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Internet troubles

Dark Raven XDark Raven X Laugh hard, run fast,be kindRegistered User regular
edited May 2012 in Help / Advice Forum
I've been getting massive slowdown at all times of the day for the past couple weeks. Last weekend, I think I went a full 2 days with near zero connectivity - occasionally getting a few KB trickling through. I'm using Firefox on Virgin Media's 10mb service (though my all time peak speed ever at the best of times is actually 1.2mb) and unlimited data use, so it's not like I've hit a cap or anything.

As of today the little Google search gadget thing up in the corner is broken - anything typed in there will result in an infinitely loading page, but opening a new tab and manually typing google.co.uk in will open Google and let me search no problem. Well, slowly. But it works. I've tried out Chrome to see if maybe it was an issue with Firefox, and that indeed loads stuff faster - but has it's own issue of failing to load anything beyond what's on the page at initial load (IE; youtube videos will fail to load if there's an ad ahead of them, pop up settings boxes do not appear etc)

I have done the whole usual turning off and on again, checking all cables are secure and blabala. Just looking for other ideas - calling Virgin for tech support is not an option. On a couple instances of service interruption last year, they refused to check anything on their end before going through the motions of checking that every cable is secure here. It took an hour to get through their script. Never again. D:

Any advice? Or recommendations for a better ISP in the UK? Cause if this is just their standard now then pfft

Oh brilliant
Dark Raven X on

Posts

  • ThanatosThanatos Registered User regular
    Are you using a router? Are you hard-wired in or going wirelessly? I assume you've unplugged the modem and router, waited a full minute (like, time it), then plugged them both back in, modem first, then router?

    If that doesn't fix it, the next step I would take would be plugging a computer directly into the modem, and testing from there, figuring out where, exactly, the problem is. If you're using a splitter (I don't know what their 10MB service is; cable? DSL? Some sort of fiber optic?), remove that and connect it directly, if you can.

  • Dark Raven XDark Raven X Laugh hard, run fast, be kindRegistered User regular
    It's a cable modem, but yeah I use a wifi router to connect the laptop and PS3 to it - but the PC is wired, and I did try cutting the router out and putting the modem straight into the PC last time it went out, no difference.

    The thing is, these slowdowns aren't like they were before - I've always had service drops, a couple times a day for about a minute. I just y'know, accepted it as a thing. This though, it's crazy. I am wary of jumping ship and signing up with anyone else though - if it's a hardware issue with the cable in my area, it's gonna be bad with any ISP, right? :/

    Oh brilliant
  • ThanatosThanatos Registered User regular
    edited May 2012
    So, plug your computer directly into your modem, pull any splitters, then call tech support again. There's only three cables they can have you check, and if the lights are on, there's no reason to check the power.

    Thanatos on
  • DhalphirDhalphir don't you open that trapdoor you're a fool if you dareRegistered User regular
    edited May 2012
    I'm using Firefox on Virgin Media's 10mb service (though my all time peak speed ever at the best of times is actually 1.2mb)

    The other problems aside, are you sure you're not confusing megabits and megabytes here?

    If an ISP is selling you a 10mbps service, thats 10 megabits per second. There is 8 bits to the byte, so 1.2MB/s is about what you'd expect from a 10mbps service.

    Just wanted to clarify that - its a common mistake. Think of bitrate as being the speed of a highway and bytes being the cars that travel down the highway. A faster highway (bitrate) will have more cars passing through it (download speed).

    With regards to your specific problem, are you able to get into your modem and post the cable stats at all? Power levels, SNR, etc.

    Dhalphir on
  • cj iwakuracj iwakura The Rhythm Regent Bears The Name FreedomRegistered User regular
    Use a website like speedtest.net and check the pings. If they're 100+, ISP problem, contact them. If not, it's possibly something on your end. Reset the browser, clear the cache, check task manager, etc.

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  • redxredx I(x)=2(x)+1 whole numbersRegistered User regular
    edited May 2012
    Trace routes are nice for telling where the slow is coming from as well. " Tracert google.com" from a command prompt in windows.

    First hop should be to your router, second should tell you about the copper between you and the isp, then there will he a few within your isp, and next comes the backbone your isp connects to the rest of the webs with.

    redx on
    They moistly come out at night, moistly.
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