[SOLVED] What kind of router do I need to help with bufferbloat?

[turtleshead1]

I've been having an issue where my ping spikes when other people in the house are downloading/uploading something at the same time. It's been driving me crazy and has made "competitive" gaming extremely frustrating. I tried to work out what the issue was and it seems I have an issue with bufferbloat. The only suggestion I really see to fix this issue is to get a fancy router (sorry for the lack of technical language, I'm pretty clueless). But this wasn't always an issue for me so I thought I would just ask BT for a replacement router as our old one was about 5 years old (it's just the original BT Smart Hub). But this changed nothing. So I'm a bit concerned that I'm going to buy an expensive router and it still won't fix the issue as wouldn't I have always had this issue if it was a problem with the router? Unless the bandwith we consume in the househould has just slowly increased over the years to a breaking point?

So unless people here have other suggestions, I guess I'll have to buy a new router, the only problem is I have no idea what to look for. I obviously don't care about all the high speed marketing mumbo jumbo they put in the titles, my connection is capped at about 50 mbps anyway. I just want a router that can manage my connections so that I have a smooth and consistent experience, I know that gaming doesn't require high speeds and nobody streams 4k video in the house. But one of the only sites I can find that talks about fixing bufferbloat links to a Router that only sells to the US and says most of the main brands pay no attention to bufferbloat. Can someone please tell me what router to throw money at as a UK resident, or tell me what I need to do, because It's driving me crazy not being able to play games online anymore.

Thanks.

P.S. I'm connected via LAN on my PC (which I use to game) but every other device in the house connects via WiFi.

 

[bill001g]

The feature you want is called fq-codel. I am not sure you can get it with any factory firmware. One of most stable ways to get it is to load merlin on a asus router that supports it. You can of course buy other more commercial router from say ubiquiti.

You are going to be much better off talking to other people and getting them to limit their downloads. It also does a very poor job if the users are using torrent. Torrent uses a bunch a small data streams and these forms of qos will in some ways favor this traffic over a larger single stream. Things like steam and some other game download also use multistream downloads.

If you have to use the router to do it you need as much CPU clock speed as you can get. QoS run only on a single process so multicpu helps less than raw clock rate.

Because of the way data rates are calculated you need to artificially cap your bandwidth at about 80% of what you buy from your ISP. This is related to data burst rates compared to average rates. This feature works rather well on connections your size but you are going to have to sacrifice the 20% to get it to run well. This may not matter to games but it will chop your speedtest results and maximum download speeds even when nobody else is using the connection.

I would try talking to others in the house to try to resolve this using other methods as a first option.

 

[turtleshead1]

The feature you want is called fq-codel. I am not sure you can get it with any factory firmware. One of most stable ways to get it is to load merlin on a asus router that supports it. You can of course buy other more commercial router from say ubiquiti.

You are going to be much better off talking to other people and getting them to limit their downloads. It also does a very poor job if the users are using torrent. Torrent uses a bunch a small data streams and these forms of qos will in some ways favor this traffic over a larger single stream. Things like steam and some other game download also use multistream downloads.

If you have to use the router to do it you need as much CPU clock speed as you can get. QoS run only on a single process so multicpu helps less than raw clock rate.

Because of the way data rates are calculated you need to artificially cap your bandwidth at about 80% of what you buy from your ISP. This is related to data burst rates compared to average rates. This feature works rather well on connections your size but you are going to have to sacrifice the 20% to get it to run well. This may not matter to games but it will chop your speedtest results and maximum download speeds even when nobody else is using the connection.

I would try talking to others in the house to try to resolve this using other methods as a first option.

Thanks for the reply. What do you suggest I ask others in the house to do? It's not like they're heavy users. At most they will be streaming one HD film at a time. Other than that it would just be casual browsing or maybe a face time call or something. And what would be the reason I require fq-codel when I have friends with similar setups. Is it something about the amount of devices, the router, the connection speed or what?

I watched a quick video about setting up Merlin here:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84PeCLiS52M&ab_channel=WirelesSHack

So would I just install the firmware like they do here and be done? Or would I need to fiddle with the router settings to cap my speed to about 80% after too?

 

[bill001g]

My internet connection is so fast running any form of QoS will artificially cap it because of cpu load. Most router have a issue going over 100mbps running the methods that stop bufferbloat. These are very advanced methods compared to simple qos where you define a cap per user.

It was pretty easy there was some option called adaptive qos where you set upload and download rates and pick fq-codel but they may have changed this since I have not looked at it in a while since I can't use it. You can try different amounts but 80% seems to work for everyone you could try maybe 85% but it may burst over this.

