900k.
My best guess right now is that something was corroded in the NID, the connection needed to be wiggled, or something that was solved by my poking around. *shrugs* While the internet is much better (it's nice not having to pause a video on YouTube to allow enough of the file to download so I can watch a video w/o stalls), it feels like an empty productivity with the two or so hours I spent on this issue today.