Okay, so network woes v3.0.
I've never had good luck with networking in my apartment, but it's recently gone from bad to worse. Story time!
I have Comcast cable, so ostensibly I'm supposed to get 6mpbs, but I've never seen more than 2.5mbps. That's much faster than my other local broadband options, so I'll suck it up and deal with it until Verizon gets around to bringing FiOs to our little town. About two weeks ago, I noticed my download speeds sinking fast; I'm down to about 10kbps at best as of this morning. I've tried all the usual suspects (NIC drivers, powercycling the whole setup, etc.) to no avail, so the Comcast tech came 'round to take a look. According to him, everything's fine from Comcast to my modem, so it's my network setup that's the culprit.
Here's where it gets aggravating. Because of the shape of the apartment (capital L), wireless signals are pretty much right out. (We used to run a wireless network, but we were down 60% of the time and even when we were up, it was dial-up slow.) Because it's an apartment and our landlord is pretty anal-retentive, I can't drill a few holes and run cable through the walls, so a cabled setup wasn't feasible either. I went with a Netgear powerline kit, which seemed to be fine until two weeks back. The tech who was out today says that's the problem and that we should consider putting our computer by the cable drop itself, which places it in the middle of our bedroom. This is not really very cool at all, but I apparently need to be rid of the powerline net kit. I'm going to stick our second computer as close to the cable drop as I can, just to exclude everything else.
If it is indeed the powerline net kit that's killing my internet, what options do I have? What's the maximum length of CAT5 a person can run and still expect a halfway decent latency? What's the maximum length of CAT5 a person can run altogether? Is there such a thing as a signal amplifier that I can stick along some CAT5 to preserve signal quality?
[If it makes a difference, the cable drop is basically at the tip of the horizontal branch of the L; the room where the PC is currently (and the room in which I'd prefer it stayed) is about three-quarters up the vertical branch.]
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CAT5 can go 100 meters (approximately 300 ft). I don't think length is going to be a problem in an apartment. You'll have good latency throughout. Unshielded twisted pair (UTP) can get some interference from close power lines, but I don't think it'll be that noticeable. We only saw issues when the cabling guy dropped his line on top of a power one in the ceiling of my last job. If it's all out in the room, you should hardly see any interference.
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You'll most likely have to make your own cable depending on length (say over 25') or pay a premium on the cable if it's pre-made and you can find one; you'd most likely have to go online to get one 50' or more.
You can get 'extenders' for networks but your apartment isn't that big. The first thing we did when we moved in was wire up the house with at least two jacks in each room, I've still got more than half of my 500' spool. When I lived in an apartment I just used a long cable (or poked a small hole through walls that I could easily patch up) and put it under the wall trim.
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Before you go nuts, plug your machine directly into the cable modem and try it out. ISPs are full of s*%t. They will always say it is your problem, even when it is their's. If you have two computers (sounds like it), try a transfer between the two machines over the powerline and see what kind of throughput you get. If you get 50Mbps through the lines, I'd have difficulty believing it couldn't carry 6Mbps for the modem.
Also, make sure your machine isn't spywared up to high hell. Usually the culprit when I hear "slow internet" complaints.
Otherwise, as already mentioned, CAT5 will go 100 meters. If nothing else, run it along your baseboards and tape it down. It's not like it's a big fat cable. . .
Grenn wrote:
Yeah CAT5 length in an apartment is a non-issue.
I like the suggestion to plug the computer directly into the cable modem and then test your speeds. Cable/DSL companies are indeed often full of crap. They love to point the finger at the end user rather than do a proper diagnostic of their network. If there is no major improvement after doing the direct connect, then it's time to scan your system for spyware/virii.
I've seen some spyware do exactly what you're experiencing.
My two favorites, Adaware and Spybot: Search & Destroy are both (last I checked a week ago) experiencing some issues with their latest builds, so I'm not sure how much luck you'll have with them. I could barely get either to run properly on a recent fresh build I did for a customer.
I'm sure others here could suggest other antispyware apps that I'm not familiar with.
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I got a 100' Cat6 cable from Newegg quite awhile ago and I don't recall it being very expensive. Running the cable from basement to living room was less work that trying to tweak a reliable wireless connection.
If you want to eliminate software as the culprit, burn a Linux LiveCD (like from Ubuntu.com), boot off of it, and try some speed tests. http://www.dslreports.com/speedtest?more=1 or some other such place.
If you we're looking for something a little more elegant wireless bridging might be an option. I use this for my desktop, for same reason as yourself but replace landlord with wife, and its perfect. Because you are getting the routers handle the wireless network your PC doesn't have to deal with extra drivers and such. Basically run cable as far as you can and get the routers to "jump the gap".
Here is a nice pic explaining it.
Routers on Newegg Here
DD-wrt firmware for the setup
Just a suggestion. Shoot down at will.
Edit: To anyone using DD-wrt firmware, use the beta v23sp3 over the stable v23sp2. Just a tip.
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You don't have to worry about latency with any wired connection. A 100-meter cable, to human perceptions, will be exactly the same as a 1-meter. The difference in propagation time is negligible, and the standard is designed to handle 100 meters. You could probably even go further if you had to, but anything up to 100m is pretty much guaranteed to work without any hassle. (after that you need repeaters; most folks use switches.) Unshielded twisted pair cable is also highly resistant to noise; that's why it's twisted. It's not immune, but most normal stuff won't bother it. If you're doing a long run, and you need to cross powerlines in very near proximity, try to cross at right angles, and all should be well. Don't run it parallel with power, along a conduit, as that can screw it up.
I would definitely suggest testing with a wired connection first. Make SURE that it's the powerline thingies causing the problem before doing anything else. (It sounds like it may not have been working that well anyway, and maybe something has given up the ghost.)
If you like the powerline idea.... GameGuru works for a powerline networking company, and he says that the technology has come a long way. You might ask him for recommendations on specific units to buy. I used first-generation stuff: it was terrible. GG insists that it's good now, though. You might PM him, as he apparently missed this thread.
You could also look into 802.11n draft equipment; it apparently about doubles the range over G, so you might be able to make it work in your apartment.
The thoughts that it might be spyware are very good. You may be mass-mailing spam... if your upload is heavily choked, your downstream will drop to nearly nothing.