[SOLVED] Sapphire mobile hotspot, slow download speed on laptop

[cashdollar.michael]

I'm currently in the middle east using a sapphire T2 mobile hotspot. Works well for streaming, gaming etc. Currently having an issue downloading anything on my laptop with it. I can run a speed test and pull 20+Mbps download speed, browse decently fast even play games with minimal lag but if I try to download an application from the internet or download a game update, I pull 5-20kbps. Anyone got any suggestions or knowledge on the subject?

 

[bill001g]

I can't say about your ISP but it is technically possible for them to have different rate limits for different types of traffic. In the USA they sometime very clearly spell this out for example they seem to know what is HD video traffic and what is not. They have many ways to spy on the data and they pretty much admit they collect lots of information.

So the best defense is to run a VPN. With a VPN they can't see what you are doing but they likely can tell you are using a vpn especially if you use one of the more common ones. They may just restrict vpn traffic rates and for example assume it is video or downloads.

You maybe able to do something simpler since most their snooping is related to DNS. If you use cloudflare at 1.1.1.1 the DNS is encrypted via HTTPS so they can't see it. Firefox and chrome both support this but you may have to turn the feature on. I don't think the game file downloaders like steam support this but they don't really use DNS anyway.

It all depends on how much effort the ISP wants to place on restricting you. Generally in the USA you only see restrictions on the so called "unlimited" plans that have lots of fine print as to why they are actually limited. The ones where you pay $$$/gbyte they really don't care what you are doing since the more you download the more money they make.