That improvement certainly suggests a lower quality cable. The 5dB extra attenuation, at least with old ADSL figures, is equivalent to around 400 metres of additional copper.
Homeplugs may be an option. I've recommended their use for quite some time now but only have actually started using them myself quite recently. I bought some £25 small TP-Link AV500s and they allow a 200-250Mbit link, which I think is limited to 100Mbit by the ethernet interface. You can pay more for faster versions with wifi/gigabit/AC passthrough. Mine add 3ms to my ping time.
As above make sure your internal phone line is totally clean and everything else disconnected, apart from a telephone if you need one which should be filtered via a filtered faceplate or at least a decent filter right at the master socket. Any extensions you use will add noise to the line and reduce your speed. If you have to use an extension for your phone use CW1308 twisted pair or ethernet non stranded.
You might also want to try removing the lower faceplate off your master socket and trying the test socket with the router and seeing what difference that makes.