Slow page loads, dropped connection

[wildjersey]

Hi,

Looking for some advice here. I write for the web for a living, and spend most of my day online. I'm not happy with the speed of my connection right now, and am considering upgrading to a faster package. I'm currently on the 768k to 1.5Mbps DSL package.

The problem is, I don't get anywhere near the speed I'm paying for now. Page load times go from speedy to drop dead slow (20-30 secs), and often hang. I'm not sure what's going on, although I can say my mother has the same problems at her house (next town over, same DSL package). I can't see paying for a "faster" package when I don't even get the speed I should be now.

Here are some stats. Hoping someone can take a look and give me some thoughts about whether a speed upgrade would be worth it.

Verizon speed test:

Analysis information:

Checking for Middleboxes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Done
SendBufferSize set to [132480]
running 10s outbound test (client to server) . . . . . 481.45Kb/s
running 10s inbound test (server to client) . . . . . . 138.24kb/s

------ Client System Details ------
OS data: Name = Mac OS X, Architecture = x86_64, Version = 10.6.8
Java data: Vendor = Apple Inc., Version = 1.6.0_24

------ Web100 Detailed Analysis ------
Client Receive Window detected at 524280 bytes.
Cable modem/DSL/T1 link found.
Link set to Full Duplex mode
Information: throughput is limited by other network traffic.
Good network cable(s) found
Normal duplex operation found.

Web100 reports the Round trip time = 155.6 msec; the Packet size = 1440 Bytes; and
There were 40 packets retransmitted, 2 duplicate acks received, and 0 SACK blocks received
The connection stalled 2 times due to packet loss
The connection was idle 1.05 seconds (8.07%) of the time
This connection is sender limited 22.57% of the time.
This connection is network limited 77.42% of the time.
Excessive packet loss is impacting your performance, check the auto-negotiate function on your local PC and network switch

Web100 reports TCP negotiated the optional Performance Settings to:
RFC 2018 Selective Acknowledgment: ON
RFC 896 Nagle Algorithm: ON
RFC 3168 Explicit Congestion Notification: OFF
RFC 1323 Time Stamping: ON
RFC 1323 Window Scaling: ON
Information: Network Middlebox is modifying MSS variable
Server IP addresses are preserved End-to-End
Information: Network Address Translation (NAT) box is modifying the Client's IP address
Server says [72.68.84.139] but Client says [192.168.0.4]

Broadband Speed Reports tests:

Parsippanny, NJ (closest server) -

Download 210 kbps

Upload 367 kbps

latency 40 ms

Washington, DC -

Download 794 kbps

Upload 347 kbps

latency 24 ms

Los Angeles -

Download 423 kbps

Upload 333 kbps

latency 124 ms

Router stats:

ADSL Link Downstream Upstream

Connection Speed 1792 kbps 448 kbps

Line Attenuation 17.0 db 7.5 db

Noise Margin 30.3 db 21.0 db

I think my transceiver stats look good for higher speeds, but I'm wondering why I get such inconsistent and generally slow download speeds now.

Thanks for your help.

Debbie

[smith6612]

You should be able to slip by with 15Mbps service on your line, so the physical loop is definitely running where it should be. First though, let's see if your current issue with the service is due to a Juniper issue or if it's due to congestion. The first question i need to ask is, are you seeing the speed issues with your download 24/7, or is it only an issue towards the late afternoon and evening hours?

Additionally, are you able to optain higher speeds by downloading from one of these FTP sites? Your connection at it's current speed maxes at 190KB/s.

ftp://fedora.mirrors.tds.net/pub/fedora/releases/15/Fedora/x86_64/iso/Fedora-15-x86_64-DVD.iso

OR

ftp://ftp1.optonline.net/test512

[wildjersey]

Thanks for your help.

The slowdowns aren't always in the late afternoon or evening hours, sometimes things are slow first thing in the morning, too. But overall, I would say yes, I do see the connection slow down as it gets later in the day.

Both of those links gave me speed of roughly 140kb/s (at 10 pm my time).

[smith6612]

I'm assuming those are in Kilobytes a second due to the notation. If so, that's close to where it should be. Normal HTTP downloads I assume never go that fast, correct?

[wildjersey]

Just tested a download via http and got a surprising 2MB/s speed (10:30 pm my time). Then again, today my connection has been relatively zippy. Tomorrow it may be another story. That's what's driving me nuts. Some days, I can barely load a web page. Other days, I'm cruising right along.

[smith6612]

Has the line been performing any better since the last post? If not, find a time where it is working poorly and register an account over at DSLReports.com if you don't already have one. Fron there, visit their Tools section of their site and perform the Line Quality/Ping test. Be sure that before you start the test, your router/modem is not blocking Pings since this will result in the test having less data. Also, ensure nothing is using your connection before and during the time of the test being ran. Post up the results of the test once it has been completed.