I don't watch videos but merlin load the same as a factory image, you point to the file and it loads.

Are you sure you actually have bufferbloat problem. I hope you did not run the test on DSL reports and think that actually means you have a issue. It will report bufferbloat on even the fastest connections . It is purely a tool to test you have correctly setup things like fa-codel. Way too much false information on gamer sites.

The only reason you get bufferbloat is if you have overloaded your data connection either download or upload. If the connection is not overloaded then any form of QoS will do nothing because data is not being discarded or delayed. From what you describe you will not overload a 50mbps connection.

 

[turtleshead1]

@bill001g Well I did run the test on DSL reports but the bufferbloat it shows seems to correlate as I get really high ms when other people are using up bandwidth and always get a bad score for it. But if that's not the issue, what else could it be? I've replaced the router, and it's not my PC as I can obtain the same results on my phone. And the connection seems fine once everybody else is asleep.

 

[bill001g]

You can try it I guess and see if it fixes it. You do not need a fancy router when you have a slow internet connection. The only large issue is you need to have a device acting as a modem when you dsl. When you have a DSL modem in the device it is almost impossible to load any form of third party firmware because of licensing issues with the DSL modem software. You would either need a dsl modem or a router running in bridge mode and then run PPPoE on the asus router. You could I suppose run router behind router.

The other nice thing about asus merlin is it has the ability to show you how much traffic is running from each machine. You have to disable a hardware nat function for it to actually work. This is a huge issue for faster connections but it fine for DSL. This will quickly show you if you are exceeding your bandwidth and even need QoS

From your conflicting descriptions you may not actually know what the other users are doing . Even a 4k video feed only uses 25mbps and web surfing uses very little. If you had say 3 or 4 people watching lots of hd video or someone downloading large games I could see overload your connection. If the connection is fine when other people are not using it you need to find out what they are doing.

I bet if you run the dsl report test when you are the only user it will still show bufferbloat. I know I can make it show it on a fiber 1000/1000 line with one machine connected.

 

[richb-hanover]

If you want to solve the lag, check Item #2 on What Can I Do About Bufferbloat: It lists several manufacturers selling commercial routers that solve bufferbloat. I use an IQrouter - setup is simple, and it just works.

Other posters have suggested asking others not to use the network: this is a poor strategy. Even if they're only downloading a webpage, or uploading a photo, it maxes out the link for a brief period. That makes a momentary blip in lag/latency, and if it comes at the wrong time, you miss your shot.

And the reason that DSLReports Speed Test (http://dslreports.com) and other good speed test programs such as Waveform Bufferbloat test (https://www.waveform.com/tools/bufferbloat) often detect high latency is that they're designed to be worst-case tests.

Idle latency is fine, but if actual "working conditions" (say during web page downloads or photo uploads) cause the link to be maxed out - even briefly - those tools will detect bad lag and report it.

 

[richb-hanover]

Alas... I just re-read your note, and realize you're in the UK. It doesn't look as if you can get an IQrouter from Amazon there. You can also learn about flashing another router with new firmware, either the Merlin firmware for Asus, or OpenWrt for any inexpensive router.

 

[gggplaya]

Just be careful with an inexpensive router, they typically have cheaper ARM SOC processors, which won't be able to run the FQ_Codel algorithm up to 50mbps.

1. Make sure you have the ability to set your BT router into bridged mode so that you can actually use your own router. Setting it to bridged mode turns it into a modem instead of a router.
2. The cheapest rAsus router that supports Merlin I can find is 130pounds, and I found this on amazon for 20 pounds more at 150pounds. The AC86u is a great router, I've owned 2 of them and gave them away to friends and family loaded with Merlin, running the CAKE algorithm. https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B075WFL15D

1. Download and install Merlin. Merlin is built on the official opensource code of the Asus router. So it installs just like the official firmware, nothing fancy to do. https://www.asuswrt-merlin.net/
2. Plug the BT router which is now set to bridge mode, into the WAN port of your new asus router.
3. Set up the router like you would normally.
4. Go to QOS and enable it, use the CAKE algorithm, set it to automatic. No need to set bandwidth limits, automatic works decently in my testing. Cake is the next evolution of the FQ_Codel algorithm.
5. This AC86u router is good for about 300-350maximum traffic shaping using the Cake or FQ_Codel algorithms. At 50mbps you should be fine, but if in the future you ever get fiber to the home, your router won't be able to achieve above 300-350mbps.

