Question Why is my download speed super slow

[Ryan2525]

I recently upgraded my internet plan to 250 mbs of download speed and there's a about 6 devices in my family so its understandable if I don't reach that amount. On my brother laptop, he gets around 150 mbs of download speed and he is connected wireless (does not have ethernet) and every other device gets around 100 mbs of download speed which is great (they are all connected wireless). However on my PC which is the newest device is only getting 2 mbs of download speed and is connected with ethernet. Im using cat5e and my adapter is TRENDnet tpl-60e which is good.

I have already tried to connect through a different port in my modem, reseting my modem, and disabling and enabling my Ethernet

The methods that i seen and I haven't tried yet is going into command prompt and disabling global autotuning, disabling large send offload, and buy new cat5e wires.
But even if 1 of the 3 methods i haven't tried yet were to be the problem, it shouldn't affect my download speed that bad to the point where im getting 2mbsand should be get ATLEAST over a 100mbs of download speed.

I dont know if this changes but anything, but my ping is really low and better than all the devices in my family. it's just my download and upload speed which is very low.

I tried various speed test and I roughly get around 15 ping, 2-7 mbs of download speed, 5-7 mbs of upload speed and as mentioned earlier the download speed is very slow compared to the rest of the other devices.

Any solutions?

 

[Lutfij]

Can you try and work with all devices disconnected from the network with only your desktop connected? See if that changes your experience of the speeds. What is the make and model of your home router that's wirelessly handling other devices? Might want to also check out the firmware version for your adapter.

 

[rgd1101]

new pc? spec?

 

[kanewolf]

Does your ethernet cable use any in-wall cabling? Is your ethernet cable a "flat" cable?
Wat link speed is shown for you ethernet connection?

 

[Ryan2525]

Can you try and work with all devices disconnected from the network with only your desktop connected? See if that changes your experience of the speeds. What is the make and model of your home router that's wirelessly handling other devices? Might want to also check out the firmware version for your adapter.

Disconnecting all devices from the network doesn't seem to boost my speed. The my home router is cisco linksys e4200 and when I was checking if my network adapters were up to date I found 8 WAN miniport which seems a bit odd to me and I have no clue if this means something.

 

[Ryan2525]

new pc? spec?

PC is about 2 years old, I don't know much about PCs and I got someone else to recommend me parts and build it for me. But from what I can tell

-Windows 10 pro
-Processor Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-6700K CPU @ 4.00GHz, 4008 Mhz, 4 Core(s), 8 Logical Processor(s)
-16 gb of installed ram
-Graphics card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 3GB
-Motherboard: ASUS z170 - A

 

[Ryan2525]

Does your ethernet cable use any in-wall cabling? Is your ethernet cable a "flat" cable?
Wat link speed is shown for you ethernet connection?

It uses in-wall cabling and my cable is a round cable. My ethernet speed says 100 mbps

 

[kanewolf]

It uses in-wall cabling and my cable is a round cable. My ethernet speed says 100 mbps

OK, so with 100Mb link speed, you are limited to 11MB download speed. That is the first thing to remember that network speeds are megabits and download speeds are in megabytes. If you were using speedtest, then that speed is in megabits.

To take advantage of the full 250Mb WAN speed, you need to get gigabit link speed for your computer. Since you use in-wall cabling, it is quite possible it is the problem. You should check the wall plugs to verify that 8 wires are connected and that the color code follows the 568 (A or B, but B is preferred) color code.

Also, if you have a motherboard with a killer network adapter, the software that is installed with it can ruin your performance.

 

[Ryan2525]

OK, so with 100Mb link speed, you are limited to 11MB download speed. That is the first thing to remember that network speeds are megabits and download speeds are in megabytes. If you were using speedtest, then that speed is in megabits.

To take advantage of the full 250Mb WAN speed, you need to get gigabit link speed for your computer. Since you use in-wall cabling, it is quite possible it is the problem. You should check the wall plugs to verify that 8 wires are connected and that the color code follows the 568 (A or B, but B is preferred) color code.

Also, if you have a motherboard with a killer network adapter, the software that is installed with it can ruin your performance.

Sorry for the late reply as I had to wait for my new Ethernet powerline adapter to come in.

I definitely got confused between Mb and MB and that was the issue so thank you for clearing that up.

It took a while but yesterday my new gigabit Ethernet powerline adapter came in. My speeds have improved from around 10Mbps to 45Mbps. I now get a download speed of around 6MB which is definitely an improvement. However im still not getting close to what im paying for so i find that a waste of money. So i did more digging. I came to a conclusion that if the issue isn't wall cabling or my Ethernet, it must be either my PC or my router.


I found out my router (cisco linksys e4200) is 802.11n and reading some articles online I found out that it has 2.4ghz and 5ghz meaning that my router supports 500mbps+?
The online manual indicated that the router has four Fast Ethernet (10/100) ports. So I would assume that 802.11n supporting up to 500mbps+ would be only wireless devices which would explain why my brother laptop can get up to 150mbps. However, since im connected through ethernet and the port is 10/100 I will not get the full potential of my 250mbps plan?

To clarify, if everything i just said is correct, my router is still pretty good but it's just the ports. Is there a way i can get a 10/100/1000 port or do i need to buy a whole new router.

One more thing, my desktop ethernet status says the speed is 1.0 gbps so I would assume my PC can support gigabit ethernet and so my PC isnt the issue?

 

[kanewolf]

All the references I can find for an E4200 show gigabit ethernet ports. Even the official manual, in the specs portion shows the E4200 as gigabit. There are multiple routers listed in the specs section of the manual. Check the top of the page for the 4200.

If you log into your router, what does the status page say about the speed of the ports?

 

[Ryan2525]

All the references I can find for an E4200 show gigabit ethernet ports. Even the official manual, in the specs portion shows the E4200 as gigabit. There are multiple routers listed in the specs section of the manual. Check the top of the page for the 4200.

If you log into your router, what does the status page say about the speed of the ports?

My bad, I was reading the wrong model. This is a old router my mom bought and she doesn't have the router password so I can not log in.

Is there any more solutions to further increase my download speed.

 

[kanewolf]

First thing would be to factory reset the router so that you can login.

 

[Ryan2525]

First thing would be to factory reset the router so that you can login.

Everything seems normal and specs/speed is the same as it says on the manual.
Perhaps the issue is that the router is 10 years old?