<First Post>

I live near Charleston SC, I recently aquired cable modem service through a local cable internet provider (Home Telephone).  Since I am not a super serious internet user I got thier 256kbit upload/ 1mbit download service, as patheic as this sounds I thought if I got approx. 70% of advertised it would suit my needs.  I ran quite a few tests from various sites on peak and off peak hours, and here is an example of one of my better results.....

::::::::::.. Download Stats ..::::::::::
Connection is:: 354 Kbps about 0.4 Mbps (tested with 386 KB)
Download Speed is:: 43 kB/sec
Tested From:: http://www.testmy.net/
Bottom Line:: 6 times faster than 56K you can download 1MB in 23.81 second(s)
Validation Link:: http://testmy.net/cgi-bin/get.cgi?Test_ID=VPPONL8DW

I have seen speeds as slow as 186 kbits/sec, which equals to approx. 23.3 kbytes/sec transfer speed.  This is pretty pathetic.....

I done a few calculations and I thought this is what I should getting....

1000kbits/sec divided by eight should equal to approx. 125 kbytes/sec transfer speed.  With an overhead of 13% deducted, It should leave me at 108.8 kbytes/sec transfer speed.

Heres the messed up part.  If I use better result, I am getting 39.5% of my advertised speed.  And my lower end result, 21.4% of advertised.  This really sucks.  Since I am stuck with this provider (only one in area), is there anything I can do?  What do you think is the problem here?  Am I screwed?

My internet settings are as follows...
Receive Window (RWIN): 256960
Window Scaling:  0N
Path MTU Discovery:  OFF
RFC1323 Window Scaling:  ON
RFC1323 Time Stamping:  ON
Selective Acks:  ON
MSS requested:  1460
TTL:  unknown
TTL remaining:  118

My computer is a home built computer with...
Gigabyte 8INXP Mobo
P4 2.53GHz CPU
1M Corsair DDR333 (2 sticks)
ATI Radeon 9700 PRO
120GB Maxtor ATA133
Lite-on 52/?/52 CDR
Sony DVD-ROM
Network Anywhere 10/100 LAN Card
Toshiba DAZ8821F Cable Modem

I have tried playing with my RWIN size--- no luck.  Two days before I got the cable modem I reformatted my HD and installed a fresh copy of XP along with Defender Pro 5-in-1 (recommended by Computer shopper).  After I got the modem I immediately downloaded all of the latest drivers for my equipment.  Im at a loss here.  What do I need to do?  Is there anything I can recommend for my providers techs to do?

Thanks for all your help, and for reading my long post.

Griff

[quote="SGTGriffReceive Window (RWIN): 256960[/quote]

That's quite high for such as relative slow connection. using a Half or a fourth of your current RWIN will problably up your speed, especially if your isp doesn't provide a very stable connection.



Good computer, it won't slow your internet down, except for the network card perhaps. I have never heard of that brand.



That's your firewall? ZoneAlarm is a great choice as well.

Your problem might be spyware, stealing your bandwidth. Run a test with Spysweeper, spybot and/or ad-aware and then check your speed here again.

Thanks for the replys guys....

Vanburen- I tried to do the tracert www.testmy.net but was unsuccessful because for some reason I kept timing out.  I had my firewall disabled.  But I did do the tweak test and my results are as follows.

http://ttester.broadbandreports.com/tweak/block:4a520b?service=cable&speed=1000&os=winXP&via=normal

RTB - Defender 5-1 is 5 different programs (anti-virus,anti-spam, anti-popup, firewall, and some utilities).  I bought it at... here it goes.. Walmart.  It seems to work great tho.  Ill try to download spybot tonite.... It will probably take me forever, but Im getting used to it now....  

Swimmer- I do not have a router between myself and the modem.

Tweak Test results:

http://ttester.broadbandreports.com/tweak/block:43ea137?service=cable&speed=1000&os=winXP&via=normal

RTB:  I downloaded spybot s&d.  I done a scan. all is well..

Correction to previous post: my LAN card is a Network Everywhere (Lincsys NC100) 10/100 bps.

I double checked my winXP firewall was disabled.  I turned off the Defender Firewall, Popup blocker, and antivirus.  Tried a tracert to www.testmy.net no luck.  Just for kicks, I tried tracert to www.lightfighter.com and other sites I visit, same thing.  WTH?  I dont know whats up with that.  Also tried ping -t to same sites... all timed out.  The only thing I can do tracert to successfully is my providers website www.hometelco.com my results are as follows (I dont know how to cut and paste from the command prompt window so I will try to improvise).....

1 29ms 7ms 10ms     10.2.0.1
2 *       *       *         request timed out
3 26ms 8ms 14ms     www.hometelco.com [204.116.72.138]

Trace Complete

That one looks better, less packetloss

You can try this tweak guide i made once to get a optimal RWIN, the problem is tto find out your ping to your isp.........

http://testmy.net/forum/index.php?topic=99

But something between 10 and 30 ms can be normal for cable.

if you use 20 ms in that RWIN calculator and MSS 1460 and bandwidth 1 Mbps you will get a RWIN value 18980

Try that, and post speed and tweak score again.

somehow you got some packetloss, smaller RWIN will help ya.

to change RWIN do like this

Open adjuster find TcpWindowSize change it from 49640 to 18980 and click save to registry.

Now reboot your pc, also try unplugging your cablemodem for a few seconds and plug it in before you start up your pc again.

Good luck

VanBuren

Heres what happened on the tweak test.

http://ttester.broadbandreports.com/tweak/block:23f0bb7?service=cable&speed=1000&os=winXP&via=normal

Dern over 30 hops to testmy.net

Where do you live?

I suggest you increase your DefaultTTL value in adjuster, set it to 128 and hit save to registry.

Reboot and try making a tracert again, also make a new tweak test and post result here.

ps: Dont forget to disable firewall during test

VanBuren