Slow download speeds with Sky

Big Chris · 28 Dec 2006 at 19:14

Finally logged into my Netgear DG834GT router and forwarded some ports for use with BitTornado (using this guide), but am only getting a top speed of 15kb/s at best, and I'm on an 8meg line.

Anyone got any ideas? I've tried a couple of torrents, from a source which in the past has provided torrents which always pretty much max'd my old connection, or at least ran into the 200kb/s region on my old 2meg line.

I'm not firewalled, BT showing a good connection to the tracker, and I've even tried turning my firewall off to test but it made no difference.

HangTime · 28 Dec 2006 at 19:25

Try doing a speedtest elsewhere e.g. www.speedtest.net or downloading from http://fuller.zen.co.uk/test/

Phil99 · 28 Dec 2006 at 19:30

That'll show if it's a general connection problem, but I'd bet on them actively throttling P2P etc and there being something in the T&Cs explaining this, especially if it's the free Sky broadband package.

Big Chris · 28 Dec 2006 at 19:43

Speed test tells me 6+meg which is ok, downloaded one of those files at over 600kb/s too which sounds about right.

I'm on Sky Connect, the £17pm connection for those of us outside Sky's current catchment area which has a 40GB limit.

Any other Sky users reaching decent speeds?

tolien · 28 Dec 2006 at 20:16

Rather than the headline speed, what is your modem syncing at?
What hardware were you using before? It should be possible to get the username/password out of the DG834GT and use your old hardware (which you presumably know works) which would at least eliminate any issue with the router.

HomerJ · 29 Dec 2006 at 10:54

So you are getting OK speeds when downloading via FTP or HTTP and it is just an issue with the speeds when downloading torrents.

What ports have you opened and have you set your machine to use a static IP and correctly forwarded the ports to the correct IP ?

Big Chris · 29 Dec 2006 at 23:12

Tolien:

Not sure what you mean by syncing exactly?
I used to share my dad's NTL cable line via a Linksys router when I lived at home, but that's his so I'm stuck with the Netgear Sky gave me for now.

HomerJ:

I followed the guide on Portforward (link in top post) so yeah my machine has a static IP now, I used ports 15000 - 15010, and also tried 10000 - 10010 but still no difference.

tolien · 30 Dec 2006 at 00:59

Big Chris said:
Not sure what you mean by syncing exactly?

I'm referring to what the router reports it's connecting at.

The NTL router wouldn't be useful for what I was suggesting anyway.

Big Chris · 30 Dec 2006 at 12:05

According to the router status page it's:

DownStream Connection Speed: 8128kbps
UpStream Connection Speed: 448kbps

david334 · 30 Dec 2006 at 12:10

man try this...

Use U Torrent .... and enable Encrpition

Worth a try i guss..

David334

Gman · 30 Dec 2006 at 12:11

I believe on the Connect package P2P applications are heavily shaped at times so that could be your problem.

Big Chris · 30 Dec 2006 at 12:22

Gman said:
I believe on the Connect package P2P applications are heavily shaped at times so that could be your problem.

Yeah s'pose I could leave something going overnight and see how much it downloads, should be able to work out if it's topped 15kb/s from that.

Cheers

Big Chris · 4 Jan 2007 at 18:44

Hmmm... still something not quite right. Set a couple of torrents going last night, got 160MB in total between the three over 8 hours, which isn't really the best.

Anyone else using Sky Connect or another Sky service that can comment on speeds they've been getting?

Big Chris · 7 Jan 2007 at 15:51

Any ideas guys? This is really getting on my nerves now.

Downloading a vid from a website at 730kb/s, but I've tried BitTornado and uTorrent and as far as I can tell have never got over 30kb/s, with it usually running between 5 and 10kb/s even overnight.

Combat squirrel · 7 Jan 2007 at 16:08

Download Utorrent and FORCE all encryption, also DO NOT allow exceptions, its then all encrypted and your less likely to be throttled, I get rubbish speeds if I dont do this, if I do i usually get around 150kb + on good torrents

Also dont be a fool in comparing a straight download speed to a torrent, torrents DO NOT work in the same manor as a 'normal download' it all depends on the other users to.......I assume you understand how it all works ? the best thing do , as I have always done is leave it over night, have patience my friend

Big Chris · 7 Jan 2007 at 17:24

Combat squirrel said:
Download Utorrent and FORCE all encryption, also DO NOT allow exceptions, its then all encrypted and your less likely to be throttled, I get rubbish speeds if I dont do this, if I do i usually get around 150kb + on good torrents

Also dont be a fool in comparing a straight download speed to a torrent, torrents DO NOT work in the same manor as a 'normal download' it all depends on the other users to.......I assume you understand how it all works ? the best thing do , as I have always done is leave it over night, have patience my friend

I don't know how it all works hence me asking for assistance so suggesting I'm a fool is a little harsh I think.

On my previous connection the download speeds I've reached with torrents has been comparable to those that I've reached when downloading directly from websites, whereas here there's an obvious difference.

Also, as I mentioned in earlier in this very thread I've left torrents going overnight and still only reached a fraction of the expected speeds from the line speed I'm paying for, hence me assuming there's something not quite right.

MagicBoy · 7 Jan 2007 at 18:16

Combat squirrel said:
Download Utorrent and FORCE all encryption, also DO NOT allow exceptions, its then all encrypted and your less likely to be throttled, I get rubbish speeds if I dont do this, if I do i usually get around 150kb + on good torrents

As suggested above....

Sounds like your connection is being packet shaped - ie they detect P2P traffic like BitTorrent and eMule and force a slow speed. Enabling the encryption in the latest clients can help by confusing the detection systems at the ISP thus enabling full speed.

Big Chris · 7 Jan 2007 at 22:45

There's a section in the settings called Protocol Encryption which I've changed to 'Forced', is this what you're referring to?

HangTime · 7 Jan 2007 at 23:52

Big Chris said:
I don't know how it all works hence me asking for assistance so suggesting I'm a fool is a little harsh I think.

On my previous connection the download speeds I've reached with torrents has been comparable to those that I've reached when downloading directly from websites, whereas here there's an obvious difference.

Also, as I mentioned in earlier in this very thread I've left torrents going overnight and still only reached a fraction of the expected speeds from the line speed I'm paying for, hence me assuming there's something not quite right.

I think what he's driving at is that torrents can sometimes be slow due to:

1) P2P users typically having low upload speeds
2) The way torrent works is to always try and download the rarest segments first. This means that speeds will typically start off slowly but should be very fast towards the end.

What I would recommend is finding a fairly small torrent with a very high number of seeds. Set it off downloading and then see what kind of speed you get over the last 10% or so. If it's still very low then yes, chances are you are being throttled.

[TR]SweetSpotOz · 8 Jan 2007 at 02:05