Question Upload Speeds 3x Higher Than Download Speeds (Wi-Fi)

[TehMidcap]

This is using Netgear WNR2000v5. Firmware Version V1.0.0.70 .

My download speeds are barely good enough to stream certain video (couldn't watch anything on HBO Now without buffering issues). Granted, this is a household where there is a PS4, a PC, two Rokus, and about 5 Androids that are consuming bandwidth intermittently.

Here's a series of speed tests from last few days with pretty consistent results, pretty much all of which between I have tried tinkering with various wireless/WAN/QoS settings.


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I know this router may be slightly outdated but surely it can handle consistent speeds of around 5mbps.

Actual downloads strangely seem to vary depending on service even with QoS and WMM off (for example, downloading torrents or downloading through internet browser crawl and I'm lucky to get 100kbps but downloading through Steam Client usually goes at around 300kbps).

I know a bit about networking but not a lot. Am I getting some kind of wireless interference or something (and yes I have tried switching between channels auto, 1, 6, and 11)? Bad wire between modem and router? Something else I'm not thinking of? Is there any statistics I can produce that could help anyone narrow down my problem?

 

[bill001g]

Did you test this on ethernet to see if it might be your ISP causing the issue.

 

[TehMidcap]

I have not (mostly because it's a pain as I'm on desktop, upstairs, and the router is downstairs).

 

[AtkinsFriendly]

So you're sitting on 2.4Ghz which a ton of items run on. Baby Monitors, Wireless Home Phones, Cameras, etc. All these could be interference, not to mention all your neighbors running on 2.4 also. If you just browse for WiFi in your area, do you have a lot of SSID's that pop up (a lot being 10+)?

That being said, 2.4ghz is pretty resilient when it comes to distance and penetration through walls but hard surfaces can be tricky. Do speeds get better if you take, lets say your android, and get closer to the router?

 

[TehMidcap]

So just in case anyone else runs into the same problem and is mentally challenged like me...

I tried the speedtest on my android right up next to the router, lo and behold the results were marginally better but just about equal.

Then something dawned on me that should have long ago. I have been messing with the router, resetting it, trying various settings for optimization... Not ONCE did I think of the modem.

I turned the modem off and left off for a few minutes, as well as untangled the bit of mess the ethernet cords and power cords had gotten into... and viola.

My download speeds are literally 10x faster now.

Now if I could only find out what took my brain so long to think about resetting the modem (I'd been having this problem for about a week now), run some sort of diagnostic on that, but I suppose that's a different forum on a different website...