iborkwood Posted October 3, 2018 CID Share Posted October 3, 2018 Hi, Would someone be able to offer me any insights as to what might be going on with my (poor) Internet speeds, please. I've provided all info that I think is relevant, but please let me know if anything else is needed... I am based in Perth, Western Australia. As s starting point, with the speed tests mentioned below, I have run them with wifi turned off on my modem, and with a single PC connected to the modem via an Ethernet cable. I had all my telephone cables ripped out and rewired in early 2017, and the only device connected to the telephone wall-socket is the modem - we don't have any landline telephones or other telecoms equipment. In November 2017, I upgraded to a 25Mbps Internet service (called NBN in Australia), and further increased my plan to 50Mbps in February 2018. I had been receiving consistently good results of 35-45Mbs (according to testmy.net) until recently. As of the last week or so, testmy.net is reporting my download speed as around 2Mbps, and my connection certainly 'feels' that slow! My provider, TPG has run through all the standard tests with me, but as far as they are concerned, there is no problem, no faults have been identified, and they have asked me to use speedtest.net which is indicating 40+Mbps. For reference, I have quite a lot of historical records on testmy.net, which show a drop from around 35Mbps down to an average of less than 2Mbps since last week (end of September 2018). I also occasionally test with Fast.com, which used to consistently indicate 40-45Mbps, but now indicates 20-25Mbps. If I run TPG's 'official' speed test now (NOT speedtest.net mentioned above), I get a consistent 5-8Mbps I am no expert on Internet connections and speed tests, and the only thing that I can see that might cause the difference in speed-test results, is the location of the server that is being used, as listed below: (I am in Perth, Western Australia) speedtest.net - (Perth) 40+Mpbs tpg.speedtestcustom.com (Sydney) 5-8Mbps fast.com (North Melbourne) 20-25Mbps testmy.net (not sure, but not Perth!) - 2-3Mbps Each of the above test-sites gave an UPLOAD speed of around 18Mbps, except testmy.net, which is reporting around 10Mbps upload. With my limited knowledge, the above tests indicate to me that there may be a bottleneck on TPG's Perth route, although it would appear that the route to North Melbourne (fast.com test) is not too bad. If anyone can offer next-steps for me, I'd be grateful. If it means moving to a different provider with a decent routing in Perth, so-be-it! Thanks, Innes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iborkwood Posted October 6, 2018 Author CID Share Posted October 6, 2018 Hi all, I didn't get a response to my original post, but I thought I'd provide an update... Having experienced nearly three weeks of having dropped from a stable 40Mpbs connection down to a consistent 1 to 2 Mbps, and my ISP telling me that there was nothing wrong with the connection that they were providing, my modem dropped the connection this morning... then came back up at 40Mbps. It's only been back up to that speed for a few hours, but it's looking promising! When the connection dropped, I used my mobile phone to check my ISP's status page and, lo and behold, the carrier was carrying out maintenance on my exchange all day yesterday. I then looked back to when my connection problems started nearly three weeks ago, and noticed that 'maintenance' had also been carried out the day before I started having problems. What an amazing coincidence! As it happens, a couple of hours before my connection went back to normal this morning, I had already decided to change ISPs (after 7 years) and had signed-up with another provider. I understand that changing ISPs was no guarantee of an improvement in connection, but I did not appreciate the service and information provided to me by my current ISP. Did it really not occur to mention to me, on the first day I contacted them, that my exchange had maintenance on the previous day? Was it really a coincidence that my problems started the day after my exchange had maintenance, and then stopped the day after further maintenance was carried out? My new provider (to which I should be connected next week) has good customer services reviews, and is AU$10/month cheaper than my current provider, so hopefully, I'll be getting the speeds I am paying for with good customer service, and a sizeable annual saving! Thank you to testmy.net for a great service. It's much appreciated. mudmanc4 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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