Post deleted by steve195527

Post deleted by steve195527

Edited by steve195527 (Fri 05-Jun-20 00:01:00)

In reply to a post by jelv:

I also started on 10-base2, but I suggested 10-baseT as it would be cables and sockets he'd recognise!

It doesn't matter how far back you go,to first consider a fault you have to establish whether any equipment is working within its design limitations,which normally you(well I) would do by checking what its specs are,you don't assume because something isn't performing as you would like that any fault exists

The statement you made (From basically the year dot ethernet ports will handle well over the speed a 200mb connection will provide) was wrong. There were a lot of different implementations of the physical layer (and a significant time) before we got to 100 base-T - see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethernet_physical_laye...

You might be smart and know all the different wifi standards and all the affecting factors such as number of antenna to work out the theoretical top speed, but for the average punter most of us would start by recommending very quick simple steps such as trying a wired connection as was done here.

Edited by jelv (Fri 05-Jun-20 14:48:10)

Thanks to everyone for the helpful suggestions - and I'm sorry this theme has proved so controversial!

Following recommendations I logged into my Virgin hub and discovered that my laptop's dramatically faster speed was owing to the Intel network adapter which updated last August so that it now runs mainly on 5GHz.
The older and new pcs both have 'n' cards it seems, although it is odd that the new pc performs at half the speed of the older one with a similar card.

When the long enough ethernet cable arrived, my new pc runs at around 210mbps wired

I ordered /borrowed 3 dual band wifi dongles and renamed the 5GHz channel so I could see when it was connected. Bizarrely the Foktech AC600 (quick cheap option from Amazon to see if it would improve anything - about to be returned) made things worse on my older pc - it slowed things to an unbelievable 1mbps download or less as you can see from the results on 4th June below - however when unplugged the internal network card shot back up to 61Mbps. A Trendnet TEW-805UB dongle shows that I can get speeds closer to 200Mbps if connected to 5GHz.

06-06-2020 10:41:09 (GMT) 45.6 Mbps 15.6 Mbps Virgin Media
05-06-2020 14:58:39 (GMT) 184.9 Mbps 21.4 Mbps Virgin Media
05-06-2020 14:56:45 (GMT) 172.6 Mbps 21.2 Mbps Virgin Media
04-06-2020 15:24:16 (GMT) 9.7 Mbps 1.3 Mbps Virgin Media
04-06-2020 15:22:15 (GMT) 1.6 Mbps 1.0 Mbps Virgin Media
04-06-2020 15:09:47 (GMT) 61.1 Mbps 7.6 Mbps Virgin Media
04-06-2020 15:07:48 (GMT) 14.3 Mbps 3.7 Mbps Virgin Media
04-06-2020 14:59:58 (GMT) 1.5 Mbps 1.1 Mbps Virgin Media
04-06-2020 14:53:18 (GMT) 0.6 Mbps 1.0 Mbps Virgin Media

But what I have discovered is that the 5GHz connection drops out after just a few minutes on all of the devices that connect to it. Do you think this is to do with the network adaptors or a problem with the Virgin hub? Or something to do with Virgin limiting usage - redirecting it to the Tivo box?

Latency also seems to be incredibly high all the time - always an F on the speed test analysis. Anything I can do to reduce this and if so is it likely to improve things?

And finally, does anyone have thoughts / recommendations about whether I should be replacing internal network adaptors or buying specific plug-in devices for the 2pcs and 1 additional laptop that seem to be affected.

Thanks again.

Frances

An F on the speed test does not mean latency is high, it is a measure of buffer bloat, i.e. how much latency is affected when the download and upload are otherwise saturated

Latency in this test was high http://tbb.st/1591041857117936155
http://tbb.st/1591286614314261955 had a resonable latency

Edited by MrSaffron (Sat 06-Jun-20 12:42:06)

In reply to a post by Victoria16:

Thanks to everyone for the helpful suggestions - and I'm sorry this theme has proved so controversial!

