Internet Throttling

Bucketman

Hello folks. So I have Comcast, its crap I know but its the only high speed in the area. Basically I have an issue where even though we have Blast Plus! internet, and are suppose to get up to 50 MBPs, when someone is watching netflix its drops out internet to like, 0.5 MBPs (according to Speedtest.net) I'm wondering what the deal is? Its not just using the internet, my roommate can be playing Halo while I play league of legends and my girlfriend is facebooking and my other roommate is playing phone games and everything runs smooth, but as soon as someone turns on Netflix, its bomb city.

I was wondering if this is a normal thing (I googled and didn't find much) or if itsa router problem or if I should call Comcast or what? Thanks in advance

Draygo

What is your bandwidth on speedtest.net when you are not doing anything?

Also keep in mind that 50Mbps is 50 megabits per second, you have an advertised rate of 6.25 Megabytes per second.

Also make sure you have a DOCSIS 3.0 Modem, I don't think the DOCSIS 2.0 fully supports 50mbits.

Bucketman

Here is right now, no one else is using anything (I'm the only one home)


We have an SMCD3GNV wireless gateway, which I think runs on the DOCSIS 3.0

Shogun

keep in mind these places advertise that you get "UP TO" a specific number. I'm not sure I've ever gotten the 24mb speeds that ATT advertises.

Bucketman

well I don't mind not getting the full speed (I recall that one PA comic about this exact topic) its the whole internet dropping like a ball when Netflix happens that bothers me.

Shogun

Bucketman wrote: »

well I don't mind not getting the full speed (I recall that one PA comic about this exact topic) its the whole internet dropping like a ball when Netflix happens that bothers me.

so on a whim I just started to google "comcast throttling netflix"

I'm not joking when I say I got to "comcast t" before google finished the search with "comcast throttling netflix"

It could be a common thing Bucketman. Do you typically use Netflix in prime time? Have you tried using it specifically at a different time? Early in the morning, super late at night, etc? I ask because between the hours of like 6pm and 9pm on most nights I can't use youtube. I just can't. The site is painfully slow, if I'm able to bring up a video's page I end up with the fuzzy screen error, or the video takes an eternity to load. I assume it is partly my ISP which is idiots and also idiots using youtube to listen to music.

Bucketman

For me its anytime. Netflix will run fine! Even my roommate will be watching it downstairs and I'll be up here watching something else and they both run smooth. Do anything else, even at like 2am? No dice.

hsu

I had to install a gaming router to solve my netflix woes, configuring it so that all my game packets had traffic priority.

My netfix woes were never as bad as yours, but I definitely had a 3-4 times higher lag before the gaming router.

shwaip

Have you talked to Comcast support? If you're not getting advertised speeds, even when not using Netflix, there could be problems on their end

Also, are you running speedtest over wireless at the same time as Netflix on wireless? Your router may be at fault.

Bucketman

Well the one I ran in here was without anyone else using it, the .12 MBPs was when netflix was running yes.
I'll give them a call tomorrow, even though I doubt it will accomplish much, its worth a shot

urahonky

Netflix did switch to SuperHD so maybe it's literally eating all the bandwidth. I think there's an option under your account settings that allows you to default to something lower (720p or something). Maybe you could try that first?

Dhalphir

If that above speedtest is with nothing else running, that's a very poor result from a 50mbps plan.

You're literally getting around 25% of what they advertise. I know, I know, "up to" and all that, but that's pretty bad.

As for what to do about it - well, Netflix SuperHD could eat up the majority of 12mbps quite easily. It may not be any sort of throttling - you may just plain be running out of bandwidth.