DL speeds question

[celticfang]

Okay, I'm in need of a geek, since my go to guy is sleeping

Basically, I can torrent/download from Frostwire fine (300-500 kb/s), but browsing/youtube watching/file downloading is really slow (1-50 kb/s), restarting the router does nothing,

[Matty]

Anything else running in the background? MSN or ICQ or similar programs will decrease performance. Or if ur also gaming while downloading stuff in the background

[celticfang]

Nope, nothing running besides Avast and Flashget

[Pie]

Most media streaming sites, webpages and file hosts will cap their uploads. This is probably your issue. Also some ISP's will throttle the connection to sites like youtube since they can easily suck large amounts of bandwidth. Torrents on the other hand, are not restricted as long as they are setup correctly. And with the speeds you are claiming, I would say that yours is.

[celticfang]

Strange, tried earlier and got 400 kb/s DL from Megaupload

Am on wireless tho

[cobra96]

at least ur not on dial up like some of us 8-|

[Pie]

Could be ISP throttling during prime time hours...

[gcountach]

You're not running the torrents the same time you're trying to watch youtube, are you? Where are you able to determine the DL speed of youtube video? Youtube may have their DL rates capped. If they know a video is a certain bitrate, they wouldn't need to give you 400k/sec DL speed to it when say 50k is enough to buffer the video while you're watching it in real time. Just a theory though.

[celticfang]

Nope, for instance now I only have Opera and MWO forum/Youtube open

[Wraith]

Close everything, take a speed test:

http://www.speakeasy.net/speedtest/

Youtube is usually slow, and I have 25mb/15mb. It depends on the site you're using.

If you're on wireless, ensure your router is somewhat locked down from anyone in the neighborhood, building (whatever people may be close to you).

You should probably give more information about your ISP, whether you're sharing the connection with others, etc.

This is in addition to Pie's and gcountach's remarks about ISP throttling (or overload during peak), and sites like youtube being extremely limited on how much bandwidth they provide.

You're using flashget, so it sounds like the download speeds you're talking about are streaming downloads; these are usually very slow (as explained by gcountach).

[celticfang]

Did a speed test

1.10mb upload
0.24mb download

ISP is TalkTalk, shared with my fam (so I don't really mind as long as we all get on).

I downloaded a TV episode from Megaupload earlier (220mb)

Min 16 kb/s
Max: 421 kb/s
Usually round the 250-300kb/s range

[gcountach]

Did a speed test

1.10mb upload
0.24mb download

ISP is TalkTalk, shared with my fam (so I don't really mind as long as we all get on).

I downloaded a TV episode from Megaupload earlier (220mb)

Min 16 kb/s
Max: 421 kb/s
Usually round the 250-300kb/s range

Sounds like you weren't the only one using the net when you did that test. Keeping in mind that the website gives you megabits and not megabytes, you can convert between the two by dividing by 8. That would give you .24 / 8 = .03 which we times by 1024 to get in kilobytes so .03 * 1024 = ~31kb download speed. If you download goes up to 300k/sec, you should be getting closer to 2.5mb in that test as 2.5/8*1024= 320kb download speed. Given some of your recorded download speeds, it's likely faster than that. There's also a good possibility that your numbers are low because you are testing from servers inside the US. I would recommend using speedtest.net and doing the test a couple of times between 2-3 of the closest servers to rule that out.

None of this will likely change the fact your downloads from youtube are slow. I'm fairly sure there's not much to be done there due to what I explained previously. What I'm discussing now is why your test results are so much lower than they should be.

So, here's what I would do next:

1.) Try this website for checking your speeds: http://www.speedtest.net/

Wraiths link seems to only have servers in the US from what I can tell, whereas speedtest.net is international. Try 2-3 different servers and not just the 1 recommended for you.

1.) Check router settings. Make sure you are using some sort of encryption over your wireless network, preferably WPA (WPA2 would be even better). It may also be worth the effort, given your router has the ability, to use mac address filtering and only adding mac addresses of the computers in your house in addition to the encryption. This adds another layer of security to your network but does require you to change your router settings every time you have a new device you want to get on the internet with. That may cause mac address filtering to be impractical for your purposes. Encryption will require you to create an unique key and then type that key into all wireless devices you wish to connect to the internet with. While this is annoying, it is a MUST if you live anywhere close to other people. You'd be surprised the number of people out there that leech off other people's internet connection without detection, and they are able to do it because many people don't lock down their routers. All of this will be for nothing if the router's password is the default, so CHANGE IT IF IT'S THE DEFAULT PASSWORD!!!

Last, if you notice your computer is going slow or not loading pages, you should check your router lights. I know on my router that 1 is my computer, 2 is our other computer, and 3 is my 360. If websites are going slow and I'm not downloading, I check to see what lights are flashing as that will provide you with valuable information as to the cause of the problem. If none of them are flashing, it points to a possible problem with the internet itself. If one of them is blinking fast, they are most likely the ones causing the slow down.

[celticfang]

I'll try those

I'll do Speedtest in a sec and put the results here.

I've noticed my PS3 (hooked up to the router) can download a gig in about 45minutes, whereas it takes 2-3hrs for my PC....which gives me an idea, I can DL the videos to a PS3 and transfer them to the PC via a USB stick? :D