Today’s high speed broadband connections like the NBN Fibre and NBN Fixed Wireless, can provide you 10 megabits-per-second (Mbps) download speeds or faster. Most internet users this year (2013) get approximately 25 megabits-per-second. However, if you are getting less than 8 megabits-per-second, don’t curse your ISP just yet – find out what went wrong.
Various things can cause sluggish internet connection, even when you pay for a ‘high speed connection’. The World Wide Web and the Internet are built on diverse technologies trying to talk to each other. The ‘slowing down’ of data can happen in many places before it gets to your computer screen.
So rather than immediately pointing fingers or replacing the equipment, try these simple tips that will often work to get faster internet speed.
Working out the Kinks
- Your modem-router may not be configured correctly.
- Your wireless router may be providing a single connection to various appliances like your home alarm system, computer and cordless phone. Make sure that the speeds of these devices do not match the speed of the router, or else it will slow the connection. The fix is to buy a router that is faster than the fastest single device using it.
- You may be using an older network interface card (NIC) – and a slower hardware at that.
- You could have malware, virus or spyware infecting your computer. Malicious content secretly uses your internet bandwidth. Use virus scanners, registry cleaners and defrag your disk.
- You may be downloading data (movies, ebooks or music) in the background. Downloading huge files can leech your bandwidth.
- Your ISP may be having issues with routing signals to you.
- DNS (Domain Name System) tables might be out of date. This can cause signals to be sent to the wrong addresses on your ISP network.
- You have a limited hard drive space so your browser has to slow down. Check if your browser memory cache is full. You can also do disk defrag or use alternative storage for old files. If you want to know the right amount of space to leave on your computer’s primary drive space, divide the total hard disk space by 10.
- Your computer is more than 3 years old. If so, it’s possible that it can no longer move electrons fast enough for modern web pages. The quick fix? Upgrade your computer, internet plan or both.
- Dozens of windows are left open in the background that are clogging your computer CPU. The task manager can be helpful. To do this, press control-alt-delete simultaneously, then close all unnecessary programs.
- Microwave devices or radio in your house could be degrading your internet wireless signal.
- A dialogue box (whether it’s Windows or Mac) might be sitting open and unanswered in the computer background. This can stall your computer CPU while waiting for your ‘yes’ or ‘no’ input.
These are just some of the reasons why your high-speed internet might be acting up from time to time. If you are experiencing any connection problems with Activ8me services, you can fill out the support query form or log on to Activ8me’s technical support live chat . You can also call Support at 1300 76 02 19.
Reference: Paul Gil
Photo credit: flickr
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