Highly tempted.

I have nothing left to try. The fact that downloading from a Zen server is just as bad even takes the "busy internet sites" out of it.

It *has* to be them, somewhere, surely.

Netalyzr might be worth a shot:

http://netalyzr.icsi.berkeley.edu

Although you're unlikely to to see full bandwidth to the US west coast, it might pick-up something and you can always use it to add to your voice.

There's a couple of "This port is blocked" things, and the only non-green is:

Network buffer measurements (?): Uplink 500 ms, Downlink is good
We estimate your uplink as having 500 msec of buffering. This level can in some situations prove somewhat high, and you may experience degraded performance when performing interactive tasks such as web-surfing while simultaneously conducting large uploads. Real-time applications, such as games or audio chat, may also work poorly when conducting large uploads at the same time.

I don't know what that means, whether it's an issue and, if so, what we can/need/ought to do about it!

Otherwise, all green. Including:

Network latency measurements (?): Latency: 98ms Loss: 0.0%
TCP connection setup latency (?): 110ms
Network background health measurement (?): no transient outages
Network bandwidth (?): Upload 1.7 Mbit/sec, Download 16 Mbit/sec

I just ran Netalyzr on my BT connection and it's able to max-out the uplink and downlink ("Upload 8.3 Mbit/sec, Download >20 Mbit/sec" - I monitored the download myself and saw 37).

So, in your case, your bandwidth is clearly being limited (OK, you knew that already). Apart from the download issue, is your upload on a 2-Mbit/s plan, or does your result indicated an issue with that too?

As for the uplink buffering, 0.5s is quite excessive; I usually see ~0.1s, wired or wireless, but I have seen higher numbers in noisy wireless environments. I'm assuming you're running with ethernet wired into the router to avoid the vagaries of wireless. I'm not sure whether the uplink buffering could have an impact on downloads; maybe if it's a symptom of a delay in the return path, then acknowledgment packets might be delayed to the point where downloads are throttled. It's worth pointing it out to your ISP.

Otherwise, as MHC said early on, it's almost certainly outside your network and somewhere in the ISPs.

I have had exactly the same trouble for a few months but far far worse, sub 20k (sub dial up) totally variable to 37meg.
I thought mine was a routing issue, pages often timed out.

Just try cleaning registry, there are some free ones plus other cleaners etc.
I have done nothing else and no help from ISP who stated a service is being provided however fast.

Yes it's all wired. Well, beloved is wireless, but I don't let him test anything

Our upload is usually about 1.6 meg actual, and is max 2 meg according to the BT IP Profile. So that's happy enough.

I've had a snuffle around the router (Netgear WNR2000v2 - which has had a firmware update in the middle of all this, same before and after) to see if there's anything to do with prioritising and there is a QoS setting to prioritise certain data, but it's off.

I shall have to read up on buffering, then.

Any Zen users out there care to run the same test and give their results, at all?

Oversized buffers are a big problem for internet performance - see http://www.bufferbloat.net/projects/bloat/ as a starting point.

This could be a red herring, given that your problem started with new modem; run netalyzr again to confirm it and let your ISP see it.

Big buffers sometimes live in routers and it's good to see that you have QoS off. Although it seems likely to be outside your net, Windows is a dark pit so far as I'm concerned; if you're running that, then I think there are tuning tools available and others here might be able to offer advice. Otherwise, try something with a comprehensible network stack (*N*X-based) .

You have to stop asking questions now. Your official status has changed from newbie, (Thursday 18:22), to learned, (Friday 13:29)!

Time for us to start asking you about our problems .

Post deleted by asbokid

I was going to suggest that! Maybe the OP could boot one of the Linux Live CDs - e.g. Knoppix or Ubuntu in 'Try Me' mode.. just to eliminate Billygatesware as the cause.

cheers, a