Each HD stream of movies is about 6-8mbps, and if someone is updating their game console or computer that can fully saturate your internet. You'll lag the entire time! Cake will carve out bandwidth for everyone in an amicable and equitable manner.

 

[turtleshead1]

@gggplaya Thanks for your reply. I thought I'd try the TP-Link Archer A7 AC1750 before bringing out the big guns and wasting time/money as it's price seemed reasonable and provides QoS settings. So far my bufferbloat rating has gone from a C-F to a consistent A by prioritising my PC in the QoS settings. But we haven't connected every device in the house yet so I'm still holding my breath. Thanks for the detailed reply though. If this setup fails in the long run I'll just have to splurge the money for a router such as the one you recommended.

As for your suggestion on putting the router into bridged mode, my BT hub doesn't support that option, but at the moment it seems to be fine. I know it's not ideal but if everything seems to be working okay for our somewhat casual use, is there anything I should be concerned about? I changed the pass on the old hub so everybody is booted off. Thanks again

 

[gggplaya]

@gggplaya Thanks for your reply. I thought I'd try the TP-Link Archer A7 AC1750 before bringing out the big guns and wasting time/money as it's price seemed reasonable and provides QoS settings. So far my bufferbloat rating has gone from a C-F to a consistent A by prioritising my PC in the QoS settings. But we haven't connected every device in the house yet so I'm still holding my breath. Thanks for the detailed reply though. If this setup fails in the long run I'll just have to splurge the money for a router such as the one you recommended.

As for your suggestion on putting the router into bridged mode, my BT hub doesn't support that option, but at the moment it seems to be fine. I know it's not ideal but if everything seems to be working okay for our somewhat casual use, is there anything I should be concerned about? I changed the pass on the old hub so everybody is booted off. Thanks again

I wouldn't waste my time with the A7. Regular QOS doesn't seem to be much if any help when your bandwidth is saturated. You really need FQ_Codel or Cake to do actual traffic shaping, which will actually throttle other users in an equitable manner. Regular QOS doesn't do that, it won't traffic shape because it's too cpu intensive.

If the BT hub can't do bridged mode, you'll be double NAT'd, which some game servers won't like at all. Also, I don't think QOS will even work unless it's the main NAT of the network. I did a little research and it appears that none of the FTTC providers can do bridged mode which is really dumb because many people want to use their own wifi systems. I guess because homes are typically smaller in these neighborhoods, they probably don't have as much range problems as we do in the U.S. where most people's homes are huge in comparison.

Is Virgin Media available where you live, they can do what they call MODEM MODE and allow you to use your own rotuer: https://www.virginmedia.com/help/virgin-media-hub-modem-mode

 

[turtleshead1]

I wouldn't waste my time with the A7. Regular QOS doesn't seem to be much if any help when your bandwidth is saturated. You really need FQ_Codel or Cake to do actual traffic shaping, which will actually throttle other users in an equitable manner. Regular QOS doesn't do that, it won't traffic shape because it's too cpu intensive.

If the BT hub can't do bridged mode, you'll be double NAT'd, which some game servers won't like at all. Also, I don't think QOS will even work unless it's the main NAT of the network. I did a little research and it appears that none of the FTTC providers can do bridged mode which is really dumb because many people want to use their own wifi systems. I guess because homes are typically smaller in these neighborhoods, they probably don't have as much range problems as we do in the U.S. where most people's homes are huge in comparison.

Is Virgin Media available where you live, they can do what they call MODEM MODE and allow you to use your own rotuer: https://www.virginmedia.com/help/virgin-media-hub-modem-mode

Yeah we have Virgin here. I was thinking about switching to them anyway but we're locked in a contract with BT for another year. Could I just cut out the BT hub altogether and get something like this with a DSL port?: https://www.amazon.co.uk/ASUS-DSL-AC68U-Dual-Band-Wireless-Connections/dp/B00O27PHGY/

I wonder why my connection seems better now then. Is it possible this new router has improved things or do you think I will inevitably go back to the same issues once all devices are connected?

 

[gggplaya]

I wouldn't buy an ALL-in-one unit, I don't think Merlin firmware is supported on those.

If BT allows you to use your own modem, then yes I would buy an ADSL+ modem to use on their network. That's what I do, I use my own modem and router.

Actually, it turns out BT has a modem on their webpage, I would just use that since you know it'll be compatible: https://shop.bt.com/products/draytek-vigor-130-adsl2--vdsl-modem-v130-k-B230.html

In my experience with routers using normal QOS, turning them on and off didn't seem to make much of a difference, at least not a difference you could notice. They don't really do anything for you when your connection is saturated.