[SOLVED] Troubleshooting very slow downloads

Craig234

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Apr 23, 2006
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I don't see a broader forum for troubleshooting, so I'm picking one area.

Issue: Never seen before. Having Steam download a game is extremely slow. Current example: In 40 hours, 9GB has been downloaded of 36GB. Normally 36GB would be a matter of minutes.

What's changed on the system: as far as I'm aware, just the installation of a new hard drive, that had no problem with Steam games for a couple days, so it wasn't the cause out of the box, but then this started.

It's remarkably consistent. I did a 1GB before this, it took a few hours IIRC. What's seen are spikes in Steam, where it shows some network/disk activity and then none.

The disk isn't showing errors from the utilities I've run, but I haven't run a read/write test yet.

The internet speed test shows 142 MB - normal (actually, upgraded a couple months ago).

Configuration: Windows 10 64, 512MB SSD boot drive, WD Black HD, Comcast cable modem.

Note: One member identified I'm using secondary SATA motherboard ports for drives. I haven't spent the time to change that yet, but doubt its being a central role because it's been that way for years, while the problem didn't happen.

Some things run fine or mostly fine; on the other hand, Elder Scrolls Online won't log in, getting the same error whether the right or wrong password is used. GOG Galaxy gets a connection error and exits. Epic Games client won't recognize my password.

I'd like to come up with plausible ideas to start to think of ways to diagnose and fix, better than 'replace everything one part at a time'.
 

Craig234

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Apr 23, 2006
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Is this just game downloading or other downloads as well? Is anything else on the network also slowing down at the same time?

I haven't really tried other downloads. Other clients either won't run or log in. I just have that internet speed test. The only other thing on the network I think is the tv, and it usually shows streaming fine.