Following recommendations I logged into my Virgin hub and discovered that my laptop's dramatically faster speed was owing to the Intel network adapter which updated last August so that it now runs mainly on 5GHz.
The older and new pcs both have 'n' cards it seems, although it is odd that the new pc performs at half the speed of the older one with a similar card.

When the long enough ethernet cable arrived, my new pc runs at around 210mbps wired

I ordered /borrowed 3 dual band wifi dongles and renamed the 5GHz channel so I could see when it was connected. Bizarrely the Foktech AC600 (quick cheap option from Amazon to see if it would improve anything - about to be returned) made things worse on my older pc - it slowed things to an unbelievable 1mbps download or less as you can see from the results on 4th June below - however when unplugged the internal network card shot back up to 61Mbps. A Trendnet TEW-805UB dongle shows that I can get speeds closer to 200Mbps if connected to 5GHz.

06-06-2020 10:41:09 (GMT) 45.6 Mbps 15.6 Mbps Virgin Media
05-06-2020 14:58:39 (GMT) 184.9 Mbps 21.4 Mbps Virgin Media
05-06-2020 14:56:45 (GMT) 172.6 Mbps 21.2 Mbps Virgin Media
04-06-2020 15:24:16 (GMT) 9.7 Mbps 1.3 Mbps Virgin Media
04-06-2020 15:22:15 (GMT) 1.6 Mbps 1.0 Mbps Virgin Media
04-06-2020 15:09:47 (GMT) 61.1 Mbps 7.6 Mbps Virgin Media
04-06-2020 15:07:48 (GMT) 14.3 Mbps 3.7 Mbps Virgin Media
04-06-2020 14:59:58 (GMT) 1.5 Mbps 1.1 Mbps Virgin Media
04-06-2020 14:53:18 (GMT) 0.6 Mbps 1.0 Mbps Virgin Media

But what I have discovered is that the 5GHz connection drops out after just a few minutes on all of the devices that connect to it. Do you think this is to do with the network adaptors or a problem with the Virgin hub? Or something to do with Virgin limiting usage - redirecting it to the Tivo box?

Latency also seems to be incredibly high all the time - always an F on the speed test analysis. Anything I can do to reduce this and if so is it likely to improve things?

And finally, does anyone have thoughts / recommendations about whether I should be replacing internal network adaptors or buying specific plug-in devices for the 2pcs and 1 additional laptop that seem to be affected.

Thanks again.

Frances

The virgin hub by default selects the channels used for wifif automatically and is "supposed" to select the ones for both bands that offer the best performance with least interference from other equipment in your area (neighbours wifi etc) sometimes this doesn't work as it should and can cause issues, in such cases it may be beneficial selecting the channels manually ,Its pretty straightforward to do/try one you have logged on to the hub and reverse if no benefit is gained or things go worse
As an aside some security software suites now come with a vpn as standard for use when conected to wifi,see the tv ad for norton 360 for example,if you have one of these on your laptop/laptops and the vpn is active,some are by default and need turning off if you don't want it active,that can dramatically slow your connection,if you want to use it then it is something you have to live with,I hope this advice isn't contrary to what others think and upsets them!

Edited by steve195527 (Sun 07-Jun-20 10:15:09)

If you have Windows then there is a free app in the MS Store that shows you channels in use, and can help find a free one:
https://www.microsoft.com/store/productId/9NBLGGH33N0N

(Mac users can find a paid app in the Apple store, and there are numerous apps for Android in the Play Store)

Edited by jchamier (Sun 07-Jun-20 10:24:24)

Best to check the blindingly obvious first.

Yes, I've now turned the automatic channel selection off and changed to different channels which seems to have helped - thanks. I've also discovered that the usb wifi adaptor works much more reliably to retain the 5GHz connection in a different port, so things are now functioning much more successfully and the last test gave about 213Mbps which seems a definite improvement.