Broadband speed problems

[MarkHudds]

Looking for ideas/pointers as to how to progress investigations into my current broadband hassle ...

Been using a 512k connection (ISP is Force9 (Plusnet)) on my HCPC for a few months and have always had a consistent download speed of around 55KB/sec.

Over the weekend and continuing this week, my download speed is fluctuating between the usual 55KB/sec and going as low as 1KB/sec!!! When it's very slow I can't even try speed tests on web sites as it just hangs.

I'm using a Netgear router connected to my ADSL modem, however the config hasn't been changed since implementation. The fact that I've got the internet connection leads me to think that its not a modem/router problem.

My ISP reports no problems and there are no reported contention problems with my BT exchange so I'm wondering what to try next!

Would be very grateful for any advice ...

[SeaneyC]

If you're uploading at full capacity, your download will fall as the server/whatever you're connected to at the other end won't be able to recieve enough handshakes to sustain the high download rate. Just a thought. Or possibly some spyware? Have you tried ad-aware to make sure no nasties are running in the background?

[JohnG]

Another obvious thing to try is to reset the router and modem - just turn off the power for 30 seconds or so.

[MarkHudds]

Thanks for the suggestions guys ...

No nasty spyware stuff going on as far as I'm aware and I've tried various reset/power off on the router/modem.

Just to clarify, the download speed is fluctuating on individual downloads, not just between downloads ... I'm doing a download now, it's jumping from 20KB/sec down to 5KB/sec, back up to 30KB/sec ... and now it's sitting at about 3KB/sec ... no use to anyone!

I appreciate I'm on a 50:1 contention ADSL service however I was getting 55KB/sec all the time up until the weekend.

The activity lights on my router/modem do stop flashing quite often which I guess means no activity so I think there's some kind of frequent blockage on my line maybe?

[Kramer]

Are you sure it's not a problem with the server you're trying to download from??

Apart from that, a router/modem reboot (as mentioned previously).

[MarkHudds]

Ok, getting somewhere now ... I've taken the Router out and it seems to have solved the problem!

Now I've got to work out if the Router is faulty or the settings had been changed somehow.

I suspect it may be faulty as I'm having trouble getting to the config page for it on my browser. When I do get a display its all corrupted - text all over etc ...

(Router is Netgear WGR614 and Modem is Netgear DM602)