internet speed

[windward]

I have Shaw 'Internet 300' for which I pay $106.77 per month. I can only get speeds of less than 75 down and 15.5 up no matter how many times I reboot the modem. I'm in Courtenay -maybe speeds are lower here.

1. Do I actually need Fiber+ 300 Plan (or some other) to get anywhere near the promised 300 speed?

2. I used to be able to use Skype phone but that does not now seem possible on Shaw. Is it because the speed has slowed down so much during the past 6 months?

3. I used to be able to use a Net gear WiFi range extender with my last house on Telus, but it does not seem to be possible to use this device on Shaw. Is it restricted to only use Shaw pods rather than other wifi extenders?

Thanks,

Alan

[mdk]

@windward -- welcome to this peer-to-peer discussion forum. It is not a path to Shaw Support.

> I can only get speeds of less than 75 down and 15.5 up

Something is wrong, if your computer is connected via an Ethernet cable to the cable-modem. If you are using WiFi, what network-adapter do you have in your computer? The "Wireless G" network-adapter has a maximum of 56 Mbits/second.

The Shaw Speed Test requires a computer with a dual-core processor of at least 2.4 Ghz, to run the test at its full-speed, to give the "best" results. How fast is your computer? 

That "15.5 up" is is what you should get when you have the grandfathered "Internet 300" plan and the previous-generation HITRON cable-modem. With the current-generation of cable-modem hardware, you should see "100 up", if your computer is fast-enough.

> Do I actually need Fiber+ 300 Plan (or some other) to get anywhere near the promised 300 speed?

No. The name-change from "Internet 300" to "Fibre+ 300" is just Shaw's "marketing" department at work, trying to use "Fibre+" where TELUS uses "Fiber".  Note that subscribing to any speed faster than 300 (namely 750 or 1000) requires that you replace the HITRON.

> I used to be able to use Skype phone but that does not now seem possible on Shaw. Is it because the speed has slowed down so much during the past 6 months?

No. System-wide, Shaw has not "slowed-down" during the last year.  Skype requires only something like 5-down/5-up to function, if your computer is fast-enough.

> I used to be able to use a Netgear WiFi range extender with my last house on Telus, but it does not seem to be possible to use this device on Shaw. Is it restricted to only use Shaw pods rather than other wifi extenders?

No. Many contributors on this forum have successfully been using non-Shaw WiFi-extenders. There is no technical reason to stop the use of "other" extenders.

I recommend that you contact Shaw Support (currently, online chat is given priority over telephone: 1-888-472-2222) for additional trouble-shooting.

P.S. Got a different computer that you can connect, via Ethernet, to your cable-modem, and run the Shaw Speed Test on that computer? Or, can you take your computer to a friend's home, and connect, via Ethernet, to their cable-modem, to run the Shaw Speed Test, and compare the numbers to what your friend gets, on their computer?

[rstra]

Are those the speeds you are getting in all devices? I have a Netgear extender and it works fine, maybe you can do a reset in it to clear out the old settings and try again. Contact Shaw and make sure the modem is provisioned correctly and do some troubleshooting.

[windward]

Thanks mdk for the helpful advice. My desktop has an Intel i5-4460 CPU @3.2 Ghz, 16GB ram and a Qualcomm Atheros AR5BWB222 wireless network adapter. I am only connected to wireless.

I checked the speeds using other devices. (PC in the basement is very slow; other devices next to the shaw modem are much faster:

Phone: 164 up/16.1 down (upstairs next to modem) and 92.9 up/13.0 down (basement directly below the shaw modem)

Laptop: 100.6 up/16.0 down (upstairs) and 79.3 up/16.0 down (basement)

I obviously need a wifi extender. Even next to the modem I can only get far below 300 (164/92.9) with phone/laptop on the download. Why? Maybe I should also upgrade the shaw modem?

Thanks again.

Alan

[windward]

Thanks I will try to reset the  extender (Netgear model EX6100)

[windward · Accepted solution]

Update: After some tinkering and getting the wifi extender connected I am now getting on average 180 (ranges from 170-208) on download and 16.2 on up load on my desktop PC. Not 300 but much better than the 75 I began with!

[mdk]

@windward -- Laptop: 100.6 up/16.0 down (upstairs)

Was it connected via a "CAT 5" Ethernet cable? You must have a "CAT 5e" cable to get from 100 to 1000 Mbps. A "CAT 6" cable is even faster, but not when you subscribe to 300 Mbps service.

> Qualcomm Atheros AR5BWB222 

This seems to use the slower wireless A/B/G/N protocols, not the current "AC" protocol (up to 1300 Mbps). So, it could be a "bottleneck" that limits your download speed.

[windward]

No, connected only via wifi, one floor directly below the shaw modem. It sounds like I will never be able to get to the 300 Mbps that 'Shaw 300' promises.

I will look at options to  upgrade the network card.

[mdk]

@windward -- Laptop: 100.6 up/16.0 down (upstairs) 

> It sounds like I will never be able to get to the 300 Mbps

What speed do you get from the Shaw Speed Test when you use a "CAT 5e" Ethernet cable to connect that laptop directly to an Ethernet port on your cable-modem?

Before running the Speed Test:

1. Start the Windows "Task Manager"
2. Click to its "Performance" tab"
3. Click on the icon for the Ethernet connection
4. Minimize this window
5. Launch the Speed Test, and immediately "restore" the minimized window

This will show the instantaneous network speed, as recorded by Windows, not the "smoothed" values as reported by the Speed Test graph.

>  I will never be able to get to the 300 Mbps that 'Shaw 300' promises.

I am on the grandfathered "Internet 300" plan, and my HITRON cable-modem delivers 5% to 10% more than 300 Mbps when downloading.

> I will look at options to  upgrade the network card.

For a laptop, you will have to disable the built-in WiFi network adapter, and purchase a USB-to-WiFi "Wireless AC" adapter -- not a "Wireless N" adapter.

One example: for $50 (plus taxes, free shipping) -- ASUS Wireless Nano USB Adapter (AC1200) offering up to 867 Mbps.

For a desktop, some motherboards have "integrated" WiFi network adapters, that you will have to disable. Or, your desktop has an "add-in" network adapter card that needs to be removed, and replaced.

Of course, actually getting 300 Mbps presumes that the web-sites that you access are capable of "pushing-out" data at high-speed, e.g., between 100 Mbps and 300 Mbps.  Many web-sites don't do that, either because they have a 100 Mbps connection, or they are "busy" web-sites, such that a 1000 Mbps connection gets divided among many simultaneous computers accessing the same web-site.

Also, many web-sites (Netflix, YouTube, Skype, Zoom) only need less than 5-down/5-up to "stream".

[windward]

I bought a Netgear AC1200 wifi usb adapter today ($40 London Drugs). You were correct. It has made a big difference. Still in the range of 100-177 download but a good improvement. I will move the PC to the Cat5 cable connection just to compare. Not very convenient to move the desktop but let's see how it does connected to cable.

Many thanks for your help mdk.