I highly doubt the router is his problem...stuff like this is typical of direcway... advertised speed is 500/50 I think, but I have yet to see it on their website...
Pinging testmy.net [67.18.179.85] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=1001ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=1247ms TTL=46
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=677ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=787ms TTL=46
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=1576ms TTL=46
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=1466ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=978ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=698ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=725ms TTL=46
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=960ms TTL=46
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=706ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=940ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=681ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=1068ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=754ms TTL=46
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=776ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=1066ms TTL=46
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=718ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=1235ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=730ms TTL=46
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=747ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=764ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=1149ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=764ms TTL=45
Reply from 67.18.179.85: bytes=32 time=798ms TTL=46
Ping statistics for 67.18.179.85:
Packets: Sent = 25, Received = 25, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 677ms, Maximum = 1576ms, Average = 920ms
also... powercycling might help occasionally by getting him on a proxy that isn't as overloaded...