Board 8 > Trying to understand internet speeds....

(+) Yeah! (+)

On my router's app, it says my download speed is 600 Mbp/s .
On internet speed tests (like speedtest.net), it says my download speed is 320~ Mbp/s.
When I'm downloading something on my desktop, and check my router, it says my desktop is downloading at 300~ Mbps.

But when I download something, I'm downloaded around 30 MB/s. I know MB are different than Mbps, but from what I understand at 600 Mbps I should download around 75 MB/s . BUT, 300 Mbp/s is around 37 MB/s. So my download speed IS close to what the online speed tests say.

I know that online speed tests and be misleading, or rather how they measure speed may not be the same as your actual download speed for things like Steam. But I have this issue where my router says I should be downloading faster than what I'm actually doing. Is this discrepancy to be expected? Is the test my router does not really a true gauge of download speed? Or is this something I should look into?

For one thing, you only can download as fast as the external source sends data. Your download speed is like an upper limit or capacity. I don't know where the inconsistency comes in between the router and PC speed test specifically, but I checked and there is a discrepancy in mine as well for both upload and download speeds. I'm not sure there's a problem.

There could be speed limiters on Steams end to allow more people to download without overloading their network

Also ISPs have been known to whitelist Speedtest sites to allow your equipment to go as fast as possible on those but not allow them to elsewhere to create the illusion that youre not being throttled

I see, so what Im seeing may be expected. Still, Id love to see my speeds being closer what Im actually paying for.

Once I got to 100 mbps, it really became the realm of 'who cares'

They changed my speed from 100 to 300 a couple months ago and it has not made a material difference in my life.

Also keep in mind that tests can be a bit random, so running multiple may help. But I was seeing like 90% of the router, not 50. Are you using an ethernet cable, or wifi?

Yeah, Wifi would be a likely candidate to drop you from 600mbp/s to 300mpb/s.

I had 1 GB speeds but was only getting 300~ or so with wifi and that is with massive packet loss if I wasn't right next to the router.
The faster speeds you have, the better equipment you need to take advantage of your faster speeds. Stock modems and routers your ISP provides you with are not good enough.

Ive bought my own router and modem. These speeds come from my desktop, which is on Ethernet to the router. Now i guess the router could be slowing things down, but then why would the routers own speed test be higher?

Lord_Ephraim posted...

I had 1 GB speeds but was only getting 300~ or so with wifi and that is with massive packet loss if I wasn't right next to the router.
The faster speeds you have, the better equipment you need to take advantage of your faster speeds. Stock modems and routers your ISP provides you with are not good enough.

This is not always true (actually if your isp is decent its probably not true)

Anyways theres a lot of reasons for this
-Bad cable
-multiple devices splitting the speed
-router firewall might be impacting the speed

Your router is likely giving you the speed before firewall while your computer is after

What internet speed are you actually paying for?

Your router may be telling you what it is capable of downloading/sending but not what you are paying for.

You can also try plugging directly into your modem and seeing what speed you get.

Edit: Also don't do this for long, I would literally just do this to run speedtest as your bypassing your routers firewall

Im paying for 600 mbps, which is what my routers speed test shows.

connecting directly to the router is an interesting test to try, I might just give it a shot. But if my routers firewall IS impacting speed, is there anything that can be done about that?

GANON1025 posted...

But if my routers firewall IS impacting speed, is there anything that can be done about that?

Realistically unless you have a bad router or a poorly configured firewall it probably isn't your only issue, its most likely a combination of things, mainly other devices.

Also one thing to note. You are very likely not paying for 600 mbps but "up to 600 mbps". Basically ISPs generally don't guarantee the speed 24/7. It sounds like thats probably not what your seeing but just to keep in mind

and a firewall will pretty much always cause at least *some* slowdown. Depending on how secure it is it could be relatively minor or a large slowdown. You might have bought a router that has some super strict security which could be the problem as well

I see. Seems like the speeds I'm getting a probably what I should expect, and I definitely shouldn't expect to get exactly 600mbps. ... There's no way ethernet cable itself is the issue, right? I mean its a few years old, but surely that wouldn't matter.

There are different standards for ethernet cables, but the newer cat5s can do 1Gbps, and I don't think they're all that recent.

cat5 can do 100mbps and cat5e can do 1gbps.

Some routers can also only handle a limited bandwidth to a single device. But with multiple devices on the wifi, you can take up the full bandwidth of your router. Wifi in general has huge variation in speed depending on how far it is, how many walls are in the way, other nearby devices etc