What's Your Internet Speed?

D

d2vasquez

New member
I recently ordered "high-speed" internet from Verizon and the nightmere of trying to figure out why my internet is sooooooo slow began. I have been on the phone pretty much every other day with the tech support at Verizon and they keep telling me everything looks great on their end but the speed tests show differently. In all faireness at 5:00 am the internet is awesome and through mid-morning but around 6:00 pm or 7:00 pm it just slows down to a crawl - even if no one in my home is using the internet.

My network is secured, I have cleaned up my computer, bought a new router, bought a new modem, had the phone lines checked, almost bought a new computer and still it is the same. So now before I go crazy I thought I would ask if others have a similar problem where your internet is slower during certain periods of the day? Or is it always consistent? Oh and is it cable or dsl? I have a contract with Verizon (ugh) so I am kind of stuck trying to figure it out so hoping for some feedback here.
 
I'm assuming you have DSL since Verizon is a phone company. With DSL your speed varies due to a couple of different reasons. One being how far away you are from the transformer and the other being how many users are on the line and how many are between you and it.

From the sound of things you are a good distance away with a lot of users inbetween you and the main. So when 6 or 7pm rolls around and everyone else is home and on their computers you speed will slow down.

If that isn't the case, then I have no idea what's going on.
 
I have broadband and my speeds slow in late evening when everyone is home & surfing the web. There is only so much space in the 'pipe' as it were and the more stuff rushing through it, the slower it gets. Possibly you have someone between you and the transformer who comes home and watches a streaming video at 6pm, or downloading/uploading lots of data, maybe backing up their HD to mozy or something. Possibly you are on an overloaded or at capacity terminal as well, then it will consistently have regular slowdowns at peak periods

My husband works for the networking side of our ISP and I'm at the outside range of the nearest receiver which is perilously near it's capacity. They need to add a unit to the tower to spread the useage out but with all the snow they can't get there to do it. So I get slow internet between 4p and 8p during the week and at random over the weekend.
 
Last edited:
I have Ntelos 3G wireless broadband, and the speed depends on where I am at that time. I am pretty far from the tower, although they are planning on building one closer to my house in the next six months, and Verizon DSL doesn't come as far out as I live. At my house, which is about 5 miles from town, I vary between dial-up speed and downloads from 45 to 100 kbs. Like everyone else said, it seems to depend on how many people are using it at that moment. For some reason, I find if I get off and then back on my speed increases. Now if I drive into town which is much closer to the tower, I have almost continual high speed and downloads between 75 kbs and 110 kbs. Then if I go into a larger town about 45 minutes from my house, my speed increases to 300 kbs.
 
We have cable internet through Comcast so it's a little different than DSL but we're in a new neighborhood and I definitely noticed a degradation in our service the more buildings they put in. I think they must have done something to fix it in the last few months because it's gotten a lot better but for awhile there were several slowdowns every day, some to the point where you flat out couldn't do anything. That still happens on occasion where it just seems to completely crap out for no reason but it does seem better.

I had them replace the modem and I took my router out of the picture and it didn't seem to matter. Sometimes restarting the modem and router would bring the internet back but I kind of think that was a coincidence more than anything else, haha.

Good luck figuring it out. Internet problems are so annoying. :thumbdown:
 
I figured there may be a traffic issue and asked Verizon to change me to a different server but they still want to trouble shoot everything else but try that. I know it is there end because I have one of the little MiFI mobile hotspot modems and get awesome speed if I used that for my home internet. Just that has a cap and I don't want to find myself going over and having to pay more fees.
 
I also have verizon and about 2 years ago had a similar problem and after a week on tech support they finally figured out it was a modem problem and sent me a new modem. That actually fixed the problem. Since then we've upgraded to a hi-speed Fios and now I'm not getting the speed that they advertised and sometimes not even close to that speed, but since it works pretty okay they have no solution for me. It's probably overcrowding on their system I guess. If you find out what solves it, I'd love to hear since it would be great to get better speed.

Here is the speed test site that I like to check my speed: http://www.speakeasy.net/speedtest/
 
Broadband through Time Warner here, but either the second or third level slower than full blown... I've noticed that it goes down the more people are home surfing... so when school is out... forgetaboutit! We, too, are in a newer subdivision...
 
I had a similar problem but it was continous. I had 4 tech guys come out here and they also replaced the gateway and all the cable and phone lines. It still was messed up. Turns out the last tech actually looked at the wall where the cable came out and the cable was bent at a 90 degree angle. All we had to do was pull it out a bit so it would slope and not bend and it was fine. I hope yours is an easy fix!
 
I am with BrightHouse (cable) and my speed varies but it is around 750 Kb per second. I have the lite version because it is the cheapest. Around christmas though my internet was slower then when I was on dial-up. Called the company and apparently ALOT of people were complaining. They even came on the news and told their customers that they would not be doing anything about it (meaning no discounts for customers for non-service) because it was not their fault. I went without internet or very little access for several days around christmas time though. Only suggestion I have is to try to do your internet surfing during off times so you are not so slow
 
Ok I feel slightly better than others are going through this too....I use that same site Julie to test my speed along with the one that Verizon wants you to use and it still says the same - it's slow. :) I wouldn't be surprised Amanda that it wasn't something like your issue. I will keep calling - they may get tired of me and just move me to a new server...lol. I did notice though in the community forums over at Verizon this is an issue all over the United States and not just my area I live in. Now if only I could stay up when others are in bed - life would be ideal for me and the internet....lol!
 
A lot of my internet usage is late at night so it's fine, but the speed of my Verizon DSL line is definitely inconsistent. There were a few days last week when it was taking 20 minutes to load each page! (Luckily, that's rare.) I ran the test Julie posted, and right now my DL speed is 2.87Mbps.
 
wow I wish I could get that speed right now my DL speed is 754 kbps which is better than usual - I usually have way less!
 
We have the highest package from Comcast (and pay through the nose for it :D) and grant it, it is 8AM on a Saturday but using the site Julie posted (I chose Seattle, WA) here were my speeds!!!

Download Speed: 17217 kbps (2152.1 KB/sec transfer rate)
Upload Speed: 3783 kbps (472.9 KB/sec transfer rate)
 
I've just checked mine, I'm from UK so I'm through Virgin Media, I pay for 20mb and I only get just under 3mb because of my location. I pay a fortune for it, too, I am going to phone them and get the next package down which will save me £10 a month. :glare:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Community platform by XenForo® © 2010-2026 XenForo Ltd.
Back
Top