[SOLVED] My ethernet is capped at 100mbps

[urssa123]

So I bought a Cat5e ethernet cable and I tried to hook it up. At first it seems well and I noticed my speed was capped at 100mbps instead of the 300 I pay for. I get that I won't always get what I pay for, but on my phone and laptop I get over 200mbps. I thought it was the cable itself so I went and got another one, but no luck there. It still caps at 100. I just thought it was a motherboard problem, (I have a Dell Prebuilt and it said it had gigabit networking, so I downloaded a driver from the dell website and I installed it, but nothing. I tried to set the Speed&Duplex to 1.0 Gbps, but that just disconnects my ethernet driver and makes it appear that no ethernet is installed. The Motherboard is a Dell 08WKV3. Thanks in advanced!

 

[boju]

What router/switch is the Dell connected to? Are Phone and laptop connected wirelessly? Have you tried laptop on the same ethernet connection?

 

[SamirD]

If you think it is the system, a quick way to determine that is to boot up a linux live cd/usb and check your speeds there. If you have full speeds, it's a windows software issue. If you don't, then it is probably something outside the system and in the network.

 

[kanewolf]

So I bought a Cat5e ethernet cable and I tried to hook it up. At first it seems well and I noticed my speed was capped at 100mbps instead of the 300 I pay for. I get that I won't always get what I pay for, but on my phone and laptop I get over 200mbps. I thought it was the cable itself so I went and got another one, but no luck there. It still caps at 100. I just thought it was a motherboard problem, (I have a Dell Prebuilt and it said it had gigabit networking, so I downloaded a driver from the dell website and I installed it, but nothing. I tried to set the Speed&Duplex to 1.0 Gbps, but that just disconnects my ethernet driver and makes it appear that no ethernet is installed. The Motherboard is a Dell 08WKV3. Thanks in advanced!

Does your ethernet cable connect directly to your router or does it go through in-wall cabling? In wall cabling could be bad. So buying new patch cables from the wall makes no difference.

 

[urssa123]

Does your ethernet cable connect directly to your router or does it go through in-wall cabling? In wall cabling could be bad. So buying new patch cables from the wall makes no difference.

Directly into the router

 

[urssa123]

If you think it is the system, a quick way to determine that is to boot up a linux live cd/usb and check your speeds there. If you have full speeds, it's a windows software issue. If you don't, then it is probably something outside the system and in the network.

Would any linux distro work?

 

[SamirD]

Would any linux distro work?

Yep, pretty much. The idea is that the linux is a completely separate and stand-alone operating system interfacing with the same hardware and performing the same test. If it tests fine, it validates the hardware and network as working correctly, pointing the finger to windows. If it does not test fine, it points to something either in the hardware level at the nic, cabling, network, or network configuration.