Bugging me for over a year - same slow speed for Steam downloads

doodah

doodah

doodah

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I have had this problem for well over a year but it wasn't much of an issue as I rarely downloaded through Steam, however I find myself downloading demos/games quite frequently now. Basically, no matter if it is night or day my download speed in Steam is always 60k/sec (give or take a few).

At first I thought it may simply be a coincidence, then I thought it might be my connection (8mb but doesn't really come into its own until around midnight). However it can't be this as I have downloaded through Flashget, IE, Firefox etc reaching speeds of 800k/sec and continuing or pausing the download has no effect on Steam. Then I thought it might be Steam but the fact that this has happened for well over a year at completely random times of the year/day leads me to believe it probably isn't. Something is throttling the speed and I cannot work out what the heck it is. Anyone here have an idea?

Same problem has happened on my main rig in both Vista and 7

With Virgin ADSL 8MB and tried changing server location - works fine for 5-10 seconds (different locations greatly differ speeds, all much faster than 60k/sec though) and then just settles back down at 60.
 
Also check that it is set to UK as the download region.

I used to get really slow downloads until I realised I was connecting to the steam servers in some really random country O_O
 
Lol - I am not stupid. It is set on DSL/Cable 2MB+, tried it on 10Mb just to see if there would be any different a while back but did squat. KiTBoH, it has been set on UK for most of the time, except when I change region (which others have suggested) to see if it will increase the download speed.
 
Hmmm i have been hearing a lot about this these past couple of weeks. In my opinion they are capping Steam downloads to 512k.
And if they are that ain't good ...especially from a legal source.
 
Steam definately aren't capping downloads, I downloaded the ruse open beta thingy at the weekend, constant 1.2Mb/s (as usual) which is the max my connection will give :)
 
The download speed you set in client makes no difference, for me anyway. I have it set to DSL 256K and have no problems maxing out my 20mb.
 
KiTBoH said:
Also check that it is set to UK as the download region.
Click to expand...

iirc, Ireland is the best option - they don't have their own content server, so Steam will automatically pick the best current available one.
 
No i am not on about Steam capping downloads, i was referring to Virgin capping downloads from Steam :)
I have been reading a few stories with people complaining that their downloads are at 60K and one name always crops up .... Virgin ADSL.
Classic case of capping/traffic shaping or whatever they call it these days, although they will probably never admit to it.
 
I've downloaded well over 30 games from steam over the last 6 months, always hit my full 6.2Mbps download speed, that equates to about 20GB per hour.
 
billyboyd said:
No i am not on about Steam capping downloads, i was referring to Virgin capping downloads from Steam :)
I have been reading a few stories with people complaining that their downloads are at 60K and one name always crops up .... Virgin ADSL.
Classic case of capping/traffic shaping or whatever they call it these days, although they will probably never admit to it.
Click to expand...

Ah, that makes sense :)

I used to have virgin cable (well telewest and then virgin), and they were awful at capping stuff, I swear everything other than http was capped, until you downloaded more than 10kb and went over the download limit and then http got capped as well, happy days ¬_¬
 
billyboyd said:
No i am not on about Steam capping downloads, i was referring to Virgin capping downloads from Steam :)
I have been reading a few stories with people complaining that their downloads are at 60K and one name always crops up .... Virgin ADSL.
Classic case of capping/traffic shaping or whatever they call it these days, although they will probably never admit to it.
Click to expand...

Yeh wouldn't suprise me, they shape everything else lately. :rolleyes:
 
I sync at 24.5 on my Be* connection and consistently get 2.5Mbps download speed on most items. If the games just been released it can be half that.

Try changing your location to somewhere in europe instead. It may be the UK mirror server for your area isn't much cop and if changing location works, report this to Steam.
